Harbor Freight DIY Panniers

When I was looking at luggage for my Vulcan S I was greeted by a few tough truths:

• There very few choices that met my needs
• The best products needed to be imported and were fairly expensive
• Cheap, generic luggage wasn’t all that cheap and I knew it wouldn’t hold up in the long run

So I set forth on a journey to build my own hard side cases that would be exactly what I wanted.  I figured that i had enough know how to be dangerous – so why not?

Here’s what I was looking for:

1. Waterproof Pelican Case style hard bags
2. Lockable – both the case itself and onto the bike
3. As big as I could make them without looking too ugly (a little ugly is ok)
4. Easily removable and transportable (so I could easily carry them into a motel room if need be)

Immediately I realized that, for the size I wanted, pelican cases would be cost prohibitive. They are great and there is a reason that the case industry is copying everything they do.  The number of models and various lid orientations is awesome, but relatively expensive. Searching for alternatives led me to a couple of other manufacturers but I ended up settling on the Harbor Freight Apache case line. Even though we live in the free shipping world now, it was nice to go to the local store and  

At the time, the largest cases they had were the 3800.  These were knockoffs of the Pelican 1450 and I got them for $30 a piece with a coupon. (Pro Tip: never buy at harbor freight without a coupon. Never.  This is the best resource I have found for harbor freight price tracking and coupons: https://www.hfqpdb.com/)  The Build quality is good.  Not amazing, but good. Having used them for a while now, I am satisfied that they will certainly last for a few years, if not more.  

There is a idiom many have said to me: Buy cheap, buy twice. And I understand the sentiment behind this.  Some things are worth spending more money on and having a reliable long lasting device. Others – like a plastic box – are not.  Moreover, for the price of 1 pelican case I can get 4 of the same size Harbor Freight boxes. Case failure would/could/will be horrible if it happens, but replacement will not.

Affixing the cases to the bike had a very similar narrative.  I found some generic side case mounts but they all seemed cheap/flimsy or crazy expensive.  Even the cheap chinese pot metal ones were not that inexpensive. So I decided to make my own.

After a few complicated iterations, I settled on a vertical “U” that the cases would slide onto.  This would ensure that all of the weight would be held and there would be little to no horizontal movement.  To make the “U”, I picked up some angle Steel and flat bar and cut and welded them together. I’m not a great welder, but the Bolt that ties them to the frame goes through the joint, so it would be held even tighter when installed and have no chance of coming off.

The Brackets for the cases were made out of Strut Channel.  I chose these becuase they would be easy to bolt onto the cases and… i also already had some laying around the shop precut. The arms and lip of the strut wrap around the flat bar and the bottom of the strut sits on the angle steel holding all the weight. The “U” is bolted into the frame using some spacers I had and some large nuts to keep the lines all straight.

Perhaps the biggest problem with the design is where I had to mount the brackets.  The design on the bottom of the HF boxes made it really difficult to attach anything down there and make sure it wouldn’t come off. So the struts had to be mounted on the top lid of the boxes.  This makes the box easier to set down on a flat surface for sure, but it adds to the ugliness of the boxes off the bike.

In the same vein, you cannot – or at least should not – open the boxes while they are attached to be bike as everything would spill out.  This means that there is not a quick way to throw something in while the bike is packed. It certainly isn’t a deal breaker, but is a limitation.

The cases aren’t perfect, but for the $80-ish dollars I spent I am really happy.  There are a few things I would upgrade and change moving forward:

• A custom cloth liner or multiple hard fabric bags to help me use all the space i can inside
• I still haven’t figured out a good way to secure the bags to the bike.  Maybe some sort of lockable quick release latch
• Recently HF came out with a larger version of the case that is 23L as compared to the almost 16L current size.

I would love to see some more DIY cases on bikes! What do you think?