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Hi,
What are peoples experiences with AliExpress* or other Chinesium bikepacking gear?
Specifically I'm looking at Newboler fork cargo cages - https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005005908133866.html
Not expecting top notch quality but im only looking to try a new config on my other bike for a less-kit set up that'll probably get used for 3 or 4 overnighters per year.
In the interests of making the thread a bit more general...
What other chinesium bikepacking kit have you tried? What worked? What didn't? And what fell to bits on the first outing?
.
No experience of using these at all but if you're only going to be using them for a couple of trips of year, £20 seems a cheap and cheerful solution.
That was pretty much my thought process!
Those look very similar to the podsacs cages I got from Planet X ages ago.
The cages themselves are pretty decent tbh.
Its the same stuff on ebay. I keep toying with the idea of buying them just for the mounts. If you do buy them let us know what they are like
I've got a half-frame bag which cost about £12. Fully waterproof and well put together, if a bit heavy. I also got a 10 litre seat pack for the same price. Both are pretty decent. I've had the Rebellion Way out of them so I'm happy.
Places like Planet X, Ebay, Amazon etc are just rebranded Chinese products. If you buy direct from the source you can get some great deals. There is a lot of searching needed though as there does seem to be a lot of tat.
Delivery has always been great, arriving in a few days usually.
That ali-express link has an option to buy a set of two, or individually.
The individual ones are £7-something, whereas the set of 2 are >£20.
If I've understood that correctly, it looks like you can get a set of 2 for around £15, which is a pretty good deal.
I've got the Planet-X ones. They are OK, but perhaps a little heavy than more expensive solutions. The thickness of the plastic means I also need to source some slightly longer screws to attach to the fork leg, as the ones supplied with my Camino are too short.
I think were seeing a lot more direct access to factories in China
AliExpress, Temu, ebay & Amazon sellers are all cutting out the middle man, planet-x, Polaris & im sure many more 'respectable' brands have just been rebadging this studf for years.
Not just true for biking, loads of previously expensive niche stuff can now be had for v cheap straight from east Asia, if you don't mind a few weeks delivery time and nor worried about returning
AliExpress, Temu, ebay & Amazon sellers are all cutting out the middle man, planet-x, Polaris & im sure many more ‘respectable’ brands have just been rebadging this studf for years.
Its either buying direct from a catalogue and adding your branding
or
spending money on R&D and quality control, getting a company to make it and then they blatently steel your design and start selling it at half the cost as they have no R&D costs and don't care about quality control. Sometimes they use cheaper materials. So although they look the same, they aren't the same.
been looking for some 500mm or wider across the top drop bars on there.
if anyone see's any please post on this thread.
@ton I’ve got some enormous Funn G-wides that are too wide for me. I’ll go have a measure if you’re interested as I’m sure they are over 600mm at drops, which is going to put the tops around the 500mm you’re after?
spending money on R&D and quality control, getting a company to make it and then they blatently steel your design and start selling it at half the cost as they have no R&D costs and don’t care about quality control. Sometimes they use cheaper materials. So although they look the same, they aren’t the same.
If only it was that simple we wouldn't have major brands such as Cannondale and Commencial having once had a terrible reputation for cracking frames.
Think I may get a set, but leaning to the 3L. Don't think you can buy 2x single pack/mount, max qty is 1.
Yeah, I'm thinking 3ltr might be more appropriate. 5ltr is starting to get pretty bulky - then more likely to be packed heavier - which will put more pressure on the cages.
spending money on R&D and quality control, getting a company to make it and then they blatently steel your design and start selling it at half the cost as they have no R&D costs and don’t care about quality control. Sometimes they use cheaper materials. So although they look the same, they aren’t the same.
I'm sure it's true to an extent / in some cases. But you are rather glossing over the fact that in a country with almost double the entire population of "the West" there might be just a handful of keen campers, cyclists, backpackers, etc capable of designing stuff. And some will work in factories, be entrepreneurial, or however else they join the dots to get them made.
Does my Naturehike tent bear a passing resemblance to some other Big Agnes / MSR tent, yes. But then so does an MSR tent look like a Big Agnes, which looks like an Alpkit, which looks like a Vango, etc. It's a tent, there's only sop many ways you can connect together some sticks in a vaguely dome / prism shape. Same with my stove, I've no idea who it rips off, but essentially it's a small brass valve, some Ti bits, Venturi nozzle, and a burner on top. It'd be quicker to size all that from scratch than to take apart an old MSR rocket.
Currently looking at Jolmo Lander Quilts, it's a quilt, I'm sure in the 1.41 billion people in China there's someone somewhere that can figure out how to make a quilt.
In most cases there's as much similarity between Apidura and Alpkit, or Restrap and Revelate. Do they all owe a debt to the first person to strap a drybag to their bars with a couple of twofish blocks? Are they all in fact just making knockoff's of drybags? Who even invented the drybag, or the bottle cage to put it in?
Doh! Ordered the mounts/bags, but to a previous address. Website says it can take up to 24 hours for payment to be verified, during which the order cannot be edited. Does anyone know once the payment is verified if I can edit postal address? Thanks
Never mind, cancelled and reordered.
Let's face it. There are very few genuinely new products these days. Most new products are evolutions of previous models.
Risking your designs gettiing ripped off to save some £ on production is the chance you take when you send your designs to a country that is known to be very lax on copyright breaches.
@thisisnotaspoon thanks for the tip off on that quilt. ...more money 🤑😉
You never know, maybe just maybe they are capable of thinking for themselves and aren't just a bunch of idea thieves.
I’ve got a fair bit of Woho stuff bought in sales and on Ali, it’s not cheap but it’s more like Apidura and is rather nice.
I bought a rear rack cheap and it didn't last a ride without bending totally out of shape. The alloy was as soft as a Cadbury Fudge.
i bought an alloy front rack from brick lane bikes and despite being under laden it failed at the fork crown and pitched me over the bars. Which was shit. OP I’ve got a pair of the 3l podsac bags and they don’t hold a massive amount. I prefer the Blackburn outpost fork cages and a dry bag.Or a 2.5L flagon of cider.
https://flic.kr/p/2nNa743
I bought a pair of the brackets and bags that the OP posted the link too.
arrived the other day. The brackets look decent and durable. The bags are fine for the money I think they are good value.
I went for this instead to use on cargo forks.
I've just got 2 bottle cages on each leg. Water in one, tool kit in the other. On the other side a dirty water bottle and sawyer water purifier. Not having to search through bags for my sawyer makes it a lot easier and quicker to get clean water from streams etc.
Also received the 3L bags and fork mounts - not used yet but look decent. Will take them for a week's bikepacking around the Atlas Mountains in a couple weeks so will report back after that.
@duane...
I guess you have a fair amount of faith in the mounts, now that you have them in hand, if you are prepared to take them to another continent.
I'd almost convinced myself just to buy blackburn outpost cages just for peace of mind.
...as an aside, the lixada ti french press I ordered turned up. Well happy with that.
I am looking at that same setup, have you had a chance of using them?