Nitto/Berthoud project

I've been wanting to use a small pair of panniers on my front rack with my Berthoud front bag for bike touring. Because this guy looks cool. And I want to be like him. I don't like his handlebar bag though. Too high.

A constructeur type rack with a solid attachment, to more than just the dropout eyelets and the fender, I thought. I have a Nitto Campee front rack here and the side low rider mounts are removabale, so why not take them off and use that?

The Campee comes with stays to attach to cantilever brake studs, but I was able to get some 150mm stays and attach them to the mid fork braze-ons on my bike.

A standard rack mount bracket will become the new light mount. It screws into the holes where the low rider mounts were. I simply need to cut it off, grind a nice smooth radius on the end, and attach the light

The rack sits lower than if it were attached to the canti studs, but this is what I was after. I used a p-clamp to attach the fender to the rack, mostly to keep the fender from rattling and to hold it a little higher off the front tire.








But wait.... will the light clear the Berthoud panniers?





Oh Yah!!!
Now, the Berthoud panniers use the Rixen Kaul Klik-Fix attachment which appears to be very solid. But the red, spring loaded retainer clips protrude above the top of the bag and the rack. Since I want to use the top rack mounted Berthoud bag in conjunction, I probably need to cut off the protruding portion of the clips. I think it should still work fine.


Since I'm pretty sure nobody who has read this far will be able to sleep until they see how this turns out, I will post the final results forthwith. Or pretty soon, anyway.