In preparation for the Epic 2012 Motorcycle Ride I needed to get a good set of panniers to help carry all my camping gear, food, clothing and accessories. I was originally debating between Touratech and Jesse Odyssee panniers. The Touratech panniers looked nice but for some reason the whole setup would have been over $2,000 for the Tiger 800. The Jesse bag looked nice but they didn't have any kind of built in attachments for attaching bungee cords to the top cases.

After a little more research I opted to get the SW-MOTECH TraX ALU-BOX 45 liter panniers from Twisted Throttle. They were a little cheaper than the Jesse bags and the mounting points are nearly invisible when you take the racks off (which only requires undoing about 4 big screws on each side). I purchased the panniers and they arrived less than a week later.



The panniers and mounting hardware were well padded in the shipping boxes and arrived in perfect condition.

The panniers even come in these very handy cloth carrying cases that are great for carrying them around and storage.


The first thing I did was install the locking mechanisms which just require putting them in the appropriate hole and sliding a locking pin on the back side.

The actual install
The first thing you have to do is remove both seats and then take off the two mounting bolts on each side. You'll need to set the nuts aside because you'll use these with the new mounting bolts.


The four new mounting points consist of the mounting piece, bolt and spacer.


The mounting bolts go in very easily. I left them a little loose because I wasn't sure exactly where the final bracket would end up. One thing to keep in mind is the mounting bolt closest to the rear of the bike is a bit of a pain to tighten with the frame in place. I found that tightening it as much as i could with the hex key, then putting the bracket in place and tightening the actual bolt was the best way to do this. The pressure of the bolt in the mounting plate was enough to keep it from moving.


Next up is installing the mounting point that attaches to the passenger pegs. This is a pretty cool little setup that uses two angled spacers that get a force applied to them by tightening the bolt. The two angles get closer and closer, eventually forming an extremely tight fit.



After that it's time to install the rear mount. This requires removing the license plate and the light reflectors. The new mounting plate simply bolts right through the same holes as the license plate did before.




Now it's time to put the pannier frame on the mounting points. It uses a screw with a bar at the end that twists, forming a nice tight seal. I didn't opt for the special locking bolt option, but I could see how it might be beneficial if you leave your bike unattended a lot.



The last step is to tighten up the pucks that hold the panniers and mount them up.



Overall the install was extremely easy. I didn't have to drill or cut anything. The frame and mounting points all fit flawlessly with the bike. One thing to keep in mind though... I have the Arrow exhaust which is smaller than the stock exhaust. There were a few nuts on the right frame that were a little tight to get to so you'll want to be careful if you still have the stock exhaust.

I'll post a review of the panniers soon after I've had a chance to use them for a while.