Green Chile Adventure Gear Uprising Luggage System Reviews

So I was really dissatisfied with my 2013 R1200GSW lashed cargo capability.  This bike simply has no convenient lash-points from the pillion frame, sub-frame, or frame.  The sub-frame carries no horizontal members and the BMW engineers thought it was a great idea to put a plastic tail on the end that may look stylish but has very questionable structural integrity.
 
As a sailor, I tried several rigs to secure my “dry bag-sleeping bag-tent-bedroll” gear including both shock-cord and line.  My riding buddies used Rok-Straps (www.rokstraps.com), but these seemed like a single-point-of-failure to me with their plastic clips and I didn’t want to lose a load tumbling through Cal City or up and over the Paiute Range on the way to Monache Meadows, California.  To be fair, my buddies reported my own load bouncing around a great deal with my home-grown rig.
 
I came across Green Chile Adventure Gear (www.greenchileadv.com) and contacted Ben Rainchild and Adam Owens through Facebook.  We talked through some of my needs, the bike, my gear, and through what conditions I ride.  Ben recommended their Uprising Luggage System kit.  This kit includes an infinitely adjustable soft rack, looped straps of both 48 and 60 inches, as well as an assortment of looped tension steel cam adjusters, D-rings, and non-tension nylon D-ring loops.
 
Since they were just coming online with production, I asked for a custom color and Ben sent my kit in “adventure-worthy” olive drab nylon.
 
Pros
 
I was immediately taken with the level of quality production.  Ben sews every one of these kits himself in his New Mexico shop and I’m all about helping a small business succeed.  The straps, cams, tensioners (a protective nylon sleeve surrounding a flat shock-cord load carrying line), and selection of D-rings seemed to offer a great variety of rig configurations for whatever load I might need.  The system is infinitely variable.
 
Cons
 
I was a little concerned with the steel cams, sewn into both the soft rack sitting on my pillion, as well as the cam-tensioners.  I thought these steel cams would eventually chafe through my pillion seat or my camping gear.  I’ve used this soft rack system now for over 1,000 miles of at times pretty demanding off-road use with no chaffing, but I do inspect the rig often enough so that if I did see something, I could make adjustments on the fly.
 
I understand that Ben and Adam now offer rubber cam covers, and I look forward to getting some.
 
One more thing is the fact that the system is nylon so you must ensure that you protect it from your exhaust or you’ll melt a strap and potentially put your load at risk.  Again, if you ride these big bikes off-road you’ll know all this, but I wanted to say it anyway.
 
Using the Uprising Soft Rack
 
The soft rack installation is pretty intuitive.  You simply lay the soft-rack onto the pillion area, find a structural element on either side of your bike, and loop the two forward nylon straps through, then up into the soft-rack cams.  Same for the rear.  When you have the soft-rack centered they way you want it, take a tension on each leg a little at a time until the soft-rack is snug. 
 
Then position your gear, and using the 48 inch or 60 inch nylon straps and the cam tensioners or D-rings, secure the load, snugging it down onto the soft-rack. 
 
http://youtu.be/qZxOAqOj0jo
 
Final thoughts
 
The soft-rack has an infinite number of load configurations, and I’ve used it to secure not only my full camping kit, but also a day-kit with tools and first aid supplies, and also to secure my kayak to my truck, to hang wet gear from a tree, and to hang gear inside my tent. 
 
The system is well engineered, quality made, has as many uses as you may dream about, and comes with their “Hardcore Warranty & Raving Fan Guarantee,” and honestly, who can beat that?