No, I don't think it is silly to be worried about chafing or scratches on an adventure bike - or any bike, come to that. It's something I look at very carefully when considering how to carry stuff on any of my bikes, and particularly so when there's no easy factory or aftermarket solution.

Tank bags are my bete noire. No matter what I do, no matter how much care I take, sooner or later there will be scratches or some other paint damage. There's two right now on the tank of my ancient Suzuki 125. That paintwork survived pretty much unmarked from the mid 70's until about a year ago when a piece of grit must have got under the bag.

Throwover panniers are another pet hate. There's a kind of hipster marketing vision with these things where you swagger out of your penthouse apartment, stroke the cat on the front steps, smile at the pretty girl peddling past on her pink bicycle and head off for a weekend in the country with the throwovers flapping away on the back of your custom cruiser. It may look good in the adverts but it's a sure way to end up with no paint on the rear of the bike. Over the years I've hand made countless sets of pannier mounts (well, ok, about 15 or so) to either try and keep luggage off the bike parts or give it some kind of sacrificial part to rub against. I'm making something at the moment to try and keep a set of the said hipster throwover panniers from rubbing on the rear suspension units of my ancient Yamaha 250.

Like you I've dismissed anything that involves glue, so no stick on patches or wear strips or anything like that. I have got through an awful lot of yellow dusters over the years though where the luggage hasn't quite worked how I'd intended and shoving one of them between the parts is the best I can do with a tight ferry schedule to meet.