Friday, January 28, 2011

Rory bag hack

Before diving into the Rory bag trick, here's a picture from my ride today.

That's out on Mission Road. The one on the west plains. The bag there is attached with a zip tie on the bottom and leather straps on the back, which are strapped to my handlebar. A solution which is both inconvenient to remove and is wobbly and shaky and slidey.

So here's the fix.

Those are Ortlieb hooks. Specifically, the QL 1 Top hooks. I used longer M5 bolts and a big washer on the inside of the bag. Rory's technical term was a "big ass washer."

On the back, I had a cargo net that had busted and it had a nice hook. So that was easy too.

Aside from making the bag easy to remove, this solution also keeps the bag in one place without attaching it to my bars.

Big ass washer is top left. There's a hard plastic mat on the bottom of the bag.
Bonnie Mager and Pro-Emergency Services campaign signs stiffen the deal.
If this works as well as it's looking like it's going to work, I may do a similar hack for my Swift bag.

9 comments:

Unknown said...

John, you are a mix of ingenuity and genius.

John Speare said...

Nice words Ryan. But actually, I just mostly copy other people.

Anonymous said...

nice!
I especially like the signs.

Bill Foss said...

Elegant in its simplicity!

adventure! said...

I like it. I have a VO handlebar bag and a Jandd front rack, but it didn't "work" that well either. I had it customized by a local outdoor repair place, who added more loops to the bottom. If I had a wider front rack the Ortlieb clip solution might work!

John Speare said...

Shawn: do you have a rack that's more like a Nitto Mini/traditional rando set up?

You could make the ortleib hook work on such a set up -- the hooks don't have to live in a series on a rail. Each one can be attached independently.

adventure! said...

John: My Jandd rack is a platform front rack that is more like a rear rack for the front. Here's what it looks like:
http://www.jandd.com/detail.asp?PRODUCT_ID=FREXT

rigtenzin said...

After riding this bag setup for while how do you like it?

John Speare said...

rigtenzin: I really like it. I use it all the time for long rides and commuting. I'm pretty surprised that it's still holding up and has turned out to be such a good solution given how simple/easy it is. Highly recommended. Thanks Rory!