Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Drink holders!

Here's how you install the single drink holder...aka the Solo, aka the Copilot.


Thread the webbing under the down tube and into the cam buckle. Pull that thing tight. Maybe it's a good idea to go under any cables...unlike in the photo. It's your call.
Now what to do with this extra webbing? If you plan on never using it on another bike with a larger head tube you can cut it off (not really recommended). Or you can fold it under the wrap-around strap like so (keep reading for that step):

 Open that cam buckle.
 Now close it.
Enjoy riding with a beverage close at hand.

Drink holders now available at Maude Vintage, downtown CoMo.

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Ultimate Hip-pack Project

A couple months back my friend requested a pair of hip-packs. They had to be relatively small, hold a mini u-lock, and have a secure pocket for a cellphone. Here's what I came up with:
8" across the top, ~5.5 deep, 6x2 on the bottom. 1000d Cordura nylon, acrylic-coated poly liner.
I usually don't use velcro, but since this was a special job I made an exception.
Typical u-lock holster design. There's some thin padding in the u-lock straps on these, though.
Now, here's how I got to the above bags...prototypes galore:

This is a nearly complete bag. I pretty much just moved the label and nudged the zipper up a bit. On the final packs, the pocket is lined with a mil-spec oxford nylon.
Below is the first finished design. Zipper pocket, floating liner...super water-resistant but hard to get into. The final design is a little smaller than this but has better accessibility.
Dumb place to put a label. Whoops.
Same lock holder strap. I'm also not wild about how the binding looks on this bag. It's an okay design (I use it a lot)...just a li'l goofy on a bag this small.
For scale.
No floating liner (above). But no holes in the corners. Hell no.
And here are most of the prototypes I made, excluding some paper ones...and I gave one of the vinyl ones away before I took this. A big thanks to the public library for providing me with such fine prototyping material. Books are great.

Special Wallets

Just made these wallets. They have an extra bike-tube card pocket. Pretty swift, huh?