Thursday, October 13, 2011

A Carradice Bodge

The seat tube angle on the LHT is fairly slack, and I've never really liked the way the Carradice hung from the bag loops on my saddle because of it.  Last week, I finally got around to doing something about it.

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I cut a short length of pvc pipe, wide enough to feed the seatpost strap through.

Then, I cut a longer piece from a 26 x 2.00 innertube - this went through the pipe, with the ends folded back over the outside, and taped down with electrical tape.  The tube should, I hope, stop the pipe abrading the bag.

The whole lot goes over the seatpost strap, and stands the bag a little way away from the post.

With something reasonably firm packed against the seatpost end of the bag (a book, for example), the bag now hangs at a far better angle. As a bonus, I finally feel like a proper Carradice owner, having used a few pennies worth of leftover DIY stuff to fettle the bag.

 

 

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6 comments:

pete said...

To be a proper Carradice owner you have to be about 90, understandably set in your ways and still cycling on a beautiful, high quality vintage 1950s machine, or a modern cycling evangelist with a penchant for nostalgia.

Karl McCracken (twitter: @KarlOnSea) said...

Nice - I've got one of the quick release frame do-dads that does an excellent job of keeping the bag at the desired angle. Trouble is, I use the bag on two bikes, and on the other one I have the hanging-at-the-wrong-angle problem. Time for some plumbing work!

John the Monkey said...

Pete, I reckon I'll take number two there, although these bags are better than anything else I've tried for commuting (so far).

Cheers Karl :)

adventure! said...

Nice work! I haven't had that problem with my Carradice on my LHT (yet) but good to know there's an appropriate hack.

Pete-I prefer the term "retro-grouch" for the latter person you are describing. And I happily fall into that camp.

John the Monkey said...

adventure!, another tip someone gave me recently fro Carradice on LHTs is to turn the seatpost clamp through 180° (for a bag that rubs on the clamp bolt portion).

You have a nice looking bike, assuming that's your LHT leant up on the wall in the photo on your blog. What's the front rack you're using there?

adventure! said...

John (the Monkey)-
If you are referring to the bike on the banner of my blog, that is not my LHT. That was a 70's Univega road bike modified so it had a giant Wald front basket and a 3-speed Sturmey-Archer rear wheel. I sold that bike last year.

You can see my Long Haul Trucker with Carradice in my most recent post:
http://urbanadventureleague.blogspot.com/2011/11/dialing-it-in-on-long-haul-trucker.html