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I bought a Ostrich handlebar bag from an iBOB list member about a year ago. I have used it on my specialized expedition touring bike for months. It has plenty of storage capacity and many convenient pockets and a map case. On my old touring bike it sat on a Nitto M-12 front rack. Initially I used two leather strap to attach the bag to the handlebar and a pedal strap to attach the bag to the rack at the bottom (see left). To gain some hand space on the handlebar, I used the Velo Orange decaleur (quick release bag mount) and did away with the leather straps. The decaleur allows to bag to sit more properly on the rack and hold it there more securely. I really like the set up (see the picture on the right to look at the bag with decaleur).
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When I sold the touring bike to pave way for the Ebisu, the Ostrich bag sat in my bike garage for a while not getting used. I had a basket on my commuter at the time and I hadn't set up a front rack for my Romulus yet.
When the rack strut broke on the Mark's rack on my il pompino, I took off the rack and replaced it with the Nitto M-12 rack that was on the touring bike. I thought about putting the basket on, but instead decided to use the Ostrich bag.
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I tried to buy an extra steerer mount for 1 1/8" size from Velo Orange, but VO didn't have any, and Chris there told me that VO might not get any for a few months. I wrote a WTB email to the iBOB list to see if anyone has one lying around to sell it to me. From that, Ryan Watson sent me a reply, with a link to his flickr photostream showing his home-made bag mount (here is one of Ryan's picture showing his bag mount using a piece of steel bracket).
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4 comments:
I did a similar hack for my front-bag mount.
No way! After the 200k I just did with my ostrich bag, I've been trying to figure out how to mount it to the stem using some struts. I've also noticed the two little buttons on the strings that stretch over the hooks in the front. Mine are set up exactly the same way! Ha! Thanks for the images. Time to break out the tools...
Bikesf,
I just did the SFR 200k this past weekend, too. I remember seeing a couple of ostrich on the route. Currently the ostrich is on my kogswell, but I took my ebisu with the Riv Lil Loafer. Several others have tried home-made solutions, and I have had a couple of other configuration that worked.
It looks cool and funny. I like that. I use back pack for my mountain biking travel. It will look awesome. I bought that from Hydrapak through e-shopping.
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