Hill Repeats

I decided to put my new bag through the paces climbing and descending some steep hills behind town on my way back from the post office today.  June gloom, fog and mist aside it was a great time.

I have had a handlebar bag design bouncing around in my head for years now.  Never making the time to sew it up myself I approached Swift Industries (Martina) about the possibility of a collaboration while we were up in Seattle for the Expo.  A few sketches, a meeting, time on the phone, material exchanges, a few speed bumps with the design, and then shazam!  My dream bag showed up the other day.  Martina did an amazing job translating sketches, pictures and videos into a 3d object.  As I was searching for a contractor to partner with, Swift’s bags were the closest to what I envisioned, their business ethic was a good match and we hit it off pretty well, i.e the vibe is right on.

The bag is named the Docena,  Spanish for a dozen or dozen eggs.  My Rambler is primary transportation, we eat an average of 2 dozen eggs a week in the house, and I wanted a safe way to get them home from the farmers market.  Most bags are not wide enough to hold the eggs, this one is.  There are a bunch of other details going on, taking cues from traditional Sologne or French style bags for the form factor, material and elements from the light weight bikepacking world, a pinch of messenger bag and a twist of old school backpack all come together in this one.   The bag is 11 inches tall and primarily a solution for larger/taller bikes.  I do have a sketch for the Docenita, pulling many of the unique elements into a smaller bag, but that is in a holding pattern for the moment.

I will have a more detailed post in the coming week or so, explaining all of the key features, dimensions and clearances for given handlebars.  Since it comes up first, my Nitto RM013 bars are 41.5cm C to C at the hoods and I have over 3cm of room for my thumbs on both sides.  Second is that for over 17L of volume the bag weighs in at 1.5lbs with stiffeners, if that sort of thing matters to you, that is pretty light for a full sized bag like this.