Functional bikes. Not Porn not Anti

Tnx.

I think it's amazing.

Yeah, I've been told that's where I need to go to get rubber sheets, but there are no stores in the city itself. I guess I need to find some means of transportation to get me 10 km out of the city. Hmmmm.

@Sveinung rent a horse

one of those cannondale tourers on retrobike at the moment I think. not so sure how functional a 20+ year old alu tourer is but they do look really nice with the skinny steel forks and a front rack

Would love to be able to afford something ridiculous like this for Mrs Ratty. Would be fun to have a silly paint job on your winter beik to cheer you up on those horrible winter mornings.

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nowt silly about that, it's just missing a dynamo.

Maybe it could take pictures of our bikes afterwords?

New front racks from Surly in the new year... http://surlybikes.com/blog/post/something_wicked_this_way_comes

Look solid but unsure about the amount of vertical adjustment, seem to sit quite high on the Troll they're modelled on, maybe it'd look fine on 700/29er wheels...

Yes yes yes yes yessssss. Will buy.

Unless Specialized release the pizza rack, that is.

FFS, just gotten rid of my Krampus fork with all the mounts.

ALL the mounts.

Nah, that system is a little better despite looking quite overbuild (and made from steel).

The main reason is that the full rack may stiffen fork up too much, however having a big platform that mount on the middle of the fork allow the fork to absorb vibration as well as it normally can without making it overly stiff.

Also the way it's mounted, it look very easy to simply fit a low rider on it and still be under 1kg and have increased stability and strength (if the Surly rack is around 400g which I doubt).

Oh that surly rack is perfect, im going to get that and a low rider

860g! that's pretty high.

My Haulin' Colin Porteur rack is around 400g for a similar footprint.

The larger Surly is about 3 inches wider and the adjustable hardware is going to weigh a fair bit compared with the HC with it's fairly set mounting points.

Still 500g lighter than the Soma, VO or the Nice Rack, combined it with a Tara and it weighs the same as the above but you have a lower mounting point for the panniers than the first two which should help in most scenarios...

STW have more photos of both mounted to bikes http://singletrackworld.com/2015/10/new-surly-front-racks-launched/

Still 500g lighter than the Soma and the Nice Rack..

To be quite fair, those have low rider as well, only the Velo Orange is comparable.

Tubus listed the Tara as 360g, but the mounting hardware is 140g which mean it's actually 500g.

Anyone want an as-new Nitto M12 front rack? I fitted it but don't use it and it interferes with my Lumotec placement...

I should have stated my assumption that most people in this thread with the Soma/Nice Rack tend to strap stuff on top rather than in the panniers on a day-to-day basis.

A modular system like you describe (HC/Surly/Nitto M18 + Tubus Tara or similar) is a better solution overall, usually the same weight or lighter and generally better at it's job. Having owned a Soma, yes it has rails, but they're not really ideally placed for running panniers, puts the weight quite high and forward relatively to the axle e.g.

This is all based on having owned both the Soma rack and a M18/Tara/Wald combo. The latter being better IMO, with the Nitto being the weakest link (small platform and quite flexy with the longer stays needed for Surly forks).

It doesn't fit on the side of the rack?

I'll take it, sent you a PM

Yeah, but it sticks out and then there's the shadow... use a bar bag touring and have lo-riders for panniers too so this is kinda redundant.

Also, anyone looking for cheap but rugged 7spd touring wheels? Got some retro suntour xcd hubs laced to Mavic 3cd's I'm wanting rid of. £50 posted. Comes with VGC suntour block. Also got some 7spd shimano indexed d/t shifters to go with for a meager £10 more...

The 3 CD rims were excellent, a forgotten relic of Mavic's great quality of having a thick braking surface without the weight penalty.

510g is impressive for a touring rims, I'd love for Mavic to actually build proper rims again.

Yeah-they're pretty nice, quite wide too without being crazy over-built like the rigida sputnik my SP8 is laced to-that thing weighs a ton!