How to make your own saddle bag quick release for $1.00. This also works for sprung saddles.

[REC (Roberta)]

RBW content--this is on my beloved Joe Appaloosa and I'll be making another one for my A. Homer Hilsen.  I love the Nitto one on the Riv site, but it cannot be used with sprung saddles.

The idea is to have the dowel long enough so the straps won’t work their way off by themselves, but short enough so you can slide the straps off fairly easily.   My dowel is 7 3/8” long and that’s plenty long.

You'll need:

One 7 - 7 ½” long dowel.  I used a ¾” wide dowel, but I suspect a ½” would work just as well.

Two zip ties

 

Zip tie the dowel to the INSIDE side of each saddle bag loop--for the left loop, zip tie to the right; for the right loop, zip tie to the left.   Make it fairly snug, but no need to over tighten.  You need to make sure the dowel won’t slide out on its own.

Slide on the pre-buckled bag straps, first one side, and then the other.   Your straps should be sitting just below the saddle loops, in the same position as if you had threaded them thru the loops.   Voila!

To remove the bag, just slide the strap from one side first, then the other side.  It helps if there’s a little movement in the dowel.

To make the dowel “disappear,” paint it the color of your bag or saddle.  Or, have fun with markers and “art” it up!

[lambbo]

this is really quite smart...one could sink a rare earth magnet into the ends, and slap on an oversized washer, if you're like me and end up swinging your bag around a lot on bumps and corners. 

[Patrick Moore]

Admirably simple, and it looks secure. How do you judge the maximum dowel length -- for security -- that allows easy removal? Simply trial and error?

Perhaps one of the smaller auto hose clamps might be more secure? You can find these at True Value as well as auto parts stores.

I've made pretty effective QR holders for bags by shaping -- cutting and bending -- Nitto-type arms out of stiff aluminum plate, and using a hollow metal rod -- about front axle diameter -- and a front QR; the Nittos are better of course but work best with Brooks-type saddles where the rear rails are near vertical; with Flites and other saddles where the ends of the rails have a less acute upward angle, the Nitto puts the bag quite low. If you can do simple sheet metal cutting and bending, you can for arms that extend pretty much horizontally. I used small U bolts to clamp to the rails.

Sorry, it has been years since I made one and I can't provide photos.

Besides the Nitto, Carradice makes -- besides those models that don't release quickly -- several QR saddle bag holders, including one that must not be commonly sold in the US that hooks into Brooks loops (or I daresay Cyclo or VO clamp-on loops) and cinches around the seatpost. Then there is the Bagman QR model and the SQR.

https://www.carradice.co.uk/products/saddle-fixing-systems/carradice-classic-saddlebag-rack

https://www.carradice.co.uk/products/saddle-fixing-systems/carradice-classic-saddlebag-rack

And this seems to be relatively new: https://www.carradice.co.uk/products/saddle-fixing-systems/bagman-quick-release-saddlebag-clamp

At least, I don't recall seeing it ~4 years ago when I was looking for QR clamps for my Matthews; perhaps it's not new.

I wish Rivendell would make a Silver-quality bag holder that works with Flite-type saddles (ie, with non-vertical rails); an adaption of the Nitto qr clamp ought to be easy.

Of all the clamps, the SQR holds bags highest -- necessary to carry a bag when there is little distance between tire and saddle, as when you have tires almost 30" tall (29.6").

Patrick Moore, who presently favors the SQR.

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Patrick Moore

Alburquerque, Nuevo Mexico, Etats Unis d'Amerique, Orbis Terrarum

[REC (Roberta)]

Lambbo--

Actually, I was going to do an oversized washer, but found just having a long enough dowel works.  I do think if you rides with more movement than I do, it would be a good idea (I don't know anything about rare earth magnets).

Roberta

[REC (Roberta)]

Patrick,

I started with an idea that the dowel should be about 1 1/2" wider than the outside distance of my straps.  They cannot move too much to either side, since the "other' strap has a stopping point with the zip tie.    So, I said to my brother-in-law, "about this long, please."  Until tonight I didn't know actually how long he made it, but this works for my fairly smooth rides.  If one rides more aggressively or the bike and bag jostles a bit when riding, oversized washers on the end would work.  The dowel cannot be too long, or else you'd have a hard time slipping the loops off.

I'm not an engineer, but I live in the city and was getting really tired of threading my straps thru every time I took off my bag.  And, they are harder to thread when there's springs to contend with.

This has worked well for me for the last month or two that I've been riding with this set up. 

BTW, the bag is sitting on a rack, but I think this would work well without a rack too, but I'd definitely put a "stopping" device on the ends if I didn't have a rack.

Roberta

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[Bob Ehrenbeck]

This is brilliant, Roberta! Simple, yet effective.

Bob E

Cranford, NJ 

[Sky Coulter]

Great idea!

Thanks for sharing it.

Sky in new west

On Nov 19, 2019, at 6:48 PM, Bob Ehrenbeck <ree...@gmail.com> wrote:



This is brilliant, Roberta! Simple, yet effective.

Bob E

Cranford, NJ 

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[Joe Bernard]

What a sweet hack! Aside from being cheap, I dare say it's also better than the Nitto piece. I've tried them several times - several of you own the ones I sold - and that metal thingy sticking up with the bag removed is a bugger. If I wasn't kicking it swinging a leg over the saddle then I was scraping it on a wall in my apartment. Gimme a wood dowel!

[dougP]

That's pretty cool.  I too find that messing with the saddlebag is a nuisance.  Esp. if you ride 2 bikes, and you like having one bag with all your stuff.  This makes it EZ to move that bag back'n'forth. 

dougP

[ascpgh]

Clever hack Roberta!

I have the same bag, decades older, on my daily commuter. Since I park in a garage at work that's pretty safe, I use a stuff sack for my cargo and take all contents with me when I get to work (I'm a good bit west of your 17th!). I put my shoes and helmet in the bag during the day and am happy that the hassle of the straps is as it is, but I may use this idea on my Rambouillet, but with a bigger zip ties, when I put that bag on it for trips!

Andy Cheatham

Pittsburgh

On Tuesday, November 19, 2019 at 8:49:48 PM UTC-5, REC (Roberta) wrote:

[Pancake]

Great idea, definitely will do something similar for my Acorn bag that’s a hassle to take on and off with my Flyer and B67 saddles.

Rather than washers at the ends, I have a couple alternatives:
1. Put some indentations into the dowel for the bag straps to rest in. Removes weight rather than adding it and should give a little extra hold for the straps to stay in place.
Or
2. Use a metal rod or bag stay that’s bent forward slightly at the ends - would be smaller and the ‘hooks’ and the ends would keep the bag in place with even less width I expect.

I’ll start experimenting! New life for my acorn seat bag!

[John Phillips]

Very cool Roberta!  

One can also use 6" or 9" voile straps instead of zip ties and/or leather bag straps.

Voile straps are kinda grippy and you can add a few wraps of duct tape to the middle of the dowel to prevent side-to-side slippage.

I was inspired to a solution like Roberta's by the way Ron's Bikes Fabio's Chest Bags attach to saddle loops.

John

[Roberta]

Wow!    So many great ideas that enhance my simple idea.  I'm glad it got your imagination juices flowing!

Roberta

[spencer robinson]

Hi Roberta,

Wow, this is excellent, I recently installed a brooks flyer on one of my klunkers and discovered what a PAIN it is to get the saddle bag in the saddle loops...esp with poor eyesight. I am off the woods to find just the right stick! Thanks for posting it up!

[Nick Payne]

This is what I did to attach a Goldback Niño saddlebag to a Berthoud saddle. The straps on the Niño were too far apart to fit the slots in the frame of the saddle, so I zip-tied a piece of 15mm diameter "carbon fibre" tubing (given how cheap it was, I strongly suspect it's actually fibreglass) to the slots in the saddle frame and the straps on the saddlebag attach outside those. The saddlebag can't move sideways in either direction, so the piece of tubing only had to be a few millimetres longer than the minimum length needed:

Nick