New Custom Rack—Sal’s Front Rack

After a long hiatus from the workshop, it’s time to get going on another rack project!  This time it’s a rack for a guy named Sal, who’s in the process of having an absolutely gorgeous bike put together for him by Dream Cycle here in Vancouver.

Sal’s going to be running a Tubus Duo lowrider rack for carrying his panniers, but wanted something custom to act as a high-cargo carrier and bag support, and we’ve been talking about ideas for a simple but elegant rack that would integrate with and compliment the aesthetic of the Duo. The rack will mimic the Duo’s upper  curve, and act as an extension of the duo when the two are in use together.  When not touring, Sal intends to remove the Duo to save weight, but continue using the upper rack in town.

Here’s the design we settled upon (in pink).

Dimensional sketch

The construction of this one is relatively minimal, deriving the two main structural elements from single bent pieces, terminating on the bottom with a pair of extended tangs that will slip behind the Duo’s attachment tangs on the bottom connection point; the top attachment points will mount to a set of Paul’s Rack Adapters, sitting in front of a Paul’s Racer Brake, a modern-day reimagining of the old french Mafac Racer Brake. The upper stretch of the rack tubes will terminate with a pair of 1/8″ tabs which will angle down from the deck to reduce the  width from the 108mm width at the deck to the 78mm width at the brake posts.

The rack will also feature a curved front light-mount to accommodate Sal’s Son Dynamo-powered headlamp.

Here are some early shots of the rack parts in progress…

Rack deck, bent up and ready to rock

Another angle

Deck spans and backstay cut and ready to miter.

More to come soon!