Finishing Touches on the Touring Nimble 9

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I’ve finally done it. About 8 months after starting this project, I’ve finally found the time to finish what I started. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve been riding the heck out of this bike so far and it is certainly the coolest commuter I’ve ever had, but it was missing something when it came to touring. It needed a rear rack. When I was hauling stuff, it felt very odd to just have the front rack loaded down and no weight on the back. So i went about trying to fit a rear rack on the frame.

The first option I looked at was just a system that had the rear rack free-floating from the seatpost. A manageable idea, but it didn’t give me the weight limits I wanted. The second option was to get a frame/large seat bag. That didn’t seem to be the best option for commuting. The third option was to buy A rack mount adapter that attached to the QR axle. Tubus makes a really nice one and I did buy it. It didn’t fit. I had chosen the Salsa Down Under racks for the front and loved the robust build and look so I really wanted to use the Salsa Wanderlust rack to match the front. The Wanderlust’s bottom section angles steeply toward the top/front of the rack and it wouldn’t clear the disc brake assembly using the Tubus adapter. Oh well, only out $30 and back the the drawing board.

Being the resourceful, forward thinking, do-it-all “Man-Knowledge-Guy” that my brother Brian is, he suggested that I have a piece manufactured that would give me the desired fit. He, as he always does, knew a guy that had a machine and would be willing to create the needed adapter. So a couple bucks later and a six pack of yummy Durango micro brew and I was holding the freshly cut pieces of aluminum. Next, my brother and I set off to Brian’s friend’s auto shop. It’s a primarily custom build shop and Pete (the friend who owns the shop) owns almost any piece of equipment you can think of. Amazingly, he can also find almost any little tool he owns in his four bay shop and the tool is usually buried under layers of other tools, rags, scrap metal, beer cans and a heavy film of metal dust and car grease. He’s known my brother for years and for a 12 pack of Bud, he’s let us take over one of his bays for a couple of hours more than once.

After “tooling” around for a bit (pun intended) we had a couple of holes drilled that would allow the adapter to fit onto the sliding dropouts of the Nimble 9 and some smaller holes that would allow for the rack to be mounted. It fit like a glove. The finishing assembly was a breeze and the finished Nimble 9 is on the road. It was a perfect adapter for the frame because it moved the panniers back quite a bit and there is no chance that my heel will hit the bags. I have a set of Small Detours D2R Panniers on the front and set of Large on the back. Love it!!!

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