Specialized Road Bike Essentials SWAT Kit
The goal of this project was to design a way for one to store all the essentials they would need on the exterior of a performance road bike frame in the most integrated way possible, with a minimal weight consequence.
Having a spare tube and inflation kit can be the difference between a great ride and a very bad day.
Project Background
Road cycling requires a number of accessories and a certain amount of preparation to minimize the chance you will be stranded on the road. There are a number of different ways to typically store items on a bike, mainly in a saddle bag or in the riders’ jersey. This project started with a question; how can we visually integrate a flat repair kit onto the bike frame without compromising the frame performance?
Rider Research
Most rider’s vary what they carry with them when they ride but flat repair is an essential part of every rider’s kit. Through talking with our product team and researching the flat repair kits of a number of riders, we landed on the following pieces needed to be incorporated into this storage design.
Design Criteria
Fully Removable - The final design needed to be fully removable from the frame so that it would still appeal to competitive cyclists (*placing a hole in the frame and attempting to store the repair kit inside would bring a prohibitive weight consequence).
Light Weight - Weight is paramount in road cycling.
Appear Integrated - or as integrated as possible.
Fit all sizes of bike frames - this became one of the more difficult requirements for this design as frame tubing shapes and angles vary from size to size.
Sketch Concepts
The main options we considered where behind the seat tube, in the bottom pocket of the front triangle, and tucked up underneath the water bottle cage.
Prototype Mock-Ups
Concept Refinement
Using full scale form representations of each concept, further testing and evaluation led us to choose the bottom pocket of the front triangle as the location for the repair kit. The main reasons for this were the visually integrated appearance, compatibility with all of the frame sizes, and low center of gravity.
Production Hand-Off
I worked with an outside engineering consultant to create the final CAD production intent before handing off the design to our manufacturer.
The Final Product.
