First of all, Thanks to Dobie at Cyclistic, Dave, and Terry at Cli-Max Riding Gear for supporting MOOTmag once again.
I was fortunate enough to have my number drawn in time to choose a Cli-Max gift certificate.
It promptly went towards a new tank bag after much assistance from Terry. He even went out on his Magna while we were on the phone describing how it fit. Great customer service :-)
The first pic shows the bag roughly in place. Note the centerstand from Dobie... it was especially useful when I had to reach under the frame to wrap mounting straps. Essentially the bag clips on to a tank bra. The bra is laced onto the frame.
The second pic shows the handlebars getting close to the bag... I knew this would probably happen after talking to Terry on the phone. See the highly reflective parts of the bag? That's the ace in my back pocket... the sides are essentially a removable fanny pack. I plan on giving it to Shelley's Mom. (kidding...) Removing it, and adjusting a small handlebar mount clock allowed the handlebars to clear full sweep. Note that this is with 1" risers, on the Valkna tank.
The 3rd pic shows my initial idea of wrapping the tank bra's front straps in place. I'd thought to go under the steering neck. But as you can see it would block the little black side panel. I have an obsession with that little side panel. Behind it are my HID headlight box, a fuse for the Stebel air horn, and connections for my CB system. Those little black panels come off more than they need to. I also like to entertain myself by dropping those little screws. did you know they are the same screws as some of the screws that hold on the airbox? yep, trust me, tried and true. I once found one a few thousand miles after I lost it... it was stuck behind the tab it threads into! But I digress. I didn't want to block those little black plastic covers.
So off they came, and I was going to wrap under where the frame uppers met the back of the steering neck. See picture 4. The idea here was trapping them behind the black plastic covers.
But alas, the bra straps were too wide. (ever had *that* problem before!?!) They were spaced far enough apart that the black covers couldn't be reattached.
Now, up to this point I was thinking to myself: "Self, you can just package this thing back up, clean as a whistle and ship it back to Terry and get that other one you thought would fit. It was cheaper too."
But I had one more idea... to wrap under the steering head frame gusset, as seen below. the bottom of the strap seems to disappear behind the gas tank, but really wraps under and across. It was at this point I knew I wouldn't be able to return the bag. Because it's kinda dirty back there....
So the strap goes across. Had to be careful here as there are lots of cables on the left side of the bike (none on the right). Throttle Cables, horn wires, ignition wires, spark plug wires, and some things I wasn't even sure of. The strap though misses all these things (if carefully installed). It only touches a mystery threaded bracket in the middle. I couldn't get a good picture of it. It is holding nothing.
The last photo shows a detail of the back moutning straps. they go to a cross-frame member between the front of the side panels. After losing a panel a while back, they are now loosely zip tied so I can't lose them so easy...
All said and done, I think it looks good. It is a Givi bag made for ADV bikes. Which I wouldn't mind having in the future.... :-) But works well on the magna. I do have to unclip the front of the tank bag to access the gas cap. Not a problem, I don't mind. I am bummed to lose the reflective sides (not the fanny pack feature, just the reflective feature!).
Hop Along
Looks like you figured out a way for extra storage, we need daylight photos. lol
I will start taking daylight photos next week :-)
Maybe my nighttime eyes are not what they use to be.
Oh... I mean daytime photos somewhere other than the indoors shop these pics were taken :-)
Quote from: hop along on June 16, 2013, 09:38:46 PM
Oh... I mean daytime photos somewhere other than the indoors shop these pics were taken :-)
Now you have it.
So I've got a few thousand miles-and have lead the group ride of @20+ bikes through and around the Great Lakes, which was why I initially purchased the Givi Silver Enduro tank bag. I can say it worked well, the bag itself is mostly waterproof and includes a raincover for the times it really rains-and the rain cover really worked.
I didn't mention some of the bags features. It has a GPS holder (though I don't have a GPS). It has a removable belt, which can be handy to take along valuable things, though I leave it on and it holds my point and shoot camera and sidestand foot quite conveniently. It is also expandable though when doing so, it is honestly too tall for my use. The bag is conveniently shaped to hold our faceshields-they nestle in perfectly and waste zero space-unlike when they store in my saddlebags. For this reason alone I've kept the tankbag on the bike at all times :-)
See the first photo, the cloth bag for the visors blends in; also shown is the rain cover in a storage pouch.
The only real negative I have about the bag is that the zipper into the map compartment is a little short. A standard map, folded to see two sections at a time, barely fits through. Thus, best to have a AAA membership for free maps because they *will* get torn up over time, especially from the random folding you'll have to do. But if you're a GPS user, you won't have any problem.
Bottom two photos are a side view with belt removed, and a side view with the bag expanded.
I'm not the best at getting great actions shots, but here is one at the Black Mesa, OK campground, next to the river. Lighting is a little odd due to the sunrise backlighting.
Nice undiscovered feature storing faceshields inside, that is a problem on any bike. Some just do not get the zipper issue and maps or hands getting inside, same on some chaps also.