Rear bottle cage setup... will it break?

Triathlon Forum
1

Hello folks, been a reader of this forum for long time and 8 months ago I decided to embark into my IM journey!
I’m going for IM Nice this June (ofc not the WC) and I’m trying to figure out an ideal bike setup (I have a normal aero bike) to carry as much nutrition and liquids as possible.
I realized I need to carry at least 3 bottles (1 with liquid nutrition, probably 950ml with 6 maurten 320) and the others with water (maybe 1 water, 1 energy drink) to refuel at each station.
I bought an Elite SkeKane rear cage system that allows me to carry 2 additional water bottles and it seems to be compatible with carbon rails saddle; my carbon rails saddle (Selle Italia SLR Carbon) is ofc not made for such a setup, so it’s impossible to find if this will lead to cracks.
I installed everything, torqued to 3nm and the setup is super stable (tried going on bumpy roads) even when I fully load it with to full 750ml bottles and 2x60gCO2. Before attaching the saddle to the rails, I did cover the rails with electrical tape just to prevent accidental scratches (although the attachment mechanism on the SkeKane has some padding.
Attaching a few photos.

Any experience with similar setup? Something I should be worried about?

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2

I’m surprised that you aren’t using a saddle like ISM, Cobb, or Dash.

3

The only thing I would do is angle the bottles back.

Having the bottles straight up and down makes them easier to launch.

4

Given my first IM will be Nice and the course is hilly I decided to stick to the bike I had and make only minor modifications (see picture).
I tried adding clip on aero bars, swap the saddle etc, but in the end it felt the geometry was never going to be as good as a proper Tri bike (had a chance to ride a speedmax and it was almost like doing another sport), making me feel like I would always want to reach for normal aero bike ride position (although not as much aero as staying in the aerobars all the time)

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5

I tried angling the bottles back but it felt harder to fit them than into a straight up position.

6

I’m thinking it should be fine.

-Saddle rails are designed to be clamped and bear high loads/torque from your body weight. Two bottles is very little in comparison.

-Lots of riders use double carriers with carbon-railed saddles, and you don’t hear lots of stories about failures.

7

I tried angling the bottles back but it felt harder to fit them than into a straight up position.

you should try some sort of side-loader cage, much easier to get a bottle in since you just slam the bottle in from the side and then push it down to set it into place.

8

That’s a beautiful bike, however you really, really should try and master using clip on aero bars. The time/energy/comfort savings, even on the Nice course, will be huge.

9

I had that same carrier and only could get it stable by drilling another hole and fixing it with cable ties BUT I had it as far forward as possible, so the clamp was fixed on the horizontal part of the seat rails and the ties went on the upper part (where yours is fixed)
I didn’t like it cause it’s limiting angeling the bottles
Toppeak got a nice cage for rear mount, gotta look for those, makes it a lot easier putting the bottle back in just by the different design itself.