Ivan the Functional: A Review of Chrome's Midsize Roll-top Backpack...

Ah, Ivan, if you were a beer, you'd be a Russian Imperial Stout, something akin to Old Rasputin, I'd like to imagine. Robust, a bit heavy, highly satisfying, the one to have when you can have only one. Alas, you are only a pack, which means the closest you'll come to beer is hauling the damn stuff around every now and then. There are worse things in life, comrade, but let's leave that for another post. This one is a product review, so on with it.

A midsize (1680 cu. in.) roll-top offering from San Francisco's Chrome Bags,¹ Ivan is a fully waterproof, made-in-the-States backpack whose main compartment is sealed by pinching opposing sides of the pack together and, as the style suggests, rolling the bundle downward, before securing it via a hook-and-loop closure flap. The end result is that your booty (and I'm not talking ass here) remains dry, regardless of what Lady Nature throws your way. Here's the breakdown as I see it...

CAPACITY: The main compartment is cavernous. Plenty of room for two six-packs or a bevy of bombers, along with some grub to soak it all up and an extra jacket or other cycling article you feel naked without, plus a laptop (pic below left shows a load of two sixers and an 18" Powerbook in a protective sheath, with room for a sub, some fries, and a backup bomber, not pictured). To give a better visual, four one-gallon milk jugs will easily fit in the main compartment, with a little room to spare.

The shape is rectangular, so the key here is to stack upward, not outward, being mindful to leave enough room near the top to get a full (180°) roll going, particularly if it's raining—no roll in a downpour means that bounty of purloined panties you liberated from the local laundromat (ya sick bastard!) is gonna get wet and heavy and begin to feel like the owners are wearing them by the time you get home, without the benefits the actual presence of these ladies might confer.

Owing to its slim design (depth), Ivan has a surprisingly low profile when you're hunched over, down in the drops, even when it's packed to the gills. Over-the-shoulder ass glances aren't a problem, as the pack sits low on the back, adding to stability while you ponder the callipygean aesthetic of passing pedestrians.

Overall usable dimensions² come out to be around 21"x14"x6"—a good size for the solo grocery shopper who doesn't mind a return trip later in the week when the last bottle hits the bottom of the recycle bin.

FEATURES: Ivan boasts five compartments in all, including an LP-cover sized outer pocket and smaller cargo twins (u-lock size) that can be accessed without opening the main compartment. And then there's Chrome's infamous "kilo-keeper,"³ a concealed contraband compartment whose clandestine configuration was conceived to confound cagey constables on all continents who might otherwise confiscate your coveted cocaine cache⁴. Well, I like to think that's why it's there. The aforementioned LP-cover sized pocket has a seam-sealed zipper closure hidden beneath a storm flap, so that latest issue of Juxtapoz or Bizarre (my audience, such as it is, is nothing if not eclectic) you're hauling around stays tinderbox dry.

Waterproof all over is Ivan. Really waterproof all over. The waterproofing agent is of the truck-tarp variety, overlaid everywhere with a formidable layer of Cordura. Seams are "high frequency RF welded." Bottom line: relax—your crap is DRY. Forget about it and concentrate instead on the SUVs, buses, and cabs looking to squeeze you out of your skin at the next intersection.

Two shoulder-straps, a chest strap, and a waist strap (all adjustable) keep everything on your back where you intend it to be. Unlike some messenger bags, Ivan won't do orbits around your midsection as you spin out on a long, steep downhill. On the back, a daisy chain of three loops runs straight up between the twin cargo pockets like a spine, offering a home for a blinkie or two (though its usefulness is severely limited when the cargo twins are stuffed). Rounding out the utilitarian features are a haul loop near the shoulder yoke and two large, steel D-rings—one mounted near the top of each shoulder strap—so you can dangle your keys (or whatever) hipster-style within easy reach without removing the pack to dig for them.

DURABILITY: Bombproof. Seriously.

Hardware on the twin pockets and shoulder straps is stainless steel, and a beefy nylon waist buckle stabilizes the load nicely around your midriff. The chest strap also comes together via a nylon buckle.

As mentioned above, the whole works is wrapped in a tough layer of Cordura, meaning the pack should hold up well in those unfortunate situations where skin typically doesn't.

COMFORT: The shoulder straps are fairly wide and nicely padded; in fact, I've hauled some heavy stuff around in my Ivan and I've never noticed any discomfort in those areas. The pad between back and pack is just thick and wide enough to keep beer bottles and other hard objects from playing your spine and ribs like a xylophone as you pedal, and it's channeled like a set of chiseled abs to allow a little air flow during the hot summer months.

WEIGHT: As you might suspect, steel hardware, comfortable padding, and waterproof, rugged, double-layer construction mean Ivan is a bit of a pig when it comes to the scales. Mine weighed in at just under 4 lbs. But on the streets and rolling, the fit and feel of the pack render this factor largely irrelevant. You simply don't notice its comparative heftiness because Ivan cradles your body snugly like a nubile new lover. The load neither shifts nor digs into your shoulders. And all the things that amp up the weight a bit make Ivan one tough Cossack.

OVERSIGHTS: Just three, all of them minor, two of them related. First, the smallest pockets are the twin cargo pockets. These v-shaped spaces measure roughly 12"x8" (width measured at the vertical center) each, so small things get lost in them without effort. A nice zippered pouch inside one or both would be ideal. Second, no key lanyard. Anywhere. If there's no small pocket to stash keys, a key lanyard in one of the outside pockets makes sense. Lastly, the cinch webbing on each shoulder strap is overly long for my torso, leaving about 12 inches to flap in the breeze—just a slight annoyance, really, which I mitigate by tucking the loose ends inside the waist belt. Those with freakishly long torsos may not have a problem in this regard.

The verdict? Ivan is a champ, no question. I love this pack, and I recommend it to anyone who is looking for a comfortable, durable, stable, waterproof bag that will carry everyday loads (and then some) for years to come, and who seeks to avoid the douche-chills that may come with wearing a messenger bag and delivering nothing⁵ (then again, I ride a fixed gear and I've never set foot in a velodrome, so there you have it).

1. Full disclosure: Chrome is an official sponsor of the Single Speed Outlaw Factory Team (SSOFT), of which I am a member. This influenced neither my opinion nor my review of this product.
2. Usable dimensions account for space lost when the top is rolled closed.
3. My nickname for this pocket, not Chrome's. But I'm sure they wish they'd thought of it. This same secret pocket is a feature on other Chrome bags.
4. This sentence is a pretentious example of a wonderful literary technique—generally reserved for poetry—known as alliteration.
5. The opinions expressed on this blog are not necessarily those of Chrome Bags. No, really.

Beer Bucket and Beyond: A Review of the Banjo Brothers Commuter Backpack...

UPDATE, May 9, 2008: I'm in contact with Mike from Banjo Brothers, who has offered to replace the bag free of charge with a larger model. According to Mike, the drybags have been redesigned to be more robust, so the problems I experienced should now be addressed.
UPDATE, April 30, 2008: In the five or so months that I've used this bag, the inner "drybag" described below has begun to crack around the top edges and has developed a quarter-sized hole in the side and a two-inch split along one seam. Also, the webbing on one of the shouder straps has begun to fray substantially where it contacts the cinch buckle, threatening to dump the whole works one day without warning. In the interest of full disclosure: I did use the pack daily for those four months, and on occasion I carried some relatively heavy loads; however, none of them contained sharp objects or anything that I would expect to cause a puncture.

On April 9 and again on April 13 (2008), I tried contacting Banjo Brothers by email to see what my warranty options were. To date, I've received no reply. It's clear, in retrospect, that the cost-savings with this pack come at the expense of quality. Sadly, I cannot recommend this pack based on my experience, both with the bag and with what I can only perceive as a lack of customer service. Your experience may vary. Read on...


The first thing that struck me upon opening the Banjo Brothers Commuter Backpack is the color of the interior: white.

Bleached-bone white. Ass-of-Casper white. White, white, white.

Why white? If you've ever dug around in a backpack at night for a coveted object, sans light, you know the answer already: a dark interior turns the pack into a black hole, swallowing your junk like a toothless maw and sending it deep into duodenal recesses from which it doesn't return until the light of day. So, white is good here.

The next thing I noticed is that this white interior is actually a removable drysack, tacked inside the "ballistic nylon" pack shell by conservative use of a hook-and-loop closure system. The drysack achieves dryness in part with a rolltop and cinch-buckle design. Now, drysacks keep water out, hence their name. The alcoholic Einstein in me, however, was thinking about things from a different angle, quickly staggering across the closely-spaced cobblestones of drunken deduction to arrive at a dazzling conclusion: a waterproof bag is also a watertight container. Ipso-fucking-facto: this drybag, filled with quality beer and some ice, would make for a highly portable, dripless cooler. And look, it's even shaped properly for the job: rectangular, wide, deep, and pleated, like a grocery bag. Dimensions for a medium Commuter Backpack come out to 17" tall by 12" wide by 8" deep, yielding 1500 cubic inches of dead air in all.

But wait, there's more. Load the bag with ice and a six-pack or two, place your dainties and some foodstuff in separate drybags (separate drybags not included) and place them on top, roll the whole thing closed, and you're ready to hit your next punk bike enduro, seedy assignation in the park, or uptown social event in style. No more worries that some dollar-store degenerate will sneakily pilch your last Old Rasputin from the community fridge or unmarked cooler, eschewing his own crass contribution (a Straubs, perhaps, or some other watery domestic), which goes as untouched as a warm specimen cup, assuming he even bothered to bring one.

Okay, so it's a portable cooler, anything else? Glad you asked.

The Good:

The Commuter Backpack sits low on the back like a messenger bag, making those furtive, over-the-shoulder glances at the shapely backsides of passing cyclists a snap. This arrangement also contributes to a low center of gravity, permitting better balance as you flee from the local saw-bellied constable, who has just turned a blind eye from speeding motorists to watch you roll cautiously through a stop.

The pack is lightly cushioned with three low-profile strips of padding—one on either side and a shorter one down the middle. Just enough to do the job for soft cargo, but a little under-equipped for hard or heavy items. Speaking of cush, the shoulder straps are nice and wide and anatomically sculpted to preclude the dreaded cheese-slicer effect, provided you don't overstuff the pack. There is a removable waist belt that pivots on snap-links at either side—no more fucking around trying to straighten out the straps before buckling. Don't like waist belts? Unclip it and toss it—the pack rides well without it, settling in nicely against the lumbars and staying there. There's also a sliding chest strap to stabilize the pack and hold down your groodies, if ya got 'em.

The pack is black on the outside. The plus here requires no explanation beyond the obvious: black is eternally cool—hell, it's the color of the river Cocytus, for Pan's sake. Banjo Brothers gets around the obvious drawback (nighttime invisibility) by running twin racing-stripe reflectors down the "quarter-panel contact zone", so that the cellphone holding, Starbucks slurping, Suburban cowboy or urban Explorer who might otherwise perforate your sigmoid flexure with his two-and-a-half-ton motorized scalpel has absolutely no conscionable excuse for doing so. Along these lines, Banjo Brothers saw fit to also include a blinker-light loop for extra confidence at night.

The pack is voluminous. It could easily hold two stacked six-packs and a bomber or two, with room for a couple layers and a fried peanut-butter-and-banana sandwich on top. It also holds my 15-inch Powerbook and padded cover with room to spare. Nice.

The pack is capped with a waterproof storm flap that buckles closed, making for twofold protection against the watery elements and tidying up the look of the whole works. The flap extends almost all the way down the pack to cover the outside compartments (some zippered, some hooked-and-looped) where a cellphone or wallet, small tools, and a pump ride nicely and remain exceedingly accessible. Of course, the flap coverage diminishes as you fill the pack, no getting around that.

The pack has drainage holes in the shell so that any water finding its way between the shell and the drysack exits quickly through a few grommets. There is a loop at the top from which to hang the pack—ideal for making room at the local pub for that special person who will come to realize her or his mistake more fully with each passing drink.

The pack is rugged, having come through my recent mano a mano with a DC cab as unscathed as my own bag of bones, save for a few minor mars on the racing-stripe reflectors. Ballistic nylon, indeed.

The pack is curiously devoid of garrish logos, settling for an understated, almost invisible tag (à la a Levi's pocket label) halfway down the side of the storm flap. No rolling billboard with this baby—my blinker light has more ad copy!

The Bad or Marginally Ugly:

The Commuter Backpack is a bit on the heavy side, owing, no doubt, to the dual (drysack and shell) design and the use of burly materials throughout. In real use, this typically goes unnoticed, and dry haulables can be worth their weight in gold. Wet underwear not only sucks, it chafes! On sunny days, remove the drysack to lose some chub.

The pack has no internal pockets, making cargo subdivision within impossible. Fortunately, most small items will fit in the aforementioned external compartments: a roomy zippered area behind a smaller closable pocket and three...uh...penholder slots (penholder slots?...and three?...WTF?...wasted space, methinks). And there's no key lanyard. Why pack makers forget this helpful feature is beyond me; I like the warm and fuzzy feeling I get when I stagger from the pub knowing my keys are going with me.

The pack sports an external pocket on the left side intended for a small u-lock. However, the lamentable absence of any closure system earns it a rating of Functionally Dubious at best. A snap in the center would have gone a long way toward inspiring confidence. As it is, I can't imagine what I'd trust to this open pouch unattended, so I think this feature missed the mark.¹

Bottom Line:

An excellent pack, overall. Well-designed, with only a paltry snag here or there to snivel over. Definately a good deal for the money; 80 clams for a waterproof bag is hard to beat. I'd buy it again, although as rugged as it is, I don't think it'll come to that.

1. After closer inspection, it seems that two water bottles might fit nicely in this pocket...or perhaps two cans of Dale's Pale Ale. However, the absence of an elasticized edge still makes this storage space a bit of a dice toss.

Multi-tool Personalities...

Reviewed: Park Tool I-Beam Mini Fold-Up w/ Chain Tool (IB-3)

Ah, the multi-tool...where would we cyclists be without this jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none? A good multi-tool eschews the glorious, self-aggrandizing path of the specialist, preferring a more cosmopolitan approach to the world, where "getting by" in a variety of situations is more practical than excelling in any one. It's the socialist of the tool world, a classless microcosm where no single implement dominates or exploits another.

Exordium -
The Park Tool IB-3 sits at the top of the company's trinity of I-beam themed multi-tools, offering up to fourteen (depending on how you count) tools in a compact, relatively lightweight design. The "award winning" I-beam configuration, in addition to lending strength to the tool body, affords four "compartments" in which the separate tools recess. The whole package has a low profile and a nice hand-feel. Weight (6.4 oz. or 180 g.) is respectable, given the steel and aluminum-alloy construction, and compares favorably to similar offerings from other companies.

I carry this tool in a seat bag on my fixed gear and I've owned it for about 3 months.

Ingredients -
Features play out as follows, stolen from the Park Tool website and slightly modified for brevity:

• 1.5 hex wrench
  
• 2 hex wrench
  
• 2.5 hex wrench
  
• 3 hex wrench
  
• 4 hex wrench
  
• 5 hex wrench
  
• 6 hex wrench
  
• 8 hex wrench
  
• T25 star (brake rotor bolt) driver
  
• standard screwdriver
  
• composite-wrapped tire lever
  
• two spoke-wrenches:
  
  1. "0" (3.23mm nipples)
     
  2. "2" (3.45mm nipples)
• 10-speed compatible chain tool

Design -

Good:
The IB-3 is aesthetically pleasing. The comparatively compact configuration, recessed tools, and absence of sharp edges mean that it rides well in a saddle pack or pocket. The aluminum alloy I-beam body is light, strong, and flex-free—a characteristic sorely lacking in many multi-tools that feature a plastic housing. The blue color, a Park Tool standby, comes off a bit prissy on a hand tool, owing to an odd and presumably unintentional shade disparity—a common issue with anodization—and a glossy sheen that is anything but proletariat.

Evil:
The I-beam design is not exactly palm-friendly in action. The unused tools tend to bite into flesh when applying torque (e.g., using a hex wrench). The discomfort may be reduced by prophylactic use of a glove, something I don't often wear out on the road during the summer. A minor snag, really, but I thought I'd point it out for the delicate of hand.

Function -

Good:
All hex wrenches are made of hardened steel of an undisclosed alloy. As mentioned above, they fold nicely into the I-beam body, with the slotted tire lever/chain-tool handle sliding onto tabs along one side. The star driver is nice to have if you run disc brakes and need to tighten or loosen rotor bolts in situ. The chain tool/I-beam interface is solid and offers ample leverage. The slim tool body means easy rotation when turning a bolt with the wrench extended 180°. Overall, the tool feels solid and durable, with no discernable play at the junction where each tool attaches to the body.

Evil:
All of the "driving" tools are very short, even for a multi-tool. A short shaft (cue the cock jokes) is an open call to battered knuckles, greasy hands, and a bad fit in tight places where the tool body bangs against parts of the bike. A slip on a tough rotor bolt could mean fillet of hand. Of course, this downside is the trade off you make when you're going for a short, compact design. There is no Phillips head screwdriver or bottle opener (very important to some of us).

The "composite-wrapped" (read: plastic) tire lever features a metal core to lend it strength. However, Park mysteriously failed to extend the metal core into the plastic lever tip. The result is a business end that is noodley under force, as I discovered recently while fixing an obstinate flat. This oversight, and the fact that there is only one lever with this tool, makes this feature all but worthless in most real-world applications, and raises the perennial question, do these engineer types even ride? The lever could be removed and discarded except for the fact that it also functions as the handle for the chaintool and as a spoke wrench.

Regarding the latter, the tire lever does an adequate job of adjusting the two most common sizes of spoke nipples. However, because it is a lever design, you cannot spin it 180° around the spoke as with a typical spoke wrench; thus, adjustments are made only in small increments and require a bit more dexterity and a modicum of patience.

The 8mm hex wrench is really a cap that fits over the end of the 6mm wrench—a common concession in the multi-tool world. In use, the 8mm wrench works as expected. The downside is that this small cap is easily lost in the field or on the street. What's more, it does not fit snugly enough on the end of the 6mm wrench to remain in place while somersaulting around in a seat bag.

The chain tool, though it is well-built, solid, and streamlined, is not without its drawbacks. Its weakness is the dead-horse tire lever, which has a nut-shaped hole in the center that fits like a box wrench over the head of the chain-tool drive shaft. Once attached, you spin the lever like a propeller to drive the shaft and push the rivet pin out of the chain. The problem here is not so much one of concept as it is of execution: the tire lever is so thin that it walks off the head of the drive shaft under force. Again, it works, but requires care and finesse, qualities in short supply when you're in a hurry or stranded in bad weather.

Purchase Worthiness -
Hmm...this is a tough one. I like the compact shape of this tool. The wrenches are tough and resilient. On the other hand, when I pay for something that has multiple features, I expect all of them to work satisfactorily, at a minimum. The lame tire lever, while clever enough in concept, blows it on the execution. This alone is no deal breaker, since I'm unflinchingly faithful to the Pedro's Milk Levers and wouldn't be caught flat on the bike without them. The quality of the other tools, the overall design, and the tool's fierce resistance to self-dissection in my seat bag—an underrated feature not "found" on several offerings from competitors—means the Park IB-3 gets a passing rating, though without a helluva lot of fanfare. Park Tool, if you're listening, some suggestions: beef up the tire lever, magnetize the 8mm wrench cap (or find some other effective way of holding it fast to the tool), and field test the prototype before unleashing it again on the public. With minimal modification, this would be a fine addition to any portable tool stable.

From Mars...

Okay, as history has it, Edison perfected the first incandescent electric light bulb sometime in 1879, improving on earlier light bulb designs that had been around for 50 years. Some twenty-one years later, Edison, having earlier sold his soul to Old Nick a la Robert Johnson in exchange for eternal notoriety, came up with the first alkaline storage battery, the precursor to today’s expensive, nonrechargeable landfill landmines.

In 1896, Louis Jackson (like Edison, possessed of a particular intellectual fecundity), founder of the Acme Electric Lamp Company, applied for and received a patent for his Portable Lamp, a dry cell battery powered light. Perhaps in reaction to the frenetic (if ephemeral) clamor for bikes that mysteriously took root in the 1890s, Jackson’s light came equipped with a bracket for mounting it to a bicycle. Jackson’s creation eventually found its way into the willing hands of the Eveready company, which began mass-producing (and improving) the lamps shortly thereafter.

Flash forward a century to the bike lights available to us today. Let’s take a little look at one example of more than a hundred years of bike light evolution and see what the captains of commodity have cooked up for us in the form of the Blackburn Mars 3.0 tail light.

Mars. As in Roman God of War. Son of Jupiter and Juno. Eager deflowerer of vestal Ilia. Father to those fratricidal, lupine-teat sucking twins, Romulus and Remus. Arguably the most revered deity in the Roman pantheon. A real Renaissance ma—...uh...god. You get the picture: this eponymous light has got to kick some heavy ass; maybe it can even blind those who would dare gaze upon it, the way a glimpse of the Gorgons or a sideways glance at Sodom and Gomorra could turn one to stone or salt. (Of course, the myopic marketing mavins at Blackburn likely had in mind only a planetary allusion.)

So, how does it work? In two words: good enough. It has several blinky modes powered by two AAA batteries, orange lights pointing out from either side, a decent clip for mounting it on saddlebag loops, and a nice, soft on/off button that is pretty easy to locate and operate with one hand and no eyes. So yeah, it functions fine. Now on to the negatives.

One immediate downside is the price, especially given that the Mars doesn’t seem to be any brighter than lights costing half as much. Okay, it has the side-mounted caution lights, but really, by the time a driver notices these, he's already tallying up the cost of a punctured car grill and trying to remember whether he sent a greeting card to his legal counsel last Christmas. And additional bulbs (seven LEDs!) mean shorter battery life, my second complaint with the Mars.

But the third complaint really takes the cake. It’s one of those things that only the most misanthropic of designers—one who can’t possibly ride at night—could have brainstormed. The aforementioned energy-eating propensity of this light means that battery changes are a frequent phenomenon. Recognizing this, the innovative folks at Blackburn decided to dispense with the overly complicated slot found on competitors' models whereby the edge of a dime or a knife blade or a thumbnail is used to sort of gaston apart the two halves of the light. Instead, they put their best minds together and came up with a really progressive method for securing/removing the Mars 3.0 tail light cover: three tiny Phillips head screws.

Three tiny, fully detachable Phillips head screws.

Three tiny, black (the color of night, the color of asphalt, the color of the devil's heart), fully detachable Phillips head screws.

Now, if you were a designer employed by Blackburn, and you suffered the sudden epiphany that a cyclist might need to replace spent batteries at night (that dark portion of the day when lights are actually used), somewhere out on a lampless road, well, it should occur to you that a return trip to the drawing board is warranted before you unleash Mars on an unwary cycling public.

Perhaps a better name would have been Achilles...

BIAOA* Rating: Not likely

(*=Buy It All Over Again)