Blackburn Rear Rack - Light

[caer urfa]

Could anyone please advise of either how a Cateye battery-operated light could be fitted to the Blackburn Expedition 1 rack? OR Whether the Blackburn Mars 2.0 or 3.0 would fit directly (without adapting) on to the horizontal tubes that form the back-end of the rack?.
Would also like to hear your views on the 2 Blackburn options

I look forward to hearing from you

Many thanks

Caer Urfa

[AndyK]

The latest Cateye rear lights now come with their "flex-tight" bracket - a ratcheted plastic band that you tighten by hand. See Cateye LD270 on Wiggle
for instance. I've had some success attaching this to the thin tubing of a rear carrier, though I had to pad it out with a padding strip from an old bike computer mounting - you could wind insulating tape around a few times for the same effect.

The Blackburn Mars 2.0 definitely would NOT fit without modification. It comes with two mounting options, one suitable for a seatpost and one for a belt clip. Neither is easily adaptable to a rear carrier.

Another alternative that will suit many rear lights (but not the Mars 2.0) is to buy a mounting bracket - one end bolts to the carrier, you screw the light's normal bracket to the other end. Annoyingly this will only fit round a single tube's width, so it won't attach to the most obvious bit at the back of a Blackburn rack where two tubes are welded together in parallel. You have to fit it to one side or the other, but it's easy to arrange it so that the light itself sits more or less centrally. I use this for the Cateye TL-AU100BS and similar. It's very solid.

[PinkPanther]

I've just used a Cateye HL-LD 500W FRONT BRACKET and BS 3 CLAMP 12.7mm - 13.8mm together to my EX1 rack, doing up the clamp is a bit awkward - you need to hold the clamp tightly to get the screw started without damaging its threads and then do it up very tight to make sure enough thread is in the nut. Looks quite neat though.

[PW]

Tightly wrapped inner tubing makes a good base to attach a seatpin mount. Tack it down with insulating tape. Cateye mounts can operate at 90 degrees to the intended position.

[glueman]

Dunno about the Cateye but I use Esge Blackburn brackets or whatever they are called now, which have bolt holes in various orientations to suit most angles and lights. In fact they are so practical somebody will probably tell me they don't make them anymore.

Edit: I see AndyK's link takes you to the very thing - the Busch and Muller one looks even sexier.

[Cunobelin]

Did you mean this one:



Available form St John Street Cycles

[leftpoole]

Could anyone please advise of either how a Cateye battery-operated light could be fitted to the Blackburn Expedition 1 rack? OR Whether the Blackburn Mars 2.0 or 3.0 would fit directly (without adapting) on to the horizontal tubes that form the back-end of the rack?.
Would also like to hear your views on the 2 Blackburn options

Hello,
Spa cycles supply a suitable alloy clip for about £4 .Telephone them.
John....

[caer urfa]

Many thanks for all your interest and useful advice. Also, I stumbled across the Cateye CA5342250 rear rack bracket (complete with cable ties) and this seems to have overcome the problem.