Is there a best practice for how much clearance works for standard water bottle cages?
In other words, on a smaller frame, or one with multiple bottle cages, how much room does one need to be able to comfortably pull the bottle out and put it back in the cage. I realize this will depend on the specific bottle and cage, but just wondering if there’s a standard or just a number anyone’s come up with.
I am aware of the existence of side loading cages but for now let’s focus on a standard bottle cage, like the King or Topeak Shuttle, and a standard bottle, like say the 22 oz Purist.
I consider King cage to be the de facto standard; they make a standard cage, a lowered, and a raised cage… I think they vary by +/- 25mm. If that won’t work, upon request they will make a cage with a custom offset.
I agree with this sentiment but don’t trust my mocking up ability as much as the hard earned experience of others. Put another way, I’m very good at making dumb mistakes on things like this!
But short of any wisdom from the sages I’ll just clamp some bottle cages to my frame and see how much clearance is practically required.
Mock ups are great. For several recent frames I’ve added three boss mounts positioned so that you have maximum clearance from the top tube by using the bottom set of bosses, but also the possibility of using the top set for less of a reach when you don’t have a top tube bag.
My latest frame is kinda low-slung with a short-ish seat tube and I was still able to fit a 975ml Zefal bottle with a standard King Cage. I definitely maxed out on how far down the ST I could place the bosses. The clearance to the DT in the attached screenshot is actually a bit more than in real life as the bidon boss braze-on I put on the DT is tilted forward a bit and thus puts the front edge of the bottle closer to the DT.
The screenshot also shows the BikeCAD dimensions I use for King Cages and they’ve turned out to be quite accurate.
Note that the bottle dimension in the screenshot probably does not match the 975ml bottle I test fitted. That’s why I’ve marked the clearance from the lid to the TT in yellow.
I’ve had 3 people in the past year hit me up to see if I could help them fit a dropper post in their bikes. (It’d be great if it could be internal routing but it doesn’t have to be). They were all turned away.
The moral of the story is: “If you think there’s a chance you/your customer will run a dropper, try to plan for a dropper.”
Great advice. @JMY would you say that with 46mm clearance, grabbing the bottle and putting it back is no problem, or kind of a pain in the butt?
I guess this is why I posted the question rather than (in addition to) mocking up. A drawing can tell you what could work. Using something repeatedly will tell you if it actually sucks or is great, in real life.
I was thinking about it on my ride yesterday. There is so much about building a bike that any fabricator could figure out, and we have all seen and / or built the result of a smart person doing that for the first time, but the last 10% to a really great functional product is so hard to nail with intuition and engineering. You need some experience, and maybe the help of a community.
Sorry if that’s a bit deep for a question about water bottle boss placement lol
Just to add some data to the thread, my mocking up seems to indicate that 8 cm between the top of one bottle and the bottom of whatever is above it is about the minimum for comfortably pulling out and removing the bottle and putting it back in. 10-12 cm would be more comfortable. Anything less and you’d want a side-loading cage.
