I’ve written about my Dahon Folding Bike before. It’s the one that I configured as a city apartment bike (read more here). The Dahon is a fun bike to ride. With its tiny tires you feel like you’re on a kids bike. It has a three speed hub gear system, so it’s easy to use. And it has fenders and chain guards, so you don’t have to be outfitted in bicycling gear to ride it.

While I had previously outfitted it with a lighting system, etc, it was lacking a good way to carry stuff. It has a really nice rear rack — but the wheels are so small that you can’t use regular pannier bags. It needed something like a milk crate.

Trouble with milk crates is that they look like milk crates. And any attempt to make it look nicer simply resulting in a nicer looking milk crate. I’d have to build my own.

So, out come some 1×12 scrap boards, and some knowledge recently gained from a new Super Secret Project. Here is the core:

The front, angled parts, and sides are all 1×12 pine boards. The front is 6″, angled 4″, and sides 8″. These dimensions were chosen because (a) my scrap of wood was only 30″ long and (b) it just happens to be exactly the right size for my rack.

In this shot you can see the angle cuts:

This is where having a gigantic miter saw really paid off. I was able to make those 22.5 degree bevel cuts right on the Makita. You can also use a portable circular saw, a good straight edge, and a steady hand.

Why 22.5 degrees? Because if you cut your lumber equally you’ll make a hexagon. I wanted a hexagon-like shape for my box, since I didn’t want it to look like a cube. The other huge added benefit it that the angled parts allow my feet to clear — if I made a cube my my pedals/feet would have whacked into the box. Luckily, my aesthetic choice was also a good usability choice.

The sides were glued up and allowed to dry using a strap clamp to hold it in place (this was a big pain and the hardest part of the project).

If you look carefully in the above photo you can see that I also used small pieces (cut at 45 degree angles) as braces. Why 45 degrees? Because 45 + 22.5 + 22.5 = 90. Geometry in action. The braces are glued in and then bradded (using 2″ brads — thank goodness for my DeWalt nail gun).

Again, by lucky happenstance, my scrap lumber and it’s dimensions lead me to one very important conclusion: It’s ideally sized to hold a 6 pack of bottled beer. If you are going to build your own, make sure it can accommodate 6″ x 8″ x 10″ tall. Unless you drink from cans, then you can reduce the height.

For the back, I used a piece of scrap 5mm plywood held in place with brads. You can use 1x if you have it (I was out). The bottom is another piece of high-quality 1×12 that I’ve had around. It’s held in place with about eight 1 5/8″ deck screws. Make sure the bottom is fastened well — it’s the primary mounting point to the bike.

Now that I knew this would hold beer, or a picnic lunch, or both, it was important to add some insulation. Two reasons for this: (a) to keep stuff cool in the hot Texas summer and (b) to keep things from rattling around while I’m riding.

I had some spare garage door insulator lying around (it’s like silvered bubble swap) which would work perfectly:

The insulation on the sides is one piece, held in place with construction adhesive. The bottom is more insulation, but is NOT adhered to the bottom. It has to be removable so that you can bolt the box to the bike rack.

This being Austin, I knew that I couldn’t leave the box plain black. That would be too boring. So we finally put to use some of the many, many bottle caps we have collected:

The caps are hot glued to a piece of Kommerling Komacel. Komacel is a plastic material that is weatherproof, cuts like wood, and can be purchased in a variety of colors. It’s a great material to work with. We had a scrap of white, so I spray painted it matte black. The resulting panel is then mounted to the rear 5mm back using 4 machine screws and nuts.

You can see that the top is cut to mirror the shape of the box, has the edges rounded over, and then mounted with a single hinge. Since I was out of larger boards, I biscuited and glued up two 1×6 boards and then cut to shape. Insulation was also glued into place so that the entire box is insulated.

Next up, some designs for the side:

A nighttime test ride:

I’ll try and get some photos of how the box gets mounted to the rack, and some more of the top.

For the final touches, we’ll decorate the sides some more, and probably put a latch (perhaps magnetic) on the lid so it doesn’t bounce around. (I noticed a little movement in the top — mainly because I used a cheap leftover hinge. If you have one, use a piano hinge.)

Our prototype panel is above. We decided that the black background looked better than white.