what's a good water bottle cage that's sturdy and reliable? I fell sucker to one of those ebay glass fiber $4 a pop piece of crap that can barely secure an empty bottle much less than a full water bottle. I want to get the plastic specialized rib cage, which supposedly can secure a bottle, even upside down. But I’m weary about spending $40+ on a pair of water bottle cages. It's a shame there aren't any other cages that use that design. I hear Tacx Tao is good, but I’ve also read that the plastic can deform under the sun. Any other suggestions?

I still use the old metal kind. I've never lost a bottle out of one. Maybe not the lightest, but are you really going to notice the difference in weight?

Spending $40 on a pair of cages would make me "weary" too.

If you want to roll in style, there's really only one option:

Arundel Sport

https://www.competitivecyclist.com/pr...5569.49.1.html

I bought some knock off carbon fiber Elite cages for around $30. They look really good and are light. I can't make myself pay alot of money for bottle cages.

Actually this:



Or any other similar cage made from 6mm aluminum rod.

Cost is $3.99. It will hold a bottle securely. When it eventually gets loose, you just bend it back. It will eventually fail from fatigue, and you'll need to replace it every 25,000 miles or so.

Spending any more for a water bottle cage ( with a few limited exceptions, such as needing a side loading cage to fit a frame, or a aero bottle for a TT bike) is simply vanity. ( which admittedly I'm not above.)

Elite custom run $15-20/ea on amazon. Got 4 for all our bikes on there and have had no problems with them whatsoever.

How is $30 not a lot?

I've had very good luck with the Profile Design Kage.

It is cheap, has been durable thus far, and I have yet to loose a bottle. The downside is the limited number of colors available, but black works for me.

neither am I. oh no. what have I become!!


But really, this design is really common, but it's really apparent that the bottle goes in very easily, and that tongue is really flexible, which means the bottle falls out pretty easily.

I use the same ... got em for $8 each from the UK.

They were WAY too tight with standard Specialized water bottles, so I had to cut the rubber piece in half. Now they work very well, except I lost a bottle once when I hit a HUGE pothole (wasn't paying attention).

They don't. I've used cages like that for years and never launched a bottle from one, or seen a bottle launched from one. If they get a little loose, you just bend them back to whrr they're tight.

They will eventually die of fatigue, but at $4 every 10-15 years, you can replace them in perpetuity from the investment earnings on what you would have spent on a CF cage.

I'm not sure how to answer your question. It's all relative.

I like the Specialized Rib Cages. I buy them at full price from a local store, I think they're now $20 each, and they used to be $15. Plastic, reasonably light (39g according to my scale) and I've never dropped a bottle out of them. They're tight at first (I'm using CamelBak Podium bottles generally speaking) but they loosen up after a bit.

For one spot, because the bike's main triangle is small, I got the side loading version of the same cage. It's a bit easier to pull a bottle out of it but it's also super secure. When I say "secure" I'm talking roads where people's brake levers shifted on their bars, their bars twisted in the stem, clinchers get pinch flatted, and other people's bottles went flying ("depth charging"). These are typically in races where you don't have much choice in riding through something or not - swerving is one of the most dangerous things to do in a group of riders - so even though it would have been simple to avoid those bumps if we were riding solo it would have been extremely selfish to take out a bunch of others just to avoid dropping a bottle.

A tongue in cheek review of the cage (because weight isn't all that), back when they were $15 each:
https://sprinterdellacasa.blogspot.co...ds-for-30.html

btw I've dropped bottles out of those Elite cages pictured in the same post, hence my changing out of them. And yes I know about bending them in and all that.

The only reason I "upgraded" to the Elite plastic cages was not because of weight, but rather the cages are nicer to my frame and my bottles. The aluminum cages tore my bottles to shreds, and I had to apply tape to the back side to avoid scratching my frame.

1) Who cares about water bottles. They wear out and you replace them, as they get ugly, and grunchy.

2) How can a water bottle scratch your frame? They only touch the frame at the two water bottle bosses. If the paint/finish is scratched off there it doesn't matter, given that it is covered by the water bottle.

I was talking about the elite custom cage, not the old school alu cages.

I've had a great experience with the Lezyne Flow HP cages, I got them for $10 each off ebay.

I've been running American Classic Bottle cages since 1992. No Problems with them. Kinda cool that the 15 or so road bikes I've been through, those cages are still the only things that have been on all my bikes.

Looks like this:

1. I do. Why have a cage that rips them up, when you can have a cage that doesn't for the same price? Also, when the paint wears off the aluminum cage (at least the one I was using), it starts to mark everything it touches (i.e. the bottle, hands/gloves, etc) with aluminum oxide.

2. The cage can easily scratch the frame, especially on my older frame that doesn't have raised bottle bosses. I have a mark right in between the bosses to prove it. Once again, price being the same, why not have plastic over metal? That said, I'm certainly not going to spend $20+ for cages.

I also care about my bottles. I have a pair of precious Podium Ice bottles, which have twice the insulation of the Podium Chill. For some reason they're no longer available, and since they keep the water/ice ice cold for 2 hours in 95 deg F heat I really like them. In fact most of my bottles are on the expensive side now, 4 insulated ones, a couple team ones. I have some throwaways that I use too but still, the plastic is nice. No marring, no gray stuff on your fingers or running down the frame after it gets wet, etc.

I have a couple of King Cage Iris cages waiting to go on my next bike when I finally get it built up. A hair under 50 grams so not terribly heavy, $17 so a little bit more expensive than merlin's aluminum, stainless steel to satisfy my retro grouch needs, and oh so pretty for my vanity.

They are great. Definitely won't lose your bottle in one of those cages.

I got Chinese carbon for under $30 for a pair. They seem very secure. Similar to this:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/2pcs-Carbon-...item3cd35f635c