The Great Porteur Rack Contemplation

Living in West Oakland and commuting to San Francisco, a single speed is kind of an ideal form of transportation: not so nice that I'm freaked out it will get stolen, not so expensive that if it does get stolen I'll be plunged into depression and financial crisis, but fast and fun and easy to tinker with.  As such, it is my most frequented steed, and like many other irrational cyclists, I have decided to defy logic and attempt to transform the one bicycle I own with only one speed into the one bicycle I own that hauls stuff.

As a beer loving, pizza getting, petfood lugging, car averse person, naturally I want to be able to haul more crap on my bike.  And the porteur seems like a perfect option- easy, light, and not horrendous on the eyes.  My first crush was on the Cetma 5-rail when I saw people zipping around town with those industrial, bomb proof looking racks made of coolness.  Really.  They are pretty hot, plus they seem to imply on their website that the rack is strong enough for you to haul your drunk friends around.  Which is obviously crazy appealing.

The Cetma porteur (from bikecommuters.com)

The Cetma rack:  bomb proof design, carries drunk friends, back support rails that attach to the handlebars via slightly wonky looking Wald brackets, 2.6 pounds, made by a dude in Eugene/now Venice Beach.  $140.

But the more I got thinking, the more I was wondering if I was overestimating my true needs for hauling on my single speed.  Will I really be regularly hauling around 60 pounds of dried cement or my drunk friends, or do I just need to be able to carry some unwieldy cases of beer groceries around  and pick up a pizza?  Would there be an advantage to the Soma/Velo Orange porteur in weight, aesthetics, or value as opposed to the Cetma?

So, enter the Soma Porteur.  Doesn't have the back rails that attach to the handlebars like the Cetma.  But pretty with a more cohesive look, less expensive, and totally ready to haul pizza and beer. A huge advantage is the ability to hang panniers on the horizontal bar on the side supports.  And I would imagine (although I don't know for sure), much lighter.  MSRP $115 (but seems to be easily procured for under $90 on the Interwebs).

Soma Porteur with Soma Torpedo light (Image by somaflickrations).

Also in the running is the Velo Orange Porteur.  The most expensive at $160, and even so it is always sold out.  Very well designed, which is typical of Velo Orange products.  Seems like it has a more simple design on the support structure that attaches to the front axle than does the Soma Porteur.

(from the Boston Retro Wheelmen)

My conclusion after reading extensively about all of these (and many others) but actually having tried exactly none of them is that the Soma Porteur is probably the best value for people with a front brake hole drilled in their fork and who meet at least two of the following criteria:

1.  Work for money
2.  Don't have to work hauling heavy objects on their bicycles to earn that money
3. Want a chrome rack
4.  Are rational

For the rest of us that insist on overbuilding bicycles to meet physical needs that they will rarely fulfill, or who manage to surround themselves with a pack of miscreants whose drunk asses they anticipate having to drape over their bicycles, the only way to roll is the CETMA.