Front racks certainly are handy for carrying gear on your bike, but you might not necessarily want one on there all the time – plus, installing one can be a fiddly process. The Jack rack, however, is designed to quickly mount on and come off of almost any upright bicycle.
Invented by Luke Cardew and designed by Miles Gibbons, the Jack features a frame made of a single formed length of 304 stainless steel rod. It can reportedly be installed on a bike – or removed – in less than one minute.
Users start by hooking the frame onto their handlebars, via a couple of recycled nylon shims that go on either side of the handlebar stem's face plate. Next, a loading strap made of climbing-grade webbing is slung beneath the stem, running from one of those hooks to the other. Finally, a retention strap is looped from the front of the rack around behind the bike's steerer tube, then tightened down and secured utilizing a stainless steel cam buckle.
Loads of up to 5 kg (11 lb) can subsequently be placed on the Jack's removable military-grade fabric base, then secured to the rack's frame via an included set of bungee cords or cam-buckled webbing straps. The whole rig reportedly tips the scales at 700 g (1.5 lb), plus it's claimed to be compatible with most handlebars – flat or dropped – and stems.
Should you be interested, the Jack rack is currently the subject of a Kickstarter campaign. Assuming it reaches production, a pledge of £58 (about US$79) will get you a complete setup. You can see it in use, in the following video.
Sources: Kickstarter, WholeGrain Cycles