Fabric Cageless Water Bottle: Rider Review

Our "Rider Review" article series features honest reviews from verified purchasers of Worldwide Cyclery. They contain the photos, thoughts, feedback & overall review you are looking for. 

Mountain bikes are always progressing with the usual things like suspension, build materials, or weight. Every once in a while a company will come along and change something that is usually overlooked. Our friend David shares his experience with the Fabric Cageless Water Bottle. Check it out! 

We all know the underside of a downtube is a terrible place for a water bottle cage. Besides getting the bottle all dirty, it leaves the cage open to getting hung up on debris, brush, rocks or more when not in use. When I purchased the Fabric Cageless water bottle and mount, I wanted to eliminate the risk associated with a standard cage on the bottom of the downtube but increase water capacity on longer rides without the use of a hydration pack. The Fabric water bottle uses plastic knobs on the bike and a proprietary bottle to fasten to those clips. Its a simple concept and saw some mixed reviews online but figured it was worth a try. I was only using the one water bottle mount on my hardtail so there wasn't much risk.

Installation was straight forward, install the 2 knobs, fill the water bottle, place the water bottle on the knobs, and go ride. Well, then pick your bottle off the trail, place it back on the bike. Ride another mile, pick the bottle back up, then continue to ride. Pick up the bottle again off the trail, a friend runs over the bottle (withstood just fine). Place in friends backpack, continue the ride. So I wasn't too impressed. Keep in mind, this all occurred at one of the easier riding destinations in NJ, so I wasn't doing 10' huck-to-flats. This was going over bunches of root or mild rock gardens. It actually held up better going off small jumps and drops but wound up falling off during those eventually as well.

Perhaps this Fabric water bottle would perform better if it was installed inside the triangle. The plastic of the bottle is not terribly rigid which facilitates an easy squeeze when drinking. The plastic is reinforced around the clips. Just to confirm, I did check multiple times if the bottle was secured properly to the knobs and it was, only to fall of shortly thereafter. However, with my homemade Velcro custom-crafted strap-a-bottle, this bottle performed much better. I cut maybe 18" of Velcro strap ($15 on Amazon for a 75' roll) and it works great. Since this is a long term storage solution, ease of access is not important. For reference, I placed the soft side of the Velcro down towards the frame to minimize scratches. This is fine for a cheaper hardtail, but an inadequate solution for your carbon beauty.

Final Thoughts

If I was purchasing again, I would spend the extra on something like the Fidlock system which MIGHT perform better.  On the bright side, the bottle holds water well, it easy to dispense into your mouth, and hasn't gotten banged up despite all its encounters with the ground.