How to move Simple Shoulder Strap's Pad to other side of slide adjuster?

[daaarn]

I'm trying to adjust my Daylight Briefcase's shoulder strap so that the entire bag doesn't dangle as low [currently the bottom of the bag hangs about 3in above my kneecap which is okay, but there's a good amount of pendulous bag movement when I walk so I want to get it closer to my core], but I'm having an issue. To adjust the strap to my desired length, that forces the shoulder pad all to way to one side. I'm wanting to move the pad over to the "double strap" side so I can center it and actually use it, but the slide adjuster buckle is in the way. Is there a good method to move the pad over to the other side?

[gadgets]

I had the same problem, and I couldn't figure out any solution but to cut off the rubber (plastic?) shoulder pad. I bought a TB Ultrasude Shoulder Strap Wrap.

https://www.tombihn.com/collections/...nt=16645280135

You could buy a cheaper one from Amazon, but TB one fits like a glove, better quality, and the price difference is not that much.

If you don't carry heavy, I think you can carry without the pad.

[daaarn]

I had the same problem, and I couldn't figure out any solution but to cut off the rubber (plastic?) shoulder pad. I bought a TB Ultrasude Shoulder Strap Wrap.

https://www.tombihn.com/collections/...nt=16645280135

You could buy a cheaper one from Amazon, but TB one fits like a glove, better quality, and the price difference is not that much.

If you don't carry heavy, I think you can carry without the pad.

That's what I was afraid of. The rubber pad is just so fitted on. I like using it not so much because of weight issues, so much that it provides some grip on my shoulder so it doesn't just slide off if I'm just using it on one side. Plus I feel like it's just plain less bulky, though I wonder how thin and short that ultrasuede one is.

[b1gsky]

I ordered an Ultrasuede Wrap, but haven’t used it so far because it is so big. Maybe it gets more comfortable once it’s broken in. Not sure. I cut off the shoulder pad from all of my Café Bags because I had the same issue you have. I just use them without a pad now, but I wanted to try the wrap with my MCB for days I carry a full bag.

[tress29]

I use the Ultrasuede Wrap with my CoPilot, for those days I carry books. And I'll move it to my NFTD as needed.

[gadgets]

Here are some pictures of the Ultrasuede Wrap on my DLBC. It is not too thick or bulky.

[moriond]

Hi @daaarn ,

I'm afraid that the consensus is correct: with the current thickness of the shoulder strap, there's no way to move the buckle section to the other side of the shoulder pad. This is the same problem that a number of (shorter) people had with the Small Cafe Bag Shoulder Strap (same design for the shoulder pad). With earlier versions of the shoulder strap that were not as thick, it was possible, although not easy, to move the pad to the other side of the buckle. This question came up in the 2014 thread, Small Cafe Bag for a 5 year old girl? where @Perseffect asked, soon after joining the forums, about getting a small cafe bag, and then about the possibility of adjusting the strap. Both @teresapoet and I described that it was possible to move the plastic pad to the other side of the buckle for the thinner webbing then in use, but many other people adopted the solutions suggested here, or cutting the pad off and/or using the Ultrasuede strap wrap. I'll quote my answer here, since it also includes a video about using the Ultrasuede Strap Wrap on the Cafe bag. (Clicking on the arrow to the top right of the quoted section will take you to the parent thread). Note that the thickness of the current strap does not make it possible to slide the pad past the buckle.

teresapoet[/MENTION] is correct: If you slide the edge of the buckle so it sits next to the plastic grippy strap, press against the two sides of the plastic strap end to make it flex and curve in an arc up from the webbing of the strap. Then rotate the buckle that has the webbing threaded through it by 90 degrees, so you can push it (still threaded with the strap webbing) through the right edge of the plastic grippy strap. Straighten out the strap and do the same sort of flexing to get the buckle threaded with webbing passed through the other end of the plastic grippy strap as well.

I agree that I find the Ultrasuede Strap Wrap to be long and thick. I've found I don't have any of the issues shoulder carrying shop bags, Swifts, Little Swifts or any of the other Tom Bihn bags and having them slip off my shoulder, so I only got this as an accessory to use when I needed to hand carry other bags. Fortunately, the current Cafe Bag shoulder straps are all soft and pliable enough to shift the plastic strap grip over the buckle, since they switched to the older style straps last November 2013, as reported by Darcy in the Cafe Bag Strap Changes? thread; this is much tougher to do with my Small Cafe Bag in Azalea, which has a stiff strap. Here's the link to the video on Installing the Tom Bihn Ultrasuede Shoulder Strap Wrap that @maverick made, where you can clearly see both the Ultrasuede Strap Wrap and the plastic strap grip, so my instructions might make more sense.



By the way, another vote in favor of the Plum/Wasabi Small Cafe Bag color combination chosen by @Perseffect . I ordered one of these as soon as I was able to confirm the newer, more flexible straps were being used again. The only reason that I didn't already have it is that (1) this was also the favorite color combination of a friend, who chose it for her Small Cafe Bag, and (2) I use the Little Swift more than Cafe Bags, or else a horizontal messenger bag (like the retired Imago) for larger bags. In the Cafe Bag line, I use the Small Cafe Bag most.

You can carry an iPad in a Cache inside the Small Cafe Bag. It's just that the top of the Cache will go up to the top of the bag. I'd estimate the iPad in a Cache takes up nearly 40% of the Small Cafe Bag (using the older style iPad padded caches that have the denser foam that I prefer-- newer caches seem to have tighter fits).

To @dorayme, @maverick, and @monkeylady I loved seeing the pictures of the kids wearing these bags! I had to restrain myself from pointing to @dorayme's pictures of Zuri modeling the Side Effect in punch in another forum thread to avoid introducing yet another Tom Bihn bag.

Hope this all works out well. moriond

I usually use the OP/TECH USA Mini S.O.S. Strap (This is made by the same people who make the larger Absolute Strap for Tom Bihn; you can find this at various camera shops as well). The other way would be to shorten the strap or use strap retainers, but this wouldn't be very satisfactory.

HTH

moriond

[BihnBag]

I usually use the OP/TECH USA Mini S.O.S. Strap (This is made by the same people who make the larger Absolute Strap for Tom Bihn; you can find this at various camera shops as well). The other way would be to shorten the strap or use strap retainers, but this wouldn't be very satisfactory.

Great to know!

Seems the absolute strap is the OP/TECH Curve but with different buckles.

That is useful for replacements for people outside the USA, and that mini SOS strap does seem like it could be great for the DLBC for eg.

I don't think it will fit the cafe bag though will it? Cafe bag has fixed straps attached.

[BWeaves]

Why don't you cut strap off the back of the buckle. Shorten the strap, and resew it?

[b1gsky]

You could also ask Customer Service if they are willing to make a shorter strap for you. They made me a shorter 1" shoulder strap a while ago when I asked because the regular strap was quite long for me and I wanted to have the option to wear the bag kind of sling style.

[daaarn]

Hi @daaarn ,

I'm afraid that the consensus is correct: with the current thickness of the shoulder strap, there's no way to move the buckle section to the other side of the shoulder pad. This is the same problem that a number of (shorter) people had with the Small Cafe Bag Shoulder Strap (same design for the shoulder pad). With earlier versions of the shoulder strap that were not as thick, it was possible, although not easy, to move the pad to the other side of the buckle. This question came up in the 2014 thread, Small Cafe Bag for a 5 year old girl? where @Perseffect asked, soon after joining the forums, about getting a small cafe bag, and then about the possibility of adjusting the strap. Both @teresapoet and I described that it was possible to move the plastic pad to the other side of the buckle for the thinner webbing then in use, but many other people adopted the solutions suggested here, or cutting the pad off and/or using the Ultrasuede strap wrap. I'll quote my answer here, since it also includes a video about using the Ultrasuede Strap Wrap on the Cafe bag. (Clicking on the arrow to the top right of the quoted section will take you to the parent thread). Note that the thickness of the current strap does not make it possible to slide the pad past the buckle.


I usually use the OP/TECH USA Mini S.O.S. Strap (This is made by the same people who make the larger Absolute Strap for Tom Bihn; you can find this at various camera shops as well). The other way would be to shorten the strap or use strap retainers, but this wouldn't be very satisfactory.

HTH

moriond

Is the Ultrasuede pad heavy? I had a TB standard shoulder strap with the slight padding on it and it always felt a little too bulky for my tastes.

The weird thing is, I dont think the length of my old TB Medium Cafe bag ever bothered me. I think it’s the extra inches you add to the newer clip on straps that’s causing the issue because you’re adding more length to the total versus the older designs when the attachment sites were more or less flush with the rest of the bag. If only they used a smaller clip because that plastic can sometimes jab my back too when the bag shifts onto my back [I concede that I am very sensitive to things on my sides/back]

[gadgets]

The weird thing is, I dont think the length of my old TB Medium Cafe bag ever bothered me. I think it’s the extra inches you add to the newer clip on straps that’s causing the issue because you’re adding more length to the total versus the older designs when the attachment sites were more or less flush with the rest of the bag. If only they used a smaller clip because that plastic can sometimes jab my back too when the bag shifts onto my back [I concede that I am very sensitive to things on my sides/back]

DLBC changed its design a while ago; the location of the strap hooks moved from each side of the bag below the zipper line to the top (and closer to the middle) of the bag. I don't have the older DLBC, so I may be wrong, but it could be almost 4 inches higher at each end than the older one. But (this is my speculation, so correct me if I am wrong) they didn't change or shorten the strap. Hence, the bag now sits much lower. On TB's website, the guy in the video on the DLBC page wears the bag much higher (fits under his elbow), and he wears an older version. The MCB didn't get the design change, so it wears higher.

Edit: DLBC is one of my favorite TB bags, but the strap length is my only complaint. (and maybe a little better handle). No, I don't feel my Ultrasuede heavy at all. You can take it off when you carry lightly.

[moriond]

Hi @BihnBag , @daaarn , and others.

First, for people who want to use the OP/TECH USA Mini S.O.S. Strap, here's comparison photo that shows the Mini S.O.S. strap and the Absolute Strap. I'll quote part of an old post that shows these two straps with a Field Journal Notebook (the original context was providing a hack that allowed people who wanted to carry more in the the FJN --- sets of water colors, etc. --- to adapt the FJN so that a wider range of shoulder straps capable of supporting more weight could be used; the Mini S.O.S. strap was the one that I recommended, and I shot the photo so that people could get a sense of how much smaller the Mini S.O.S. strap was -- it's also not as thick as the Absolute Strap, although you can't see that from this picture):

Hi @Crinodea,

I'll point you to the old ORDERING THE PCSB, shoulder strap confusion thread. My post #17 has a picture that shows the relative thickness of the Absolute Strap and OpTech Mini SOS strap.


I generally use the OpTech Mini SOS strap with my Co-Pilot.

HTH

moriond

ETA: Why do you think that the padded part of the shoulder on the OpTech Mini SOS strap will be thicker than you want? Are you using your experience of the Absolute Strap as a point of comparison?

Great to know!

Seems the absolute strap is the OP/TECH Curve but with different buckles.

That is useful for replacements for people outside the USA, and that mini SOS strap does seem like it could be great for the DLBC for eg.

I don't think it will fit the cafe bag though will it? Cafe bag has fixed straps attached.

Here's another solution that may work for the Cafe bags if you want to cut off the plastic shoulder pad. I find the UltraSuede Shoulder strap more than I need for the Cafe Bags. This is an alternative solution that was proposed by @celtical in an old thread about the Daylight Briefcase from 2014. In the specific context of the post, these luggage handle wraps were being used to wrap around the webbing of the twin webbing handles when the bag was being hand-carried, but this works for a wide variety of cases. I'm going to excerpt part of a quote my post [#2, dated 11-01-2016] in the Ultrasuede Shoulder Strap Wrap for S25 One hand carry? thread:

Hi @phelan,

The Utrasuede Shoulder Strap Wrap you're asking about is both too long, and way too stiff to be used around the webbing loop at the top of the Synapse 25. (It's designed for the use around the Cafe Bag shoulder straps). If you want something that you can wrap around the webbing loop, try the COSMOS neoprene padded handle wraps recommended by @celtical . I recently mentioned them in this post (#23) in a thread discussing ways to cope with scratchy handle materials in some recent Swifts. That post showed pictures of these handle wraps used with the Swift handles, the Synapse 19 webbing loop, and the webbing handles of the Field Journal Notebook, to give some example:

@jess, I don't think that the material is Cordura. My guess that it is pack cloth that was reinforced. (See @adalangdon's response in this thread). One solution that I posted up on Ravelry, but which doesn't seem to have gotten a lot of attention, is to use the neoprene handle wraps @celtical originally recommended that were mentioned recently in this post.

The COSMOS neoprene padded handle wraps are short enough at 5.3”/275 mm to work as padded grab handle wraps for the Cafe Bags, Synapses, Daylight Backpacks, etc. as well as for the webbing handles of the Daylight Briefcase. I’ll add that this will also work as a strap wrap for the Swift, although I’ve never had to use one for my Swift or Little Swift.


Here’s a picture of the COSMOS neoprene padded handle wrap around a Swift, with the unwrapped handle wrap shown to the right.


Demo photos showing that this wrap is soft and flexible enough to work with many other webbing handle loop uses -- such as for a Synapse or for a Field Journal Notebook. Again, an unwrapped handle wrap is shown in the upper right. It’s a little longer than the length of a Mini organizer pouch or clear organizer wallet. A size #4 Knitting Tool Pouch is slightly larger, but better approximates the unwrapped size.

On the Swift, it’s the fact that the padded portions of the handle are under the wrap that makes the wrapped section look straight -- not the fact that the handle wrap lacks softness and flexibility. The usual issue with finding a good handle wrap to use for these purposes is that they’re too long and/or too stiff to work well. So, while I can’t give you a “feel” of the wrap in these pictures, I can show instances where it is really flexible.

If you read the original post I linked, there are links to other colors of handle wraps, or you can search for them yourself. Black should work for most purposes.

HTH

moriond

Those padded neoprene handle wraps can also be used around the webbing loops at the top of Cafe Bags. If you want a post that gives the original citation to @celtical 's recommendation, and which links to other colors of handle wraps (beside the basic black version I linked above), but without pictures, you can also read my post #7 in the Synapse 25 handle hack thread. You can also follow the links in adjacent posts in that thread, e.g., to find pictures of @Ilkyway's Synapse 25 and what I did to it thread, which contains many more pictures and links in later posts to different ways of adding Paracord Cobra wraps around the handle (and tying different cord pulls). @nealopp also had a picture of how the Cobra weave could be used around the handles of other travel bags.


HTH

moriond

Is the Ultrasuede pad heavy? I had a TB standard shoulder strap with the slight padding on it and it always felt a little too bulky for my tastes.

The weird thing is, I dont think the length of my old TB Medium Cafe bag ever bothered me. I think it’s the extra inches you add to the newer clip on straps that’s causing the issue because you’re adding more length to the total versus the older designs when the attachment sites were more or less flush with the rest of the bag. If only they used a smaller clip because that plastic can sometimes jab my back too when the bag shifts onto my back [I concede that I am very sensitive to things on my sides/back]

Just in case you want direct evidence that the linked COSMOS Neoprene Handle Wraps work with the current small cafe bag straps, here's a picture that I quickly shot of one of those same wraps around a recent Small Cafe in Nebulous Grey. The plastic pad has not been cut off the Small Cafe Bag, and is on one side of the Neoprene Handle Wrap. These are lighter weight, and also shorter in length than the Ultrasuede Strap Wrap (reference the other pictures that I shot with this Handle Wrap around other bags)


HTH

moriond

ETA: You may find other luggage handle wraps will also work. I check the product links to make sure that they are working in my posts, so there is enough information for you to find them from another source.