2023 Wish List

[moriond]

I just hope there is another run of Little Swifts, preferably in some shade of turquoise, teal, or green. The aubergine is quite nice too.

Very much hoping for little Swift restocks! black halcyon or grey ballistic and açaí would look fantastic i think

Just wanted dialetheia and ridetohounds to know that Little Swifts are currently showing up in production with the following color options

Aubergine Ballistic/Sangria 210 Cerylon
Constellation Ballistic/Moab 200 Halcyon
Deep Blue Ballistic/Açai 200 Halcyon
Burnt Orange 1050d Ballistic/Northwest Sky 200 Halcyon
Black Ballistic /Cobalt 210 Cerylon
Logic Blue 630 Recycled/Mountain 210 Cerylon

[dialetheia]

Thank you, moriond! I thought I would like the aubergine, but I already have a pop tote in that color & wasn't sure about the red cerylon lining they chose for this run. I ended up going with the deep blue + açai halcyon, which I think will be lovely & should complement all my other various bags quite nicely.

[G42]

Yarn Stuff Sacks please, including the Tall

[NC Penguin]

I absolutely love my Side Kick but it is nebulous grey and I live in NC so it's not a good bag for the summer or when the temperature is over 90F. I'd like to get another Side Kick but would prefer a lighter color that won't absorb heat in the warm to hot temperature where I live. So, please produce Side Kick in yellow, orange, or other summery colors so the contents of a Side Kick don't heat up or melt. Thanks!

[G42]

Welcome to the Forums NC Penguin !

Very pretty state, but definitely toasty hot down there, don't blame you for wanting a lighter colour! They have made the SK in Cloud ballistic before, which is a lighter grey than the Nebulous, and probably the lightest exterior colour they have used.

[Chicagoan]

I absolutely love my Side Kick but it is nebulous grey and I live in NC so it's not a good bag for the summer or when the temperature is over 90F. I'd like to get another Side Kick but would prefer a lighter color that won't absorb heat in the warm to hot temperature where I live. So, please produce Side Kick in yellow, orange, or other summery colors so the contents of a Side Kick don't heat up or melt. Thanks!

Ironically the first bag I ever bought from this company was a Black Halcyon Side Kick for the specific purpose of using it as a theme park bag at Disney World (thinking cooler to carry a crossbody and allow my back to vent than trap heat with a backpack).

Different strokes, I guess!

But if they made one in Coyote Ballistic, or Xpac, I'd happily buy another!

[moriond]

Welcome to the Forums NC Penguin !

Very pretty state, but definitely toasty hot down there, don't blame you for wanting a lighter colour! They have made the SK in Cloud ballistic before, which is a lighter grey than the Nebulous, and probably the lightest exterior colour they have used.

One of the nice early color combinations for the Side Kick was Cloud/Viridian.Viridian is now a retired color, but the combination looked like this:

[Chicagoan]

Seeing that picture of the Cloud/Viridian SK really has me wishing for a Teal Cerylon or Halcyon.

[pbhatia]

I hope the Synik can get slightly updated with the skeleton back panel that's on the newer bags like the Techonaut

[G42]

I hope the Synik can get slightly updated with the skeleton back panel that's on the newer bags like the Techonaut

Welcome to the Forums pbhatia !

That skeleton back panel is pretty cool

[theedge]

Hi,

A slightly smaller cambiata, maybe around 16L volume would be great ! With that volume it should fit within the strict 16x12x6 inch limit of EU personal item dimensions thus making it even more versatile.

[Chicagoan]

Hi,

A slightly smaller cambiata, maybe around 16L volume would be great ! With that volume it should fit within the strict 16x12x6 inch limit of EU personal item dimensions thus making it even more versatile.

Let me piggyback on this because I think it's a request often overlooked...

Smaller bags comaptible with taller people. Not made for. Not specifically larger torso, taller bags for "six feet and up" or whatever. But bags with enough strap length that I don't get choked out by a sternum strap.

I actually REALLY liked the size of the L12 and Zeitgeist, but the straps were way too short.

So you guys made the L15. Life was good. I bought one and loved it so much I actually bought a second one as a "backup," and while normally that would seem redundant, you guys ultimately retired the bag and I was glad to have picked up a spare while I still had the chance.

But for all us out there who make short commutes or just don't carry a lot of stuff, and are on the taller side, I wish there was more representation of smaller bags for taller people.

I'm sure there are folks out there who are shorter and want larger bags that fit them, too, but maybe - so long as we're considering reviving retired heritage designs, it would be awesome if their new incarnation could be made a little more universal in fitment.

[John1970]

Let me piggyback on this because I think it's a request often overlooked...

Smaller bags comaptible with taller people. Not made for. Not specifically larger torso, taller bags for "six feet and up" or whatever. But bags with enough strap length that I don't get choked out by a sternum strap.

I actually REALLY liked the size of the L12 and Zeitgeist, but the straps were way too short.

So you guys made the L15. Life was good. I bought one and loved it so much I actually bought a second one as a "backup," and while normally that would seem redundant, you guys ultimately retired the bag and I was glad to have picked up a spare while I still had the chance.

But for all us out there who make short commutes or just don't carry a lot of stuff, and are on the taller side, I wish there was more representation of smaller bags for taller people.

I'm sure there are folks out there who are shorter and want larger bags that fit them, too, but maybe - so long as we're considering reviving retired heritage designs, it would be awesome if their new incarnation could be made a little more universal in fitment.

Yes! I was disappointed to find (as the TBC confirmed) that the shoulder strap webbing on the Addax 26 had been reduced from what is on the Synik and Synapse by several inches at least--it made the bag unusable for me and I had to return it.

[Chicagoan]

Yes! I was disappointed to find (as the TBC confirmed) that the shoulder strap webbing on the Addax 26 had been reduced from what is on the Synik and Synapse by several inches at least--it made the bag unusable for me and I had to return it.

Same. I liked the design of the ADX but the larger size was too big for me to carry around as my EDC. I bought a 26 and had to return it for the same exact reason.

It's frustrating because it forces taller people into larger bags and shorter people into smaller bags and - as wild as this sounds - have they ever considered fully detachable straps that could be replaced with a short or tall version?

I admire Jose for coming in with strong choices on his first pack design (roll top! exterior AND side water bottle pocket! skeleton vented mesh back panel!) and am excited to see what he comes up with next.

Maybe we won't ever get to see the Trinity, but after a long parade of vintage throwback designs, I'm really cheering for something new that might have a feature or two we haven't seen before on a Tom Bihn bag.

[moriond]

Let me piggyback on this because I think it's a request often overlooked...

Smaller bags comaptible with taller people. Not made for. Not specifically larger torso, taller bags for "six feet and up" or whatever. But bags with enough strap length that I don't get choked out by a sternum strap.

I actually REALLY liked the size of the L12 and Zeitgeist, but the straps were way too short.

So you guys made the L15. Life was good. I bought one and loved it so much I actually bought a second one as a "backup," and while normally that would seem redundant, you guys ultimately retired the bag and I was glad to have picked up a spare while I still had the chance.

But for all us out there who make short commutes or just don't carry a lot of stuff, and are on the taller side, I wish there was more representation of smaller bags for taller people.

I'm sure there are folks out there who are shorter and want larger bags that fit them, too, but maybe - so long as we're considering reviving retired heritage designs, it would be awesome if their new incarnation could be made a little more universal in fitment.

Chicagoan
Interesting comment on the strap lengths for the Luminary 12 and the Zeitgeist. Take a look at my post and comment in the Ultimate Strap Keepers method started by shoplarry in 10-13-2019.

I showed different ways that I rolled the straps and secured them with a strap keeper. Some of the pictures were based on tests we did on versions of the strap keepers that were sent out to the mods for testing before they were made generally available (BTW, these never come with any instructions on use -- they send us a pair and see what we make of it with no guidelines). In the post that I linked, I showed pictures of how I used a Peet's Coffee tie (the plastic piece that is attached to the top of a bag of Peet's Coffee -- G42 likes to use this in place of the insert that comes with TB face masks, and I also found that it was the right size and flexibility for this, so I showed pictures of what this looked like with masks, and also how I used to use this for strap keeping control on the narrow ended Luminary 12 straps (they also work well for backpack sternum straps)

I'll quote my text comment that included the statement On the L15 Luminary in particular, the amount of extra shoulder strap length to control was really astonishingly large:

I’ve tried rolling these both ways (under and over). To answer the question below about strap lengthening, I haven’t had any issues with that when the strap keepers are on. But working with slightly longer rolls of straps, where you keep the “rolled” portion retained by the strap keeper from getting too thick, does seem to work better. I’ll reference my 10-22-2020 post (#325 in the 2020 Wish List thread) to show what one of these looks like viewed from the side and from the top on the Luminary 15. (The original photos were from a sequence of test shots that we did on early versions sent out mods in the Admin forums. My comment in the post was “On the L15 Luminary in particular, the amount of extra shoulder strap length to control was really astonishingly large”. The strap keepers debuted in August/September 2019, a few months after this bag was introduced.)

I'm going to link to a few other posts/threads that discuss backpack strap design, to show how this is generally a complicated issue.
epeterson started a thread on 12-03-2022 titled Comfortable carry for 5'6" person, narrow shoulders. In the ensuing discussion ittoujuu posted about his experience with the Shadow Guide 33 (a bag that was very comfortable for epeterson to wear in the SG23 size), as

I actually struggled some with the Shadow Guide, because I was having a difficult time getting the straps to ride comfortably on my back. I am...basically the exact opposite of you, dimensionally: a 6' guy with a broad back and shoulders. The straps are attached pretty close together at the top, and I found they were riding weirdly on my trapezius muscles, to where only half of the strap was in contact with my body, which turned those into hot points.

ittoujuu also wrote

I even e-mailed Mike about this, asking if TB could move the strap attachment points out (spoilers: they wouldn't), and he said to try removing the frame, but...I could never actually get the frame out. It felt like I was going to damage something; it was in there real good. An interesting point he made was that the SG's straps are sewn in "flat," while some other bags have their strap attachment points flare out a little bit toward the outside, which is likely a more natural fit for wider people like me. For someone with your build, I imagine it will carry pretty comfortably right out of the box. The way I eventually got it to ride well was to really tighten the shoulder straps snugly and utilize the sternum strap

This led epeterson to ask MikeV:

For both the BB and the SA, I noticed more pressure on the inner side (neck side) of the shoulder strap, whereas for the SG23, the pressure was evenly distributed. This matches your point about the attachment point "flare." MikeV would you happen to know which of the other straps are "flat" vs "flared?" In particular I'm wondering about the SG33, the S25, and both sizes of Techonaut.

MikeV replied

Hey! Sorry for the delay here- bit of a busy week for us

To a large extent the angle or flare that the shoulder straps are attached to the bag is determined by the seam they're being sewn into. On Syniks and Synapses, the rounded nature of the top of those bags gives them more of that flare. On Shadow Guides they're attached more or less square to the bag into a flat seam- the Smart Alec was pretty similar. And those examples are at the extreme ends in both regards. Many of our bags (Brain Bags, Techonauts, Aeronauts for example) are slightly rounded on the top, but less so than the Syniks. So they are sort of in the middle ground with regard to how much flare they have.

We definitely hear from a few folks who prefer one or the other, but I'd say for the most part, many people can't feel a lot of difference, especially with our Edgeless Straps. We use really nice foam and I think the amount of squish to that foam absorbs any slight difference in the angle of folks' shoulders so that you don't notice much. This does all come up in the design process and interestingly, the new Addax has the shoulder straps sewn into a flat seam, but we did attach the shoulder straps at a slight angle so that they come off the bag similarly to the Techonaut.

I hope that helps!

Editing because I didn't very directly answer your question! Those three bags you're asking about go from S25 (quite flared) to Techonaut (slightly flared) to SG (basically flat).

(Quick summary: they use different designs for the backpack strap on different model bags)

To see how complex this issue is, read the thread 12-30-2021 started by loma titled Zeitgeist straps too wide. Will they break in?
and read the posts from me and Cristina about our experience testing early prototypes of the edgeless straps, and comment regarding MikeV 's "I'd say for the most part, many people can't feel a lot of difference, especially with our Edgeless Straps." My basic conclusion from the early feedback on the edgeless strap prototypes, from people who had a lot of experience wearing different models of Tom Bihn backpacks, was that while the edgeless straps provide extra leeway for comfort of fit when the design is close to being right, they still need to get the backpack strap fit close to being correct for them to work. And there are a lot of different backpack strap designs, as MikeV mentioned.

One more data point about fitting small backpacks to larger frames. I'll mention how I did this for the Sprout backpack. I need to say that all my comments apply to the redesigned Sprout, where they modified the original Sprout design to carry letter size paper, which necessitated making the bag slightly taller and also moving the connection points for the webbing backpack straps further out. I'll just mention that since they retired the Sprout soon after the redesign, almost nobody who commented about how the Sprout couldn't work on adults had experience with the redesigned Sprout (e.g. see Tonya 's 03-08-2022 Zeitgeist vs Sprout vs Paradigm thread where all the people commenting on the Sprout had the original Sprout)

Take a look at my post (dated 08-30-2021) in the Some first impressions of the Paradigm and Zeitgeist thread started by bchaplin

I'll put up some pictures that will give you a better sense of the fit. (Sorry not to populate the FS s but work is kind of busy right now.). I'll also show for comparison the (redesigned Sprout) in 1050d Ballistic Nylon Aubergine/Northwest Sky, Zeitgeist 400d Halcyon Nightwalk/Black/Northwest Sky and Paradigm in 525d Ballistic Nylon Aubergine/Northwest Sky. These bags were provided to me by Tom Bihn with no restrictions on any review comments I should choose to make. It's easier to show the size of the Sprout's inside in inverted view, since the front face of the bag slopes down from the top zipper.


The 3 bags (Sprout, Zeitgeist and Paradigm) have similar heights (easier to see in later inverted view of Sprout), but the Sprout is wider. There's an earlier set of comparisons that I made between the original Sprout (in 1050d Aubergine/Steel that I purchased separately) in February 2018 in the Hack My Sprout thread. I also showed some pictures of how I could pack the Sprout with the (retired) Aether Packing Cubes for Mini and Small Yeoman Duffel in the The New Yeoman Duffel Aether Packing Cubes thread (to carry a lunch box, thermos, and other items) along with a Mini Yeoman Duffel. More pictures of the original Sprout's debut are in The Sprout - a Childrens Backpack thread from March 2016. Detailed instructions on how I modified the redesigned Sprout's backpack straps to fit even larger users (or heavy outerwear) appear in my post #407 dated 06-12-2018 in the 2018 Wish List thread.


Here are pictures of the Medium and Small Cafe Bag Freudian Slips in the Zeitgeist (Grass Medium CB FS) and Paradigm (Cloud Small CB FS). The inverted Sprout is shown to the left. Below the top row of bags are a soft cover A4 sized Rhodia Notebook next to US letter size paper sheets. (A4 paper is taller and narrower than US letter size paper). A sheet of letter size paper is comparable to the height of the Medium Cafe Bag FS, although, if you stick a sheet into one of the back pockets of the Medium CB Freudian Slip, the top of the paper will stick up slightly above the top of the FS.


This is intended to show that the A4 Rhodia notebook is too wide to fit into the back pockets of the Paradigm. I can warp it and force it in, and you may be able to get a few individual A4 sheets in, but those back pockets were not designed to hold A4 paper, and the wider US letter paper will not fit -- use the main compartment if you want to carry this size of paper and reserve this pocket for tablets, and smaller notebooks (e.g. A5). The Paradigm design has slightly more taper to the top than the Zeitgeist, so the fit to A4 paper in the main compartment is tighter.



This is what that A4 Rhodia notebook looks like lying on top of the back pocket. The corners are slightly pinched by the narrowing at the top of the bag.


It's easier to put into the Zeitgeist, which tapers less at the top (only an issue because the height of A4 paper extends to where these backpacks narrow).


For the Sprout, you can even insert it into the internal pocket, although putting the A4 notebook inside the main compartment directly takes the corners down a bit.



US Letter size paper width is even more challenging, but can fit -- tightest in the Paradigm at the top corners.


HTH

moriond

The quick summary is that I have links that show how the redesigned Sprout compares to the original Sprout in that Hack My Sprout thread, and that I posted the mods I used to lengthen the backpack straps of the Sprout if I wanted to allow for wearing a heavily padded jacket/coat or leave room so that the redesigned Sprout could be used in extended fashion for someone who grew taller in the linked post in the 2018 wish list. I was gratified by the number of small frame adults who commented that the redesigned Sprout worked for them, since I got almost no forum feedback on my posts.

HTH

moriond