The Koala Magnetic system attaches a water bottle to your frame via witchcraft magnets. A magnetic mount and corresponding bottle collar tethers your beverage and bicycle. The whole kit runs $27 and includes a BPA free water bottle, coated magnetic ring, a recyclable plastic bottle cage with preinstalled magnets, and two 5 mm bolts with washers. All of which are manufactured in the US.
Via Koala
If high-strength magnets are involved, i’d have rather seen a super-minimalist “cage” the bottle affixed to (like the size of a pack of gum). This cage is pretty much the same size as a standard one…Seems like a somewhat misplaced application of technology, but i’ll give it credit for beating the heck out of the last great bottle innovation – CleanBottle – for looks and usability.
I’ve used Koala bottle and the magnets are impressively strong. I haven’t ejected a bottle with it yet (though I haven’t ever ejected a bottle from my Arundel cages either). One bonus is that you can use the Koala water bottle in any regular cage. You cannot use a non-Koala bottle in the Koala cage unless you add magnets to it. With the bottle removed it does take up a little bit less space than a regular cage, so it could be good for cyclocross. The other perk over Vincero is that the bottle isn’t directional. Vincero has only one position on the bottle with magnets so you really have to aim to get it in. The open design, plus magnets make it a really good option for smaller frames that may otherwise require a sideloader.
I’m all for bottle cage and water bottle innovation, but make them mutually exclusive! If I can’t use my favorite water bottles (purist and camelbak) then I’m not going to buy your cage. Either come up with a system for the most popular water bottles to work on your cage or license the idea to the bigger companies so it’ll take off.
Several friends and I bought the Vincero Designs bottles and mounts and all of us have gotten rid of them or stopped using them. The biggest problem was that you can’t move the bottle in your hand after you grip it to remove it. If you change your grip to drink out of it, it won’t line up to go back on the mount. Also the larger sized bottle would jump off the mount if you hit a hole in the road. I never had any of the smaller bottles fall out, but the big bottles would fall out if they were full.
This product seems to have addressed the problem with getting the bottle back in the mount, but I don’t see where its any better than regular cages.
I just rode Southern Cross. 50 miles of rutted out fire roads at high speeds. Alot of people lost alot of bottles. I used the koala bottle and I didn’t lose a bottle, i didn’t worry about it and it made no noise. I am a bicycle courier and use the koala bottle everyday and the newest iteration of koala bottle works really well.
My Koala bottles just arrived for some test mileage before I think about stocking them – the magnets are impressively strong (initially thought I must have failed to remove a zip tie or something because it seemed too tricky to get the bottle off of the cage!) and I was sent a couple of extra rings to fit onto other bottles.
I reckon these would be perfect in a race situation or, at the other end of the scale, for beginners / those not comfortable taking a drink in traffic / those not confident riding one-handed (my girlfriend fits this demographic).
