Baco (the British Aluminum Corporation) are most notorious for making aluminium foil used in cooking; I found that they are also a retail aluminium stockholder with a branch nearby, in Reading.

After casting around for a company to manufacture a luggage rack for my DRZ-400S – and finding prices in the 350+ Euro range – I elected to build one for myself in Aluminium, to my own design. I roughed-up a model in cardboard [www.crypticide.com] worked out the lengths of the 27 bits that it involves, created a nice clean spreadsheet and faxed a request to Baco for a price.

Total: 31 quid.

Time and materials will jack up the price somewhat, but the difference is astonishing. Now, of course, I have to assemble it.