Hi folks,

I'm new to motorcycles and new to the forum. I've looked for a similar question to this but haven't found one. Sorry if I'm duplicating.

I'm a student of Kendo - Japanese Fencing. The equipment consists of armour and bamboo swords. The armour bag's not that heavy (22 lbs or so) but it's kind of bulky and awkward to carry.

My bike has a very small sissy bar/rack on it. There are bolt holes in it and it looks like the previous owner had bolted on a luggage box of some sort. I was thinking to make a platform that could be bolted to the rack (material not yet decided, but could be as simple as plywood) which would provide a wider base to support the armour bag. The bag would be tied/bungeed down so it wouldn't fall off.

I was hoping someone could let me know if this would be considered legal or not. Would a home-made accessory be legal? There's no other way I can think of to carry the armour bag safely. I haven't seen luggage boxes big enough for this. It's too big to sit on the back seat without removing the sissy bar and even then, there's not enough room for it on the seat to even consider strapping it down. The bag's base dimensions are around 18" wide and 22" long and it's around 16" tall.

Your feedback and expertise is appreciated. Thanks in advance!