I'm part of the, uh, fold. Riv content: Grant wrote sometime around 2000 that if you want a folding bike, get a Brompton. So I did. I'm now on my 4th, and sell them. I also own a few bikes that have nicer ride quality than a Brompton, but in spite of that I prefer my B overall: just so dang versatile. More Riv content: when I was riding my Brompton with a camping load solo from Portland to SF in 2010, I wrote to Grant a couple times about how cold I was in my hammock (insufficient bottom insulation) and he spotted me a VBL and some pine tar soap and a little book of poetry, General Delivery to Crescent City post office, because he's menschy like that.
That was this ride: http://clevercycles.com/blog/2010/11/26/down-the-pacific-coast-by-brompton/ Here's more recent: http://clevercycles.com/blog/2016/05/18/my-desert-island-bike-brompton/ As for handling and comfort: the low trail steering feels funny at first. Adding a front bag/load helps. So does adding Ergon grips with bar ends to approximate wrist orientation of swept bars or riding on hoods of a drop-bar bike. A titanium seatpost helps comfort on poor surfaces without the boing-boing-boing of the soft suspension bung (use the firm). As for laughably cheap/crude components: sounds just like eye-rollly criticism of Rivendell for hanging, e.g., Wald baskets and other cheap/crude, dare I say retro, components on super nice frames. Neither Riv nor Brompton fix what isn't broken, no matter how far out of fashion. Only recently caved to popular taste for under-bar trigger shifters and black parts: still no carbon though. Brooks saddles standard? Check. Mudflaps? Hell yeah. Handmade to order, brazed steel, in a country with living wages and decent environmental standards? Yes. Even lugged fork crowns! Ever since 1975. -- todd On Monday, November 28, 2016 at 1:01:56 PM UTC-8, Minh wrote: > > So i've really struggled with a case of the Novembers (longingly eyeing > all the bikes for sale, Bill's Appaloosa, that Ebisu, that Crust, that > Rambler....) and successfully dodged most of them until a Brompton popped > up. I was reminded of my visit a few weeks ago to a Brompton dealer (just > as i was walking by one...) and i was hooked. I think Brompton should do a > kick back program for owners because we attracted a crowd when i went to > pick it up and the seller was showing me the fold-unfold-fold. I have to > admit that there is something fun about riding these bikes, the steering is > a handful until you get used to it, and some of the components are > laughingly cheap/crude but it's a fun ride. > > I think there are some cross-owners of RBW and Brompton, does anyone have > a link to an owners group? I've seen the bromptontalk group on yahoo (too > much noise), but looking for a group more similar to RBW. What i'm hoping > to find is feedback/experiences on changes, with so much folding i'm > worried about making changes that will then affect the folding mechanism. > I'm thinking of swapping in new grips, levers, maybe a saddle but wanted > feedback before i started ordering things. > > Thanks for any pointers, I need to go and practice my folding technique, > i'm way slower than the videos online! > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
