# foldable road bikes



## Yellow Fang (15 Jun 2009)

I've been idly pondering a foldable or dismountable road bike. There's not a lot of room in my flat and I have to carry my bikes up six flights of stairs. Also, I don't have a car, so if I want to travel to a race, I have to take it on the train or a friend's car. There are a few bikes to consider, including the Airnimal Chameleon, the Pashley/Mounton TSR, the Bike Friday Pocket Rocket, and the Dahon Hammerhead. The Airnimal Chameleon seems like a good comprimise of stash-ability, portability, comfort and speed. I also like the bags available for carrying them. I'm a bit suspicious they might creak a bit with that pivot and rubber block. Does anyone have experience of these bikes?


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## Origamist (17 Jun 2009)

If you've got a donor bike, there's always the Ritchey Breakaway Pro Frame Kit (although S+S couplings would also make sense).

There's also the Dahon Tournado. 

The Airnimal Chameleon is a nice, lively bike to ride. The earlier frame issues seem to have been resolved. It's also a good compromise in terms of wheel size and foldability. 

I sold my Hammerhead, but thought it was good value for money (a poor man's Moulton, if you prefer).


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## Yellow Fang (17 Jun 2009)

Origamist said:


> I sold my Hammerhead, but thought it was good value for money (a poor man's Moulton, if you prefer).



Seems like it might be better than a Moulton, a TSR anyway. It's lighter. I wonder what the ride is like for small wheeled road bikes. I hear it can be a little harsh, hence the suspension.


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## Bigtwin (17 Jun 2009)

Yellow Fang said:


> Seems like it might be better than a Moulton, a TSR anyway. It's lighter. I wonder what the ride is like for small wheeled road bikes. I hear it can be a little harsh, hence the suspension.



I have a brompton. It's horrible ride-wise for that very reason. Trade off for convienience for me, but bigger the better for comfort no doubt.


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## Origamist (17 Jun 2009)

Yellow Fang said:


> Seems like it might be better than a Moulton, a TSR anyway. It's lighter. I wonder what the ride is like for small wheeled road bikes. I hear it can be a little harsh, hence the suspension.



The ride of the Hammerhead, like all small wheeled bikes, takes a bit of time to adjust to. Not sure it's quite up there with a TSR, but I've heard good reports about the newer Hammerheads.

Don't forget that you can get wider tyres and run them at lower pressure if you find the ride harsh. I ran 35mm tyres on my 20" folding bike that had no suspension, and 28mm on my 18" Birdy (full suspension).


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## ChrisKH (17 Jun 2009)

Uncle Mort said:


> Kirstie of this parish has just bought a Chameleon.



Am dead jealous


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## Speicher (17 Jun 2009)

ChrisKH said:


> Am dead jealous



So am I


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## ufkacbln (17 Jun 2009)

The Chameleon is excellent - I have one of the very early ones, which had a few weld issues.


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## Kirstie (15 Jul 2009)

Hello! Yes I do have a chameleon which I have recently bought on the bike to work scheme. Generally speaking I am very pleased with it and for the purposes that the OP described I would say that it is ideal. It rides very well indeed - almost like a regular road bike. The suspension is a clever bit of design - it cushions the blow between both sides of the frame, but it also counteracts the negative effects of the primitive (IMO) rear triangle design which emanates from the fact that it has to fold. The effect of the suspension is similar to riding a carbon frame - a satisfying 'poing'. Given the design of the rear triangle, which mimics the atrocious non-linked single pivot designs you find on early FS MTBs, which have the potential for crap energy transfer and lots of bob, the superdense rubber thingy works well - there is good energe transfer and no bob at all. Despite what people say, you do feel the difference with 24" wheels, especially on the descents, but like anything you get used to it.

It does have some limitations if you don't want to use it just as a regular-road-bike-that-folds-up. I bought mine because I have a 34 mile round trip commute with a train journey in the middle of it. The combination of reasonable mileage and portability makes it easy to get any train I want and also to get through milton keynes station before 10am, where they stipulate that your bike must fold up in order to do this! I was also after a light tourer and so this also doubles as that. 

BUT because I want to use it as a light tourer ie to carry stuff as well as to fold, there are the following limitations:

Pannier carrier: with a regular carrier (ie mounted to the frame over the rear wheel), it doesn't fold. You have to take the carrier off first. So, I have to have a seatpost mounted carrier. You remove the seatpost in order to fold it, and so I just carry the whole seatpost/carrier/panniers assembly and put the rest of the bike in its carry bag.

Seatpost mounted carrier: these often have weight limitations to around 7 KG. BBB do one which will take 10KG, more than enough for light touring and for work, so this is OK. HOWEVER, if you are a shortarse, like me, the seatpost mounted carrier poses two problems. First, it gives a high centre of gravity, so getting out of the saddle on eg a climb is very precarious and not recommended. Second, the only bottle cage mount is on the seat tower. So with the carrier on the seatpost, I don't have a bottle cage mount because I can't get a bottle in.

Mudguards: These are a no no if you want to fold it regularly. First because it doesn't fit in its bag with mudguards on, second because they get so crushed in the folding process they are always fouling on the wheel when you ride the bike. They are almost immediately bent out of shape. So, no conventional mudguards if you want it to fold. I am looking at some kind of crudcatcher based assembly to stop myself getting covered in crap.

The carry bag: This is a good idea in principle, and the chameleon bag (there are different bags for each model), is designed in such a way that even a shortarse can carry it properly. However, the bag that airnimal do is roomy enough but designed from quite flimsy material so it will tear if used regularly. Carradice also make one, which is much more sturdy, but without a lot of heave-ho, I can't get the zip to do up fully. This is probably because i have to wrestle the bike into the bag outside rugby station, rather than in the calm of my garage.

Anyway, those are the issues! You are welcome to PM me if you have any questions.

Oh yes, and this is it in the flesh
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mrmichaelwright/3628293027/


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## palinurus (15 Jul 2009)

I used an Airnimal Joey for a while for light touring coupled with train journeys. It does fold with a rack fitted (but you'll need to select a rack that will fit it) and, with a bit of bending of the stays, you can fit raceblades.


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## Bodger (17 Jul 2009)

I think that I'd had four chameleons by the time that I lost faith in them.

I have a different take on a couple of things that Kirstie mentions:

I found no problem with doing a full fold with the mudguards on it - I attached the front only by the fork crown mount and didn't use the stays. In this way it folded fine (spin the front end round) and I never had any trouble with the guard rattling or coming loose in the four or five years that I used it for.

I like the URT rear end. These are a lot better for road riding than the linkage jobs that you get on modern MTBs. They reduce bob because the distance between hub and BB is fixed unlike designs where the BB is part of the main frame and the dropout is part of the rear triangle. They also make folding a lot easier as you don't end up with the chain tightening or slackening as you do with certain other folders. 
Remember that sus on a road bike is only there to take the buzz out - it should hardly be moving at all. The Airnimal will bob if you get out the saddle and honk it, but then so will all rear sus, but having won a couple of local hill climb events on a chameleon I can vouch for the fact that if you can pedal smoothly then it won't cause you problems.

Re-the rack and folding....this surprises me. I never had a rack on mine - used a nelson long flap/camper. But I'm pretty sure that Richard had no trouble folding his demo bike (with proper rear rack) to get in the boot of my car when I went to have a look at them.

I really liked the ride that the bike gave- very comfortable and reasonably quick. Somewhat like an audax bike. The sus made the bum end very comfie (comes into it's own on long rides - found that after 8 to 10hrs in the saddle I had more energy left than I would have had on my 531 diamond), but the front end is a little harsh - double taping took care of this for me. Folding is pretty quick when you are used to it, but the down side is that you end up with more than one piece (unlike brommies, birdys, dahons) - I used to strap the front wheel to the folded package with a toe strap.
The rear gear cable routing was a bit tortuous - this wasn't helped by having the early, rattly, 501 9spd shifters.

Overall I'd say that it was a great bike but for two things: a tad pricey (drawbacks of small production no doubt), and the ones that I had kept snapping (hopefully they will have ironed out all the build quality probs by now).


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## ufkacbln (17 Jul 2009)

MIne looking a little unwell!







I had an early Airnimal and there were frame problems which mainly went a the welds (as you can see here). 

I must say that there was never any quibbling, new frame with all parts reinstalled within 10 days to a fortnight each time it went.

My present frame is about 2 years old and is fine.


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## derall (6 Aug 2009)

Same happened to my first.
Frame was replaced promptly by Airnimal
Current frame has lasted a couple of years with no problems


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## Fab Foodie (6 Aug 2009)

My Colleage has a Joey explore and it's a fine bike but a tad heavy for my liking. We also checked-out the Joey Sport which is a lovely lively beast. It could be easily converted to drops, swap the bars, aero brake levers and a bar end shifter would have it sorted... Sweet!


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