# My copper-plated Brompton finally arrived!



## CopperBrompton (15 Oct 2017)

Ever since the nickel-plated Brompton was introduced, I'd been looking rather wistfully at them. The problem was, as I had a rather non-standard Brompton at the time (8-speed Sturmey Archer), and Brompton didn't sell the frame on its own, I'd have had to buy an expensive bike and then make the same relatively expensive modifications to it.

I figured if I was going to do that, I should do it properly, and get my ultimate Brompton built. Pretend it's the last bike I'll ever buy and hang the expense. So, instead of nickel-plated, copper-plated. Instead of 8-speed SA, a 14-speed Rohloff. Plus a few trimmings ...

This weekend was the first proper ride out on it, and I'm very, very happy!


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## r04DiE (15 Oct 2017)

I have absolutely no interest in Bromptons at all, but that is a thing of beauty! Enjoy, its a wonderful thing that you've done there


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## alicat (16 Oct 2017)

Chapeau!


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## Andrew_P (16 Oct 2017)

Lovely pass the Duraglit Again no special interest in a Brompton but that does look rather nice. Could have done with a picture fully up. I am curious have you had a name change or did you know in 2008 you wanted a copper one and waited 9 years?!


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## Milkfloat (16 Oct 2017)

Oh my! Now that is nice. Will it stay like that or weather over time?


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## chriscross1966 (16 Oct 2017)

Very pretty :-) <3


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## Fab Foodie (16 Oct 2017)

Fabulous! Now it really looks like a gas-pipe special ;-)


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## midlife (16 Oct 2017)

Nice to see copper back in fashion 






I think they look great


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## CopperBrompton (16 Oct 2017)

Milkfloat said:


> Oh my! Now that is nice. Will it stay like that or weather over time?


It’s varnished, so should stay shiny.


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## Drago (16 Oct 2017)

I'm not a Brompton fan either, but that looks awesome.


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## CopperBrompton (16 Oct 2017)

Andrew_P said:


> Could have done with a picture fully up. I am curious have you had a name change or did you know in 2008 you wanted a copper one and waited 9 years?!


Yep, I'll add one soon. Changed my username when I ordered it. The plating took a couple of months (we’ll, the varnishing mostly).


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## Crackle (16 Oct 2017)

Wooden mudguards?


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## bikegang (16 Oct 2017)

CopperBrompton said:


> Ever since the nickel-plated Brompton was introduced, I'd been looking rather wistfully at them. The problem was, ...



Holy ... Cooper says hi from Dubai... 
Can I share your photos?


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## CopperBrompton (16 Oct 2017)

Crackle said:


> Wooden mudguards?


Yes, from Proou, but I'm not sure if they do them any more. :-( https://www.proou.com


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## CopperBrompton (16 Oct 2017)

bikegang said:


> Holy ... Cooper says hi from Dubai...
> Can I share your photos?


Sure. Do you have more photos of that one?


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## bikegang (16 Oct 2017)

CopperBrompton said:


> Sure. Do you have more photos of that one?


thanks, let me ask his owner for an album link ... 

here is another with Nickel


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## CopperBrompton (16 Oct 2017)

Cool. :-) Bizarrely, Brooks pairs the brown leather grips with silver ends and the black ones with copper ends. Fortunately my girlfriend wanted black with silver, so we just swapped the end pieces.


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## TheDoctor (16 Oct 2017)

That is a bike of rare loveliness.
*approves*


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## tribanjules (16 Oct 2017)

Chapeau its stunning


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## midlife (16 Oct 2017)

Right, that's it! Going to find somewhere that does copper plate and think about having one of my road bikes done


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## GM (16 Oct 2017)

@CopperBrompton and @bikegang they are a work of art!


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## ianrauk (16 Oct 2017)

Silly question probrably. But will it turn bkuey green?


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## CopperBrompton (16 Oct 2017)

ianrauk said:


> Silly question probrably. But will it turn bkuey green?


It shouldn't, as it's been varnished, but we'll see ...


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## CopperBrompton (16 Oct 2017)

The build was done by Ben Cooper at Kinetics. He out-sources the copper-plating, but I'm not sure they'll want to do another one! The varnishing was apparently far tricker than they'd anticipated – the all-in cost of plating and varnishing was £250 and it took several weeks, so I suspect they lost quite a lot of money on the deal ...


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## steveindenmark (16 Oct 2017)

Every plumber should have a bike like that


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## MacB (16 Oct 2017)

Lovely looking bike but I'm surprised you didn't take the disc brake option, any reason or just aesthetics?


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## midlife (16 Oct 2017)

ianrauk said:


> Silly question probrably. But will it turn bkuey green?



Scratches in the varnish tend to go a bit blackish due to copper oxide, sometimes bits of the scratches go greenish with copper carbonate...


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## bonzobanana (17 Oct 2017)

Looks awesome but its gold plated or nothing for me (sadly nothing currently).


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## CopperBrompton (17 Oct 2017)

MacB said:


> Lovely looking bike but I'm surprised you didn't take the disc brake option, any reason or just aesthetics?


I'm not massively keen on the aesthetics of disk brakes, but mostly I just can't see the point, given that I can lock either wheel with the standard brakes.


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## CopperBrompton (17 Oct 2017)

bonzobanana said:


> Looks awesome but its gold plated or nothing for me (sadly nothing currently).
> View attachment 379148


I'm still saving up for the helicopter.


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## CopperBrompton (17 Oct 2017)

Yeah, maybe if you're doing Alpine tours. The only Alps I encounter on my cycle tours are the Dutch kind.


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## bonzobanana (17 Oct 2017)

CopperBrompton said:


> I'm not massively keen on the aesthetics of disk brakes, but mostly I just can't see the point, given that I can lock either wheel with the standard brakes.



Also not ideal for folding bikes anyway, the folding and transportable nature means its relatively easy to bend a disc by accident especially with the small wheels. Disc brakes make sense generally but for folding bikes less so. Generally it's relatively rare to see them on small wheel folding bikes except gimmicky cheap chinese folding bikes. Hub brakes would be the best upgrade for Brompton brake wise I think although saying that don't actually know if such an upgrade exists.


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## CopperBrompton (17 Oct 2017)

bonzobanana said:


> Hub brakes would be the best upgrade for Brompton brake wise I think although saying that don't actually know if such an upgrade exists.


Bromptons can have a lot of competition going on for the hubs – gears and dynamos ... I'd love to see a combined hub dynamo and brake for the front wheel.


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## Duffy (17 Oct 2017)

Lovely, absolutely lovely


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## BalkanExpress (17 Oct 2017)

CopperBrompton said:


> Yes, from Proou, but I'm not sure if they do them any more. :-( https://www.proou.com



Lovely bike and a big for Proou who are very nice people to deal with.


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## chriscross1966 (17 Oct 2017)

bonzobanana said:


> Also not ideal for folding bikes anyway, the folding and transportable nature means its relatively easy to bend a disc by accident especially with the small wheels. Disc brakes make sense generally but for folding bikes less so. Generally it's relatively rare to see them on small wheel folding bikes except gimmicky cheap chinese folding bikes. Hub brakes would be the best upgrade for Brompton brake wise I think although saying that don't actually know if such an upgrade exists.


I've had a disc on the back of my Brompton for nearly a year now and love it. Hub brake for front was available for a while but you lose the hub dynamo option. Kinetics and Vostok do disc capable forks and rear triangles.


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## mitchibob (19 Oct 2017)

CopperBrompton said:


> I'm not massively keen on the aesthetics of disk brakes, but mostly I just can't see the point, given that I can lock either wheel with the standard brakes.



How about with ABS? Actually, that'd be damn scary, especially on a morning like today (i.e. first slight dampness after the orange sky event... kojaks were losing grip everywhere). 

Just scrub that entire thought. I agree. Brakes have been way better on my Brompton than anything I remember of any of my bikes as a youth, even in the wet. The mechanism might be pretty much the same, but the pads or something have certainly improved immensely. Or perhaps I was too cheap to buy the expensive pads with the proceeds of my paper round?

Your bike looks amazing. Not what I was expecting when I read the headline in my RSS reader. A bit of me expected to see something like the pipes I can see in the hole in my ceiling at the moment. I wonder what weight it adds?


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## CopperBrompton (19 Oct 2017)

Haven't weighed it – the Rohloff will weigh more than the plating – but it's actually lighter than my 8-speed (which I'll be selling shortly).


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## arallsopp (19 Oct 2017)

I don't ride bromptons. I don't covet bromptons. I don't want a brompton. ...and yet, this one... its ungodly pretty.


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## 12boy (19 Oct 2017)

Out of curiosity, when the parts were plated were they immersed so the plating is on the inside as well as the outside or did they plug all the ingress points on the parts? If the whole part was immersed was there extra material on the BB threads, seat tube, hinges etc? I assume the plating is very thin, and if the whole thing is plated would prevent rust forever?


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## swee'pea99 (19 Oct 2017)

Echoing earlier posts, I've never been a Brompton fan either, but that is gorgeous!


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## Threevok (19 Oct 2017)

Lovely

I like the bell too - bling bling


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## mickle (19 Oct 2017)

God I hate you so much.

#envy


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## CopperBrompton (19 Oct 2017)

12boy said:


> Out of curiosity, when the parts were plated were they immersed so the plating is on the inside as well as the outside or did they plug all the ingress points on the parts?


It's basically the outside only, but I think they immersed the hinges, etc. I know Ben had to remove some of the plating from places it shouldn't have been, is assuming threads, etc.


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## chriscross1966 (21 Oct 2017)

arallsopp said:


> I don't ride bromptons. I don't covet bromptons. I don't want a brompton. ...and yet, this one... its ungodly pretty.


Welcome to the Dark Side


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## The Jogger (23 Oct 2017)

That is pure class.


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## arallsopp (24 Oct 2017)

chriscross1966 said:


> Welcome to the Dark Side



Happy to be a small wheeler. But I like mine within arms reach at all times


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## Hymerdude (19 Nov 2017)

That’s stunning! May just have to copper plate my Airnimal now


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## CopperBrompton (20 Nov 2017)

I think Ben Cooper will probably be game, but not sure about the copper-plating company! The lacquering took them a long, long time ...


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## Cycleops (21 Nov 2017)

bonzobanana said:


> Looks awesome but its gold plated or nothing for me (sadly nothing currently).


I understand Tamara Ecclestone has one.


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## CopperBrompton (21 Nov 2017)

Ah, much easier, then. Embracing the green look?


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## chriscross1966 (4 Dec 2017)

bonzobanana said:


> Also not ideal for folding bikes anyway, the folding and transportable nature means its relatively easy to bend a disc by accident especially with the small wheels. Disc brakes make sense generally but for folding bikes less so. Generally it's relatively rare to see them on small wheel folding bikes except gimmicky cheap chinese folding bikes. Hub brakes would be the best upgrade for Brompton brake wise I think although saying that don't actually know if such an upgrade exists.



I'd disagree, respectfully... I've been using a disc-braked Brompton for my commute for about the last year or so, originally with a Kinetics triangle which I then swapped for the Vostok one. The bike spends the 30-odd miles from Swindon to Oxford in a bus, laid down on the disc side under a seat... not had any problems with it at all, and on a more/less practical note (delete as appropriate) it means my not cheap deep-section carbon rims aren't getting any weart from braking... and on a Brompton that's no small issue, folks who do significant stop-start in-town commutes go through Brompton rims at a fair old lick, swapping a disc out is a lot easier/cheaper than getting a wheel rebuilt (or a new wheel)


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## Nigeyy (4 Dec 2017)

wow, that is great.

surely, surely the nickname of your bike is the Kettle?


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## CopperBrompton (4 Dec 2017)

Beats another suggestion of 'heating pipes' ...


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## Cycleops (5 Dec 2017)

Or coal scuttle. I think Copper Hopper is quite catchy.


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