I Discovered that Folding Bikes are Awesome

"TylerLinner" (tylerlinner1) 05/21/2016 at 23:08 • Filed to: FOLDING BIKE, DAHON

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Not folded up all the way.

Today I couldn’t help myself and bought a 1988 Dahon III folding bicycle for the price of one fatbike tire.

I hauled it home behind my fatbike (I was pulling a trailer today for another errand) and immediately got to swapping out the springy old saddle as well as repacking the front hub and lubing the chain. It was operational, so I set off on a shakedown ride.

Arriving at Ace Hardware for a couple bits, I realized that I could just pick the bike up and set it inside a shopping cart, avoiding the entire process of locking it at a bike rack. One Ace employee found it to be quite amusing, although it probably didn’t hurt that I was snickering the entire time due to the absurdity of the situation. Having the bike right there made bolt selection extremely easy.

Here is the thing in riding mode after buying too much stuff at Target later. The Target employees were flummoxed. I laughed. Before today I had never arrived at a store, put my mode of transportation inside a shopping cart, and walked through the store with it. This has been an enlightening experience, and I can now separate my life into two distinct parts: BFB (Before Folding Bike) and AFB (After Folding Bike).

It has a 3-speed Sturmey Archer AW hub which is, predictably, geared too high.

I covered about eight miles. Yes, it is heavy and slow and it needs some tuning, but it’s shaking (literally) out to be pretty entertaining at the same time. I want to use it to get to and from the local Amtrak station- the nearest station with roll-on bike storage is 60 miles away in Flint, so this will be much more convenient!

Demon-Xanth knows how to operate a street. > TylerLinner 05/22/2016 at 11:15

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Try one of these some time:.

TylerLinner > Demon-Xanth knows how to operate a street. 05/22/2016 at 11:56

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Lol, I somehow doubt that scooter’s ability to navigate 5" tall curb/crosswalk edges! The Dahon’s 305 tires are having enough fun with those. :)

bhtooefr > TylerLinner 05/22/2016 at 14:55

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So, so many bikes with 3-speed hubs were geared for 2nd gear (the direct drive gear, and therefore the perfectly efficient gear) to be the cruising gear, so 3rd is available to bomb down hills.

What you actually want is to gear 3rd to be the cruising gear, and just coast down hills...

And now I’m kinda wanting to go saddle shopping for my 2002 Dahon Boardwalk that I upgraded to a 2-speed Sachs kickback-shifting hub (a 1976 R2110) - my recumbent trike is far more comfortable of course, but there is a certain simplicity to the folder that I like, too (and because it’s got the kickback hub, there’s no cables crossing the hinge):

TylerLinner > bhtooefr 05/22/2016 at 15:03

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Yeah, I’ve never owned a three-speed before so it’s an interesting experience. It needs a little adjustment, as it sometimes shifts itself out of first gear. But that’s nothing I can’t read about on Sheldon Brown. I would prefer to ride in 1:1 if possible, but it is geared just a bit high for that. I don’t think I’ll be riding this enough to bother buying a larger cog for it though.

The saddle I threw on this is a Bontrager I bought from the $10 saddle bin at the LBS. If you’re wanting to upgrade, I’d recommend looking for that kind of deal first! How do you like the kickback? I’ve ridden one briefly, and considered putting one on my Schwinn middleweight, but am kind of so-so on the idea. Some people find them to be supremely annoying.

Edit: This Dahon has a Sturmey AW, by the way.

bhtooefr > TylerLinner 05/22/2016 at 15:13

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The kickback is strange to get used to at first, but it takes the edge off of starting from a stop, and hills, and was rather easy to install (installing a 3-speed and making sure all the cabling was cleanly routed yet long enough to not mess up when folding would’ve been harder).

The trick is that it’s a vintage Sachs kickback, made in Germany to German tolerances and all. So, the kickback is quite reliable, and it shifts every time with a confident kick back to just touching the coaster brake (or once you get used to it, not even hitting the brake).

The Sturmey-Archer kickback is a knockoff of the vintage Sachs kickbacks, but not made to German tolerances, and it has a nasty habit of failing to shift, or blowing up, I hear. (Sturmey-Archer’s own 3-speeds (at least the freewheeling ones) were designed around 1930s British tolerances, and therefore are fine when manufactured to 2010s Taiwanese tolerances... but a hub designed to 1950s German tolerances doesn’t work so hot like that.) SRAM has the Automatix, based on the old Sachs designs, but it’s based on the automatic shifting variant, not the kickback variant, and they have it shift way too early, and you have to mod it to get it to shift at reasonable speeds.

Personally, I wouldn’t put a kickback on something that didn’t fold - the good ol’ 3-speed is objectively better, and you can get a current Sturmey-Archer 3-speed or a Shimano Nexus 3-speed for less than a vintage Sachs hub - but it’s a great solution for folders.

TylerLinner > bhtooefr 05/22/2016 at 19:08

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I appreciate the info. I ride a Rohloff daily so I know what you mean about German tolerances. It works 100% of the time and if it doesn’t work “it is ze fault of ze rider!” ;)

Well the AW is kind of funny with regards to its decision to shift or not, but I think I just have to learn to stop pedaling for a split second to let it do its thing. I’m so pampered with that Rohloff! For the Schwinn it sounds like maybe I would be better off getting a vintage Sachs or Schwinn (to keep it in the brand) hub instead of an S-A then. I would definitely not want an auto.

With quality comes price, right? Sounds like a great solution for you. I’m going to have to do some more messing around to see how I feel about riding a coaster brake long distances- I think much of my issue is that Schwinn’s choice of crank length and gear ratio on the American just does not work with my body. If some subtle OEM+ action can take that to the next level, a kickback might be a good option for the Schwinn or even for the Dahon if its AW ever blows up.

bhtooefr > TylerLinner 05/22/2016 at 20:01

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Yeah, the Sturmey-Archer hubs DO NOT tolerate shifting under load. (Even if one claims you can do it, I wouldn’t.) Stop pedaling, shift, start pedaling.

That’s even the best way to ride a Rohloff, otherwise, the 7-8 and 8-7 shifts won’t happen until you let up, I thought.

TylerLinner > bhtooefr 05/22/2016 at 20:15

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I always shift a bit before TDC so the hub is never really under load. But the S-A is a little more complainypants than I was expecting, which means I’ve got to slow down a bit.

Yeah, the Rohloff will shut me out if I’m too aggressive sometimes. But it usually comes down to shift timing, rather than power output. I can easily bang through every single gear on that hub if I’ve got the shift timing right. That’s why I say it works 100% of the time, and if it doesn’t, it’s my fault.

I guess if you were clipped in and pedaling circles it probably wouldn’t work so hot, but I run flat pedals and usually ride for economy because 95% of my riding is just to get somewhere. I only really hammer on it when I’m beating cars from a light.