10:00am Tuesday 7th September 2010
By James Styring
Like an impatient child, I had gone on about wanting a Brompton folding bike every day for six months. Then, quite unexpectedly, my wife gave me my best birthday present ever: a beautiful, red Brompton.
Bromptons really are a marvel of British engineering. They are built by hand using 1,200 separate parts at a factory in West London. Never mind bailing out the auto industry, the government should let failing car plants close and replace them with Brompton factories.
When folded, a Brompton stays locked together, making an extremely compact package little larger than its wheels.
I found it easy enough to put up first time off, having casually observed plenty of others doing it. You raise and clamp the saddle and the handlebar, unfold the front half of the frame with the wheel, and lift up the rear end with a little flick so that the rear wheel swings out.
Folding it up again takes a lot more practice. I watched a tutorial on YouTube a few times before trying it.
The small wheels put a lot of people off a Brompton, but the fact is they whiz along with a lovely little bounce. The suspension is provided by a small lump of elastomer between the main frame and the folding rear wheel.
Don’t be fooled by the small wheels: Bromptons are as efficient on the road as a mountain bike, and they seem super-quick setting off at traffic lights.
Its first outing to London was the day after I got it. I was on Oxford station platform at 6.50am demonstrating to one of my neighbours (an early commuter) how to fold it. I’d got the pedals the wrong way round and it wouldn’t fold down neatly.
A man next to me, with a British-racing green Brompton, kindly showed me how to position the pedals and fold the bike properly, a story I am reminded of with some mirth every time I see my neighbour. Funny guy.
Later that day, I took a train from London Bridge to Buxted, in the depths of East Sussex. I was meeting my wife and friends at a campsite eight miles away. When I alighted just after 7pm, I had 90 minutes of daylight left to get to the campsite – I didn’t have lights and the narrow lanes were dark under the high hedges.
I set off at a good pace. Gorgeous views extended across sun-kissed wheat fields. The lanes were so peaceful compared with Range Rover-rammed Oxfordshire. The lanes were also unmarked, so my map was redundant.
The saddle started to swivel and soon only two of the six gears would select. I was lost and beginning to wonder what on earth I was doing on a ridiculous small-wheeled bike in the back of beyond.
I caught up with two gents out for an evening ride. They were laughing so hard at a being overtaken by a silly city bike that they nearly crashed. They recovered and said they were going my way. We rode together chatting amiably. Half an hour later, they were mortified to realise they’d forgotten my turning. We were soon back where I’d started an hour before, in Buxted.
Despite my protests to the contrary, they insisted on righting their wrong by driving me to the campsite. I didn’t want the cachet of arriving on my Brompton to be ruined by these two old geezers, but it was almost gloaming so I had no choice.
As we flew along an A-road with my Brompton in the BMW’s boot, my wife rang. She was lost, trying to find the campsite. I affected a pant and then had to duck in a hurry as the Beemer flew past my wife and the dog at the side of the road.
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