I am 16 stones and 13 pounds in old money. Call it 107 kilogrammes. Oh, all right, 107 and a half kilogrammes. Yes, I am loosely (very casually) trying to lose weight, in imitation of my wife who has managed to shed three stones just by setting herself a daily calories limit and sticking to it.
The thing is, at 107 kilos (and a half) I am verging on the recommended weight limit for a Brompton folding bicycle. Which is 110kg, including luggage. And clothes for that matter. I tend to weigh myself at my lightest. I find even wristwatch and glasses can carry significant avoirdupois. Undried water after a shower. Maybe.
And I have just bought a (second-hand) Brompton, a 20-year old ML3 (Bromptons come in a bewildering variety of coded versions; in this case ‘ML3’ means it has mudguards, no rack and the old sit-up-and-beg handlebars. Also its frame is made of steel. And yes, I look like I’m riding a clown bike, as the Brompton has tiny 16-inch wheels. It’s a comedy bicycle. For serious money
A Brompton is very expensive, The cheapest new one costs £850, and the top-specced can nudge £4K. Made in Britain, de rigueur for urban trendies and meeja types. As featured heavily on that satire of Beebland life, W1A. Visit London during rush hour and you will be swamped by fleets of the things, all bearing hi-viz, Gore-texed, helmeted figures whose expressions are combinations of terror and aggression lest the handebar mounts carrying their IPhone13s give way. It’s a Brompton-eat-Brompton world down there.
But a Brompton is the best. Nothing else compares. It folds smaller, is generally lighter and more convenient to carry (or roll - it has little suitcase wheels for this) when folded. It clips together. It fits in luggage racks. And it rides brilliantly, with a sense of directional predictability other folders don’t have.
I’ve had a thing for folding bikes for years, if not decades. It all began with a book called Merlin the Magician and the Pacific Coast Highway, by Tom Davies, a kind of spiritual celebration of cycling, and until I read it I knew virtually nothing about folding bikes. Moultons were supposed to fold, but didn’t. One my mum’s pals had something called a Vindec, which had a clamp in the middle of its Forth-Bridge-like frame. The Swiss made full-size bikes that split in two, so military parachutists could save the environment while defending the bankBut Davies wrote about his Bickerton, which he could slam into overhead aeroplane lockers with ease, apparently. Later, I discovered that the Bickerton was a fiendishly complicated and generally unstable thing which did diminish well, but rode badly, like a rubberised shopping trolley, and took ages to fold. Still, the idea of a bicycle you could take with you as luggage appealed to me on a very deep, gadgety level. And I loved bikes. I always have. Still do.
I currently own…well, several. Two Orbit tourers, an electric Carrera Crossfire from Halfords, a beautiful old Raleigh Clubman, restored by the eminent frame makers Argos. An old, rusty but beloved Keith Coppell, with a nice semi-scrap Reynolds frame I always intended to restore one day. There’s a Specialized mountain bike and an Edinburgh Bicycle Co-op Courier special. All will be for sale at some point this summer. Perhaps So I can buy a better Brompton. Perhap Because I now love Bromptons. Oh yes I do.
I have owned a Brompton for exactly a week, my last folder, a B’Twin Tilt 120, just sold. The B’Twin, from the French superstore Decathlon, is a bargain, by the way, at £240 new, but it’s slightly chunky - 2–inch wheels - and heavy and…it’s not a Brompton. Cue eBay and £500, and a 20-year-old ML3 (a little rough but well serviced and working perfectly) was mine. I’m heading south this week and the idea was that it would be handy for getting around Glasgow, Troon and other ports of call.
Except I’m away for a fortnight and need to take quite a lot of stuff with me. Pile it all together and I will be way over the weight limit. Not that the Brommie (Brompton owners quickly become on intimate pet name terms with their steeds) will break. But punctures and broken spokes are possible, and that rubber block suspension can get a bit squelchy.
It is a marvel, though. It folds and unfolds like mechanical witchcraft, in a series of swivels and twists that become second nature after a while. Or at least I hope they do. I just need to lay a plank over the cattle grid to avoid any nasty upsets on the way to and from the local shop. And carry some Swarfega to clean the oil off my hands as the chain gets in the way every time I unleash the velocipede from its cramped confines.
I have had numerous folders over the years. Dahon is the world’s biggest folding bike manufacturer, based in the USA but manufacturing in China, most of them with 20–inch wheels and with bikes under other brand names made by them too. But the ones I had were too cumbersome, as were the Downtubes I imported from the USA (cheap a decade ago but expensive now). A half-price Mezzo, a British attempt at the Brompton crown was prone to incessant punctures and in the end Not a Brompton, though at full price it was just as dear. I sold it to a hipster knitwear designer in Hoxton.
The Brompton design (which includes various worldwide patents) is the brainchild of one Andrew Ritchie, who came up with it in his flat opposite London’s Brompton Oratory in 1975. He struggled to produce handmade bikes in limited numbers until 1987, when the hifi guru Julian Vereker (of Naim Audio) became involved. Since then, the Brompton has proved an unstoppable and worldwide success. Lauded as a design classic, the key fold is the rear-wheel-under-frame one. The basic design has never changed, even on the (awed hush) 7.5 kg all-titanium Brompton T-line, which will set you back £3700. That’s for the single speed (no gears) version.
My battered old green machine will, I reckon, have to carry a good 125 kg if I take it south with me on the boat/train/subway/cycle cycle that is my intended route. It would be car to Lerwick, walk and carry on to boat, walk and carry to Aberdeen station, unfold and wheel up an unrideable hill in Linlithgow…and that’s just for starters. Plus the idea of dealing with a puncture or a broken handlebar/neck/head/wrist/ankle after diving into a Glaswegian pothole does not appeal. Besides, there are some modifications I need to carry out. Lights, a new stiffer suspension block, a front carrier…perhaps a respray. It’s been looking good in the hall. I’ve been practising my bicycle origami.
On the other hand, I could just get Susan to bring it down in the car when she joins me later in the week. It folds down so small she may not realise it’s there at all.
But perhaps I should tell her I’ve bought it first. Before starting the T-line conversation…
I bought mine in 1997 and would not be without it.
A dispensing locker - they call it a dock - of eight Bromptons not long appeared at Station Sq/Bus stances in Oban. The usual enter a code to unlock, and of course, there is an App ... Didnt bother with the costings, but think there is an additional annual subscription £5?, was it? Complete with unfolding instructions on the side of the unit :-) https://bromptonhire.com/