Fun Between your Legs! (Cycling Thread)

Chiming in with my bicycles as I seem to have trigged this thread at least partially.

I own two Brompton folding bicycles and a recumbent bicycle. Bought the first Brompton—the orange-black one—in 2007 or 2008, mostly for my commute which is currently about 10km per day.

After a self-accident due to an unexpected frozen puddle on a dry and sunny winter day (quite some bruises, two cuts in the nose which needed a few stitches, nothing broken, though) about four or five years ago, I decided that I need studded tyres in the winter. When Schwalbe “Winter” tyres in Brompton size (16") were finally available again (waited over a year for this to happen) the rims of both wheels of my—back then only—Brompton were due for replacement.

But since changing wheels (or tyres) on the Brompton is not quickly done in the morning depending on the weather, I decided to stave off the new rims for a year or two and buy a second Brompton—the red-white one, a floor model—instead and then equip the old one with studded tyres as winter bicycle.

Both Bromptons have quite some features in common:

  • 6 gears (2 derailleur gears in the back × 3 hub gears)
  • Lowered gear ratio for hilly Zurich.
  • Hub dynamo, stock LED rear light and a bright custom LED headlamp (1× SON, 1× B&M; I’m always driving with the light on, also during daylight)
  • Luggage rack, front rack socket, mud flaps

Main difference (beside the color) are the handle bars: The old Brompton has the M handlebar (which always reminds me of a home trainer), because back then it was the highest handle bar available as the high H handle bar didn’t exist yet. The new one has the high H handle bar.

So much for the story, here are some pictures: :slight_smile:

Both Bromptons together at home near the coat rack—you can clearly recognize the spikes in the rear tyre of the orange-black Brompton:

The orange-black Bad-Weather-Brompton (with studded tyres; currently at the mechanic, getting missing spikes re-added) in its métier :snowflake::

The red-white Normal-Weather-Brompton fully loaded after coming back from the supermarket:

My third current bicycle is a Radius Hornet I from the mid or late 90s (bought it pre-owned in 2002 or 2003, the picture is from 2003):

Haven’t ridden it for years, though — mostly because Zurich is too hilly for it. (Tried it, quickly gave up, and bought the first Brompton. :slight_smile:) It’s more for long tours on good streets without much stop-and-go traffic. (And yes, I did most tours in the past few years with one of the Bromptons, too, usually because they’re way easier to take with me on holidays, too, either with the train or with the camper van.)

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