About a year ago I bought a folding bike on Ebay. It was the cheapest one with an aluminium frame and came to around $240 shipped. I found that the ones below this price were generally steel and were closer to 18kg; this one is a more reasonable 13.5kg.
TL;DR: I did have grand ideas about this bike but it turned out to be too rickety.
It's fantastic in that it folds up. I thought I could ride one way and catch a lift back with the bike in the boot, ride to the airport and check it in as luggage. Unfortunately there's some pretty major faults that are a reflection of the price the bike was sold for.
Initially, the riding the bike didn't give me confidence so I swapped out some parts to see whether that would change the handling. I ended up with something looking like this.
When unfolded, the frame still looks like this though:
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Bah, who needs a straight frame anyway?
What's worse is the play in that main hinge in other directions. It means that going over bumps and while braking the bicycle will compress a millimetre or two. It's a really bizarre sensation.
The drop handlebars helped get rid of the overly upright feeling and widely-spaced grip. Originally it had trigger shifters that felt decent. The handlebars still like to rotate by themselves. Fortunately for me, the brifters could take up enough cable with the somewhat mini V-brakes. The saddle is adequate however the seatpost likes to rotate or descend during a ride. Quite the sinking feeling.
Actually riding the bike left a lot to be desired. The bottom bracket had a lot of resistance. When opened up you could see the ball bearings. I think the length was wrong too. The crankset was too far out and made the chain drag along the derailleur cage. The crankset was also painted and silvery bits flaked off. I found that most of the gears are not required with such small wheels. With the single main tube across and small, narrow wheels (20 x 1-1/8) I found that it felt clunky. The narrow tyres made finding spare tubes a little more difficult. I found some on Torpedo 7.
There are no mounting points for rear racks. Another point was that I found after leaving the bike for a few minutes, the wheel would become off-centre and touch one side of the brake pads. It was very fiddly to tinker with those nuts instead of having a standard quick release.
I'm thinking this exercise was renting something from mother nature and that I'll have to return it to her soon.
2/5 Would not buy Fusion Folding Bike again.
TL;DR: I did have grand ideas about this bike but it turned out to be too rickety.
It's fantastic in that it folds up. I thought I could ride one way and catch a lift back with the bike in the boot, ride to the airport and check it in as luggage. Unfortunately there's some pretty major faults that are a reflection of the price the bike was sold for.
Initially, the riding the bike didn't give me confidence so I swapped out some parts to see whether that would change the handling. I ended up with something looking like this.
When unfolded, the frame still looks like this though:
Bah, who needs a straight frame anyway?
What's worse is the play in that main hinge in other directions. It means that going over bumps and while braking the bicycle will compress a millimetre or two. It's a really bizarre sensation.
The drop handlebars helped get rid of the overly upright feeling and widely-spaced grip. Originally it had trigger shifters that felt decent. The handlebars still like to rotate by themselves. Fortunately for me, the brifters could take up enough cable with the somewhat mini V-brakes. The saddle is adequate however the seatpost likes to rotate or descend during a ride. Quite the sinking feeling.
Actually riding the bike left a lot to be desired. The bottom bracket had a lot of resistance. When opened up you could see the ball bearings. I think the length was wrong too. The crankset was too far out and made the chain drag along the derailleur cage. The crankset was also painted and silvery bits flaked off. I found that most of the gears are not required with such small wheels. With the single main tube across and small, narrow wheels (20 x 1-1/8) I found that it felt clunky. The narrow tyres made finding spare tubes a little more difficult. I found some on Torpedo 7.
There are no mounting points for rear racks. Another point was that I found after leaving the bike for a few minutes, the wheel would become off-centre and touch one side of the brake pads. It was very fiddly to tinker with those nuts instead of having a standard quick release.
I'm thinking this exercise was renting something from mother nature and that I'll have to return it to her soon.
2/5 Would not buy Fusion Folding Bike again.