Tikit followup
This is a followup to my previous mini-report on the Bike Friday Tikit. I took it on a 10 day trip to Philadelphia, Brooklyn, and Saugerties, NY. This involved two flights and a lot of car travel. I used the bike for 3 twenty mile rides, mostly in the Saugerties/Woodstock area. The rides were really enjoyable and gave me time to explore some of the backroads that we don’t see while driving around the area. Once back in Philadelphia my brother and I went for a nice around Springfield Township. This is all riding that I wouldn’t have done without a bike along, but none of it would really be enough to justify bringing a full size bicycle.
The Tikit packs almost as fast as Bike Friday says. It takes me a little bit longer due to the drop bars and my front rack (which has two bolts), but it packs much more quickly than my New World Tourist did. Everything that I need to remove is easy to adjust, unlike the NWT where I removed the cranks, derailleurs, and other major components. I’d guess that I’m packing the bike in about 15 minutes, and unpacking it in about 10. There is a lot (almost too much) of extra space in the suitcase and I had no problems storing my rack, shoes,water bottle,and tools in there with the bike.
The fold is really fast. On Wednesday I used the Tikit to bike commute (which involves a bus). I arrived at Montlake bus stop and started folding the bus. I looked up and a bus was arriving, but I still had time to put the cover on the bike. My Tikit folds wider than stock (due to the drop bars), but it still makes a fairly compact package that was easy to carry aboard.
I’m happy with the gearing that I have on there (54t chainring, 11-34 cassette, which gives me 25 to 80 gear inches). In Saugerties I rode up some very steep unpaved roads and they were challenging but no more so than on my other bikes. The bike handled nicely when coming back down them too.
I emailed the service department about the little bit of play that I had in the hinge that holds the stem. 15 minutes later I had a phone calll from the owner of Bike Friday (Hanz). He gave me some suggestions and I’ve been able to eliminate most of the play. I’m very happy with the companies service.
All in all I’m very impressed. I’d still suggest the Bike Friday New World Tourist for someone who wants to fly to a destination and spend a week on the bike. If you are primarily using the bike for shorter trips and mixing in a lot of other forms of transit (bus, car, train) I’d suggest the Tikit. It rides almost as nicely and folds much more quickly. I don’t think I’d have any problem doing some light touring (overnighters) on the Tikit.
What would I change now that I have a bit more experience with it? I still think that the bike would be better with an internal gear hub. I’ll be putting one on after I learn more about the SRAM i9. I want to tweak the design of my front rack a little bit and wish that Bike Friday had a better system of their own for carrying cargo. A second water bottle cage might be nice. It could be a little cheaper orcome with nicer components. All of these are minor complaints — it really is a very nice folder. It’s a nice blend of folding fast, folding pretty compactly, fitting into a airline-legal suitcase, and riding pretty well. There are many folding designs that can do some of these things, but not many that do them all.
Okay.. I”m excited about the Tikit and will probably go through with my trade-in once I have time to clean things up.
The internal gear hub makes sense to me as well, though I”ll likely stick with the conventional setup until it proves to be a hassle in some important way. I”m guessing that a chain tensioner would be required (which doesn”t really bug me–especially on a folder).
Thanks for the reports!
Thanks for the info on the Tikit Alex. I just got a Dahon Speed D7 this month and really have enjoyed the portability of having a folder. I”m going to leave it in Eastern Canada at my mom’’s place so I”ll have a bike to ride when I visit. I”m pondering a Tikit or something similar so I”ll have a folder at home as well. I”ll look forward to your future blog posts and see how you like the bike as the miles add up.
BTW – would you ever consider making and selling those front mini-porteur racks?
I can”t really make and sell any racks because I don”t have the proper insurance for doing so or the time to go into production. I”d love to see Bike Friday copy the design and would happily send them one to use as a prototype.
I was curious what you thought of the new Model “T” Tikit, or what I am calling the Twiddle Tikit. I was wondering if BikeFriday did this to find a lower price point for the Tikit. Or are they realizing that the more expensive cable stem lock system has some flaws and that this is actually a better solution? Or Both!
My Tikit sometimes has play in the stem as you have pointed out, so this change intrigues me.
I think the model T is a way to get a lower price point. The new cable design (which I”ve installed on one of my tikits) already solves the flaws of the first design.