K'Tesh

I am Praying that I will be able to return to school soon, and am seriously interested in pursuing a degree in the TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Language) field. My interest is in Mandarin. Enough now with the background.

Problem is, although I'm losing weight, I'm worried about breaking the bike (just broke my GT Transeo 1.0 last month). I'm gathering information on moving out of the country and it appears that Taiwan has some tiny apartments. So, in the interest of a lack of room for 3 full sized bikes, I'm now looking at a folding bike.

Bike Friday's seem to peak out at 260lbs (I'm much closer to 290lbs right now), can't find anything on Dahon's website, and I figured that someone here may have some answers...

So, I'd appreciate any help.

Xie xie (thanks!)
K'Tesh

chasm54

You'd be better off asking in the folding forum, they can tell yu just about anything you need to know, there. But to my knowledge there is no folding bicycle with a rider weight limit of more than 260lbs. You might think of getting a standard bike with S&S couplings so you can make the bike more compact for travel, storage etc. The couplings will make the frame more rigid than it was before, if anything, so there's no issue about rider weight.

K'Tesh

Xie xie (thanks).

I thought that there should be a Folding forum, I just overlooked it when I searched. So, I've created a parallel thread there.

Problem isn't with a bike that can be broken down. Buses in Taipei don't appear to have bike racks, and I'll need something that I could fold up, and take into the apartment/bus/work/shop w/o problem.

Zāijiān (later)
K'Tesh

sstorkel

I've seen lots of tiny apartments that wouldn't fit three full-sized bikes. I've yet to see any apartment that wouldn't hold a single full-sized bike.

At 290lbs, I wouldn't trust any of the smaller folding bikes. Dahon's website seems to indicate that all of their bikes, or at least all of the ones I looked at, have a 230lb weight limit. That said, it wouldn't surprise me if their full-sized folders (Tournado, Silvertip, Smooth Hound, Cadenza XL, etc) could support more weight than their mini-folders (e.g. Mu EX, Curve XL, etc). The bigger bikes use decent steel (Tange Prestige, Reynolds 631) or aluminum tubing, full-sized 26" or 700c wheels, and usually have name-brand components.

K'Tesh

My concern is actually with public transportation, office storage, and security. I figure I'd probably want a folder for commuting, and a hybrid for recreational (if I'm crazy enough to try).

mtalinm

the Xootr Swift can probably hold more weight than any other folding bike. it is officially rated for 260 but one of their employees said they have sold it to heavier riders. xootr.com