Originally Posted by
bargainguy
I'm kind of in your boat, 5'4 & 120 lb. I have a stable full of folders, so here's what I found out.
You pay a price for foldability in terms of cost, weight, "finickiness" of components, and sometimes oddball parts not easily obtained locally. Dahon is notorious for this in my experience. Not unusual for folks to wait months for replacement parts, and when we're talking main frame hinge, that bike ain't goin' nowhere until the part comes in.
I keep a few folding bike specific spares for my bikes.
ie long inner telfon cables, spare seat post clamp for my Mezzos. Spare tube, tyres, dual drive click box, 54 and 56 chain rings. Never had a problem with a Dahon hinge, but if I did I would proberly keep a few in reverve.
Many of the problems are with non standard wheel sizes.
If its a 20" wheel less problems than 16",
if you have an 24" airnimal or a Paffic reach or simular. You you can have it all; performance, folding convinence and mainly standard parts. It just requires a bit more expense initially.
I sold my ultgera equipped 653 road racing bike as my Ultgera equipped Downtube NS8 with bullbars was almost as fast a ride, but also folded to go in a car boot if ever I needed it. Not had a road racing bike since.