Originally Posted by
SesameCrunch
To make the bike foldable with the seat, you have to construct your own modification for the seat pan bracket. It needs to be elevated a bit. This applies equally to both the Mini and the FS.
Why does the seat pan need to be elevated?
You can see in this picture of the Mini that the front and rear halves of the frame are parallel on the folded bike.
So if the seat is mounted to the rear frame half then the front frame half will also be underneath the seat and, thus, the frame will clear the seat.
Moreover, you can see in this picture of the Mini that there is a good 6 plus inches of space between the frame halves.
So there should be plenty of clearance for the narrower part of the seat pan which hugs the rear frame half.
Honestly if it requires an elevated seat pan then I'm not going to bother. The appeal of the Cruzbike kit is that I'd be able to get a relatively light bike cheaply and easily and a custom bracket will ruin that.
Originally Posted by
SesameCrunch
I think the Mini would work fine. If I had to do it over again, I'd probably choose the Mini. Smaller footprint all around. Lighter too. The FS is a heavy bike and the Cruzbike kit will add around 10 lbs.
You may find that you'll want the Big Apple tires for a little smoother ride.
My main concern with the Mini is that the Cruzbike kit boom will be too long to keep the seat on the rear frame half, which will be essential to retain the possibility of sitting on the seat of the folded bike. From the pictures on the yahoo groups it seems that even the 20" bikes suffer from this problem to some degree as evidenced by most of the seats being mounted on front frame half.
You see I want to setup the bike something like this:
downtube_cruz.jpg
So the wheels and handlebars go behind the seat and the chainwheel/boom under the seat. Then I can add a double legged kickstand to keep the seat in a sitable position.
Do you see this being a problem with the Mini?