Wow. The weight of the bike remains the same. The additional length of the screw for skate wheels is minimal. Don't think its adding like 3 inches more leverage. A little increase of the bending moment. If you sit on the bike when folded, yes it may break the little horns. If the bike falls on impact on to little wheel, yes also.

I think saying "void warranty" argument, is less headache for Brompton. Also more sales for EZ wheel.

Btw: The EZ-Wheels are kind of obsolete with the new standard wheels that come with the Brompton since 2016. They're almost the same size as the EZ-Wheels but a bit wider. They roll lightyears better than the former standard wheels and at least as good if not better than the EZ-wheels. As they are wider they do not stick in little slots or other annoyances of the floor. So in my eyes there's no need for 3rd party wheels any more. I fully agree with the other posters that 3rd-party wheels like skate wheels often are too heavy or have too little damping in comparison to the originals and therefore foster damages on the rear wings. I know more than one case where that happened. And i think it is legitimate of Brompton to decline warranty if this happens - they sometimes do but this is limited to the wings in this case. Generally Brompton is famous for excellent customer-service for a reason but as the wings are one of the weak points of the Brompton already the use of 3rd-party wheels is an area where they reject warranty and I think this is fair.


It is possible to retrofit the new standard wheels to older bikes. No problem on the rear frame. Those with a rack should be aware that the rack changed in 2016, too, using M6 bolts for the wheels instead of M5 before. It is however possible to fit the new wheels to the old rack by making use of some of the parts of the original wheels (or by drilling a bigger hole).

No doubt it could be. Either way I am happy with the way EZ wheels handle.I've tried using other Brompton owners' bikes with some of the most impossible setup's you can imagine and found them wanting.Once you get the hang of using EZ wheels they work very well.

If just swapping some little roller wheels might void the warranty, the owner/individual consumer drilling out a hole has got to void the warranty!

I see some Brompton dealers are advertising a complete rack/wheel kit that upgrades to the new design, but state there's no warranty unless all the parts are installed by a professional bicycle mechanic.

I bought a 2nd hand Mk4 M3L, when I noticed the folding pedal had some stress cracks, around the bearing,

After contacting the company, (and having a friend with a digital camera that could do macro close ups) and posted a picture of the pedal in question,

they mailed me a new pedal from London.





....

I'd call your statement nonsense. It has been explained now more than once why 3rd-party wheels on the rear frame may void your warranty on that rear frame and why this ist acceptable. Swapping out the stock wheels with other, newer stock wheels will obviously not void your warranty. So people using an L-model w/o rack are fine anyway.


The rack never has had problems with breakages due to wheels (at least as far as I know). Brompton says the 2016-onwards wheels are not compatible with the racks built up to 2016 due to the M6 Bolt instead of M5. So if you want to be totally compliant you may use the "old" EZ wheels for the rack here - they use M5 are still available. If you want the newer wheels you can either use the original bolts and the metal bush from the old, small original wheels with the 2016-wheels and they will fit onto the rack. This should in my opinion not void your warrany. Or you make a M6 hole from the M5 on the old rack and use the new wheels with all parts from the new set, including the bolts, but this probably will void your warranty on the rack. You could for sure buy a new rack but this would be total overkill if you ask me.


But: As there never has been a problem with the wheels on the rack I highly doubt that a slighly bigger hole, identical to the new rack, will create a problem. And the new wheels got invented with model-year 2016, so almost two years ago. Newer models already have those wheels as well as the 2016 rack. The Brompton-warranty on the frame is five years, the warranty on everything else is two years. Therefor most Bromptons with the old rack either already have run out of warranty for the rack or will shortly. Therefor the question of warranty for the rack for this case is obsolete for most Brompton-owners.

Obviously the outlined modification on the rack won't affect the warranty on the frame. Using 3rd party stuff on a known weak spot like the wings of the rear frame is understandably a totally different story. People that are not able to take responsibility for their homegrown modifications better should not do modificactions in the first hand...


BTW: Brompton have in the uk stopped selling frame parts such as stems, rear frames, bushings for the seat post and for the rear frame publicly as it turned out that a relevant amount of people were not able do deal with those things properly, causing problems with the bike afterwards and therefor potentially damaging the image of the brand. Therefor in the uk these things now have to be installed by a Brompton dealer.
Here in Germany they are still freely available because the assumption is that people over here more likely know what they are doing when working on their Bromptons (and possibly because the amount of Brompton riders is far lower than in the uk).