I need some help deciding whether to spend £1,800 for a Titanium Brompton single speed or £2,900 for a Hummingbird single speed. Is the weight saving worth it? The Hummingbird does not fold as compact as the Brompton, but it folds much flatter.
Any advice?

Hummingbird folds the same as Brompton, except it lacks the main frame hinge. If you don't fold the main frame hinge of the Brompton, they are equally "flat".

And with 2900GBP you can buy a full titanium Brompton clone that weighs less than 15lbs.

What Brompton clone? Where can I get one?

For £1,100 difference, the Hummingbird wouldn’t even be in the running for me. The Brompton is more compact, better looking, and not much heavier.

Or, for that kind of money a superlight Pakit would be nice. It could have gears! It could be repaired if needed although I would think a steel bike would deal better with being tossed around in a suitcase better than carbon. Both Bromptons and Pakits can be modified to meet changing needs. If weight is a big deal I would lose a couple of pounds.

There's almost no difference between the weight of the Brompton 2 speed and 1 speed. I own a Ti 2 speed and that second gear makes it large difference. I really don't know why anyone would buy a 1 speed just to save a few grams. Yesterday my wife climbed over a 1000 ft on a 2 speed Ti Brompton. I rode my steel 6 speed but she finished ahead of me.

Yeah, I'd get a 2 speed Brompton too. Hbird just doesn't seem compact enough if you need to carry it in crowds or put in a shopping cart.
If you're handy with a wrench Aliexpress has full ti frames and improves the flexy old quill stem design of the Brompton.
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4000...archweb201603_

https://www.kinetics-online.co.uk/fo...ikes/brompton/
these are custom built if you wish

Kinetics doesn't change the main frame and stem that remain the original Brompton steel parts.

To have a full titanium Brompton you need to buy a Chinese titanium frame and stem for instance from Easy TI on eBay.

3Sixty has full titanium clones, no idea if they are really available outside Korea ?

They are basically the same ones I think (made by the same factory).
I read that they are now selling complete bike at around 3.5 million KRW (2300GBP)

If it was me; I'd get the cheaper Brompton(in 2 speed). Then with the money saved;
buy lighter parts for the Brompton for further weight reduction. Titanium seat post,
carbon saddle, titanium nuts/bolts, etc.

I may be biased since of the 4 Bromptons I owned over the years - 2 were titanium/superlight
models.
BROMPTON HELMET AND BIKE by 1nterceptor, on Flickr

I have a Brompton and I like it a lot, it was a superlight too.

But honestly, all factory installed components are low quality and heavy !

To have a lightweight Brompton, all components must be replaced and this is also what happened on my Brompton, only the frame is factory and even a part of it, the rear titanium triangle, was modified to 135mm OLD.

So building up a full bike from a titanium frame is also a good option and cheaper than starting with a 2s superlight.

Hello there,

I'm considering getting a Brompton that could be carried with few efforts in my stairs (6 floors with my wife's H2L... noway!).

• The Raw Lacquer is beautiful, but the matte titanium fork does not match the frame
• The Black Lacquer is OK, titanium parts are painted in black

The problem is that 2 gears Brompton are hard to find and delays to get a custom build are crippling.

The Chinese full titanium look promising, but "it's like a jungle sometimes".
I've found some posts from Raxel about such (awesome) builds. So, Raxel do you think it's safe to order an EasyTi frame set from Ebay ?

The way I like to judge folding bikes is on "backpackability" where I do ( 100,000 / ( weight + depth ) ) which gives the highest score to the bike that has the lowest weight and the shortest distance off of your back when folded. The Hummingbird single-speed has the one of the highest scores in my spreadsheet of all the folding bikes on the market.