I thought that one might be someplace in Inwood - look at the snow! - but where's PS 178 and where's Ellwood and Bogardus? Can't recall those places at all. PS 178 must be a new school. It wasn't in Inwood when I was a kid. And where's the waterfall? And have you ever been to the Paterson Falls in NJ? They are a sight to see when the Jersey rivers are in flood, or in the dead of winter when they're all frozen up. They were in a dicey part of Paterson, but I haven't been there in over ten years, and they were in the process of yuppyfying the neighborhod then.

Fitting mudguards/fenders to a Swift has been featured on this forum before. "Full" 'guards are available and I have fitted them to my Swift with reasonable affect. However, a "Full" guard on the back does make wheel removable tricky. The Swift's rear wheel is removed backwards and a full mudguard just gets in the way. Clip-on 'guards are often not the right shape or don't have the correct fittings to attach them to the bike frame. Mountain bike fenders that use a q/r clamp around the seat tube are often too small to cope with the 34mm diameter of the Swift seat tube.

The Topeak DeFender m2 rear fender does fit the Swift's seat tube and can be adjusted to cover the rear wheel. I have recently installed one on my Swift and I think it looks good. It can be fitted and removed in a few seconds so will not affect the folding action. I think it fits the sporty appearance of the Swift and being made of a tough rubber material, should last many years. I have not tried it in the rain yet but it looks as though it will offer protection.

I am looking at attaching the rear light to the mudguard's support arm.

Sorry, I missed this!

No, never been. That's not a waterfall in the picture--it's an icicle formation up near Bear Mountain.

Paul, that looks nice, but I don't think it would fit between my wheel and the bottom of my Arkel Bug. I've been using the SKS X-3 instead of bothering with the Planet Bike skewers and alignment.

Noteon -

Two photos of Paterson (New Jersey) Falls all frozen up in winter, and one looking down into the falls and the rainbow from the little bridge that crosses it.

I spent a lot of time up in Bear Mountain-Harriman State Park, hiking, backpacking, swimming in the ponds...

I'm replying to a post from Nov 2005, but nothing has changed. I replaced the front brake pads on my Shimano Deore v-brakes with those same Aztec 2 pads, and they were shrieking like a banshee. I put back the original pads which didn't really need replacing anyway, and everything is nice and quiet again. The Aztecs are made of much softer material than the originals.

My second recent acquisition has been working out much better, a lightweight Pro SLX Forte Carbon saddle, $40. I replaced my VO leather saddle (anyone wanna buy it?) with it and so far I like it a lot.

And a new discovery I made: I put back on the luggage rack I have and I found that the two stays fit perfectly into the top seat tube quick release. Much neater and straighter and more solid arrangement than the two attachment things I used to have screwed on to the seat stays.

And a new discovery I made: I put back on the luggage rack I have and I found that the two stays fit perfectly into the top seat tube quick release. Much neater and straighter and more solid arrangement than the two attachment things I used to have screwed on to the seat stays.[/QUOTE]

If you have used the top seat tube q/r you will probably not be able to fold the bike. Try using the bottom q/r and you should have no problems.

It's true, I haven't tried folding the bike with this new arrangement yet, and the truth of the matter is I very rarely fold my Swift. That's why for my next bike I'd like a non-folding small-wheeler. If it was attached to the bottom q/r it would angle down steeply. Wait...hang on...

Yoiks! You're right. It won't fold - unless I loosen up the top q/r. Then it would fold. I think.

i tend to fold my bike 2-3x a day, and recently noticed that both QR clamps are not clamping the seat post as tightly as before. i can adjust the QRs such that i can barely get the lever closed, yet the seat tube does not seem to clamp the seat post tightly. this is due to normal wear i suppose, but has anyone else experienced this? any suggestions for dealing with this? i am hesitant to buy a new seat post because it might be the ID of the seat post that has become worn?

^ This is important: Clean your QRs and lube the cams with a droplet of light oil or wax lube. It is extremely important that the seatpost be clamped very securely by BOTH QRs, or risk frame failure. The lube will make closure very easy.

Hey All,

I am very close to buying a xootr swift, but then I discovered this forum and am starting to have cold feet.

One person on this forum said the following:

"The Swift, as dozens of fellow swifters here have told, is a flying dream on hard surface. But if you just happen to pass gravel or other even slightly rough terrain, it's a nightmare on the Elm Street. After couple of hundred meters your hands don't have feel any more, your back feels like being harleying a whole weekend and you just have to make a break."

I also noticed many complaints about the folding mechanism. Is in really hard to open/close the seat post quick release? I heard it caused one member's hands to bleed!

Xootr has promised to fit my xootr with a big apple tire in the front and back - but after reading these posts I'm concerned that even my rollerblades would ride better on the streets of Berkeley than the xootr swift.

Does anyone have comments on how the xootr handle's moderately rough roads with big apple tires? Is it a huge difference from a normal, non-folding bike without suspension? I'd hate to waste close 1k on a bike I can't use!

Any comments would be greatly appreciated. I might hold of my purchase until I hear some more info on the ride since there is no place I can test drive the bike.

I don't think your worries are valid, Rishio. I ride over slightly rough surfaces, including gravel, all the time, and I'm using much harder narrower tires than your BA's, namely slick Kojak tires, and I have zero problems. The quick releases present no problem at all for me and they've never come close to cutting my hands. Perhaps they might be a problem for someone with weak hands, though, as you do have to close them very tightly.

That's good to know. Reading that it's like nightmare on slightly rough roads doesn't sound good since the whole point of me getting a folding bike is because it's too rough for me to commute on my rollerblades - yet a full sized bike is not portable enough for my needs.

Anyone have experience in getting the thudbuster and the crossrack on the seat post yet still be able to fold the xootr and lock it with those items attached?

+1

I take my Xootr Swift with 28mm narrow Continental Grand Prix tyres on lots of rough stuff, even stuff where most people would hesitate to take their mountain bikes (seriously). I think it depends a LOT on riding style. While I think my Moulton with full suspension is very smooth, I don't experience my Swift as harsh at all. But others have commented on the harshness. I have no explanation for this except my guess that it is due to riding style - my legs work harder, ie I will slightly lift myself over rough stuff and now it is second nature for me. Arms slightly bent and seat balanced. I use Peter White's approach https://www.peterwhitecycles.com/fitting.htm to bike fitment and I think that is part of the secret to comfortable riding.

+2

I've run the Swift on the standard Kwests, Kojaks, and most recently Big Appples. I've never found the bike particularly harsh. Like Jur, I'm pretty "light" in my style of riding. I'd add that the roads here (Glasgow) are pretty dismal. Harshness is a relative thing, so I suppose it might be what you are used to.

The Quick releases aren't a problem for me, but it is important to give 'em a little drop of light oil every once and a while to keep them in good working order.

I'm pretty sure that Swift has a decent return policy, so you should be OK if you really don't like the bike.

More opinion about harshness etc:

My first bike I bought was very harsh indeed. It was a steel old style MTB with no suspension. I remember very well the jars that came through the handlebars when riding over shallow bumps. Since then I think the riding style is changed, because I ride those same bumps with folding bikes and no sensation of harshness coming into the arms. I feel the bike taking a hit but it stops there. With Big Apples, I clearly feel the bike taking less of a hit but I can't honestly say there is a difference to me. I also tend to jerk up on the bars when flying over little bumps to reduce their effect. I even do it on my fully suspended bikes (Birdy and Moulton) because I dislike feeling the bike take a hit.

So if you are riding rigidly on the bike, or heavily, bumps would travel into your body. Perhaps the comment about bike harshness is a reflection of riding style?

About QRs: Clean and lube the sliding surfaces of the quick releases. This make a huge enormous amount of difference on how hard it is to operate the levers. I would feel apprehensive about levers breaking in my hands if they were too hard to operate. Lubing actually brings about the opposite effect: I frequently wonder how so little effort can be enough to stop seatposts from sliding down

I'm going to take your advice and clean and lube the qr levers right now, Jur. Actually I've replaced the front q/r with a bolt (stopped the squeaking), and since I rarely fold the bike I might do the same for the seat tube qr's. I could still loosen them and fold the bike using an allen wrench which is no big deal. As for easing the bike over bumps I thought that was instinctive, that everyone did it, but then I've been riding since I was a little child and it's all automatic for me.

Good comments Jur,

It's intuitive the way you explain how to ride a bike - but I haven't ridden a bike for about 10 years except an old one I borrowed from a friend for an hour. It was a heavy, non-suspended mountain bike worth maybe $50 with all gears broken except one (that slipped and rattled). I didn't find that ride harsh but the wheels are bigger than the ones on the swift of course.

I'm mostly worried about hand vibrations. I remember buying a xootr scooter and found the vibrations on the handlebars a bit too much for me on rough roads or going over bumps. Hopefully it's not a xootr thing and the swift will handle vibrations better than the scooter. I know I can put the 2.0 big apple on the rear and front of the swift but I wonder if I can put the new, lighter 2.15 big apple lite on the front (so a 2.0 in the rear and a 2.15 in the front). Anyone know the answer to this?

That Peter White article sounded complicated with all these terms I have a hard time understanding. Throughout these threads I see words such as cranks, derailers, cassettes, hubs..etc and it's difficult to read these articles without understanding the terminology. I think I'm going to have to get a book and understand all the parts in a bicycle before I figure out how to fit myself in it!

So I'm going to risk it and order the xootr swift. I'm just waiting for xootr to get those big apple's in before I order it. The swift kind of reminds me of a modern raleigh 20 - on paper it seems like a beautiful, long-lasting design. I hope it takes me where my rollerblades couldn't.

Go to www.sheldonbrown.com - probably the world's most informative site.

Yep - and this should help with the names of the parts:

https://www.jimlangley.net/wrench/bicycleparts.html


Jur - Any thoughts on my replacing the quick release levers on the seat tube with bolts (like I did on the head tube)?

+1

I'd also suggest that once you start playing with different setups, change one thing at a time, and ride it that way for a little while before changing the next thing. I wasted a lot of money early on in my cycling adventures changing everything to what I wanted without having the miles under my belt to really know what I needed.

I feel this particularly important in a bike like the Swift where almost everything is changeable / adaptable.

The most important thing (fit wise) when you get your bike out of the box and setup, is saddle height. Sheldon's site has a good description of how to do this.

Werewolf,

Thanks for the diagram - that helps a lot!

Jur, do you have any recommendation which lube to buy for the quick release? I'd like to buy it right away to keep my qr closing and opening properly.

Does anyone know if the new big apple lite 2.15 (55mm) will fit on the front fork of the xootr swift? I'm thinking of putting the 50mm big apple on the rear and the 55mm big apple lite on the front to minimize vibrations.

Bendembroski,

your tip on getting one accessory at a time is really insightful! I was thinking of getting thigs such as the thudbuster and other accessories but I think i'll try the bike out and get things one at a time as I feel necessary. I don't want to spend a whole lot of money to make this bike work for me.

I think there won't be any real noticable difference between the two tyre sizes. I would stick to the 50mm one as it is known to fit.

A good QR lube to have is Boeshield T-9, you can use it for a lot of stuff. Wax-based, it will prevent rust on brake cables, bolts, do the chain, silence squeaks etc.

Thanks for the info on the lube - I'll pick that up when the bike comes in.

According to one post I read, the 2.15 made a huge difference and it was really 2.15 where he felt the 2.0 was more like a 1.75. The 2.15 is also lighter than the 2.0. Anyway, xootr is installing the 2.0 on the front and back to start.

Here is what he wrote if you are interested:

"I installed the 2.15 Big Apple’s LiteSkin version on my folding bike (20 inch wheels). I used to have 2.0’s on it before, which were OK, but nothing special.

So how does it feel to go from 2.0 to 2.15? Well, in short, it feels like riding a new bike. I never understood what all the hoopla surrounding the BA’s was all about, although I was riding the 2.0’s that came with my folding bike from the start and experimented with various pressures to find that sweet spot. Yes, the ride was definitely smoother than on Kojak’s or Stelvio’s, but not so amazing that it was worth drooling over. I still felt every bump and pothole that NYC is littered with and was a bit skeptical of the whole balloon bike idea.

The 2.15’s have converted me! I rode home from work last night and paid special attention to the now familiar pot holes and other road imperfections that made my commute a pain. The ride is really, noticeably, significantly better than on the 2.0’s. So good in fact, that I didn’t notice some of the old trouble spots I rode over in the past and the more significant ones, were greatly smoothed out. Anyone living in a city with crappy roads and commuting over less than perfect road conditions, should have these. It’s worth the investment! At $52.85 a piece, they are not cheap, but again, it really transforms the ride, so if you are on the fence about buying these…fall off it and do it!

I stumbled across these 2.15’s pretty much by coincidence, while checking over the choices on Schwalbe’s website. They only come in LiteSkin version, which is a fair bit lighter than the “regular”, non-folding tire. The claim is that the LiteSkins retain the same puncture protection…let’s hope it’s true! At least the Kevlar is still in them, so I am hopeful. I basically went from a 50mm to a 55mm tire and saved 50 grams. Not bad! Ok the weight saving is irrelevant at this level, even for weight weenies I should think, but going to a bigger tire and not adding weight is great.

I put a call in to Schwalbe before ordering these and they confirmed that they are a new addition to their line-up and were introduced, since the jump from 2.0 to 2.35 was too big and people were asking for an option in between. Good job! At least in the US, the 2.15’s are only available in the LiteSkin version, although on the international site, they show regular wire bead’s in 2.15 as well, although I don’t know why anyone would want them (assuming the puncture protection claim is really accurate). Given the novelty factor, I wouldn’t be surprised to be one of the first to be testing these

Oh yes, last but not least, they look really cool too. The logo is just much better than on the 2.0’s…and 2.35’s for that matter!

I can only imagine what 2.35’s must feel like…sadly not possible to install on my folder, but I am very happy with what I have."

Here is the thread if you want to read the follow ups..

https://www.schwalbetires.com/big_apple

Rishi O.

Well that is certainly an interesting read. Looks like I will have to see if these would fit... my guess it's the Liteskin more than the extra width that did the trick. But not sure...

I added a springed Brooks saddle, made a big difference for me.