Vacation, with Dahon

For spring break, I took a break from driving up north to Michigan to turn around and drive south with the family. I borrowed a new Odyssey from work so we wouldn't rack up more miles on our aging Pilot. As Henry and I were loading up the van on Saturday morning, we both looked at my Dahon in the garage with the same thought.

"Dad, let's take it!" Henry said. He didn't have to twist my arm too hard. We nestled it in the rear cargo bin to smuggle it south:

Quickbeam Updates

When I got my recent Rivendell Quickbeam, I had a thought that I would keep it as received for a few months before I started futzing with it.

That lasted about two rides before I could no longer fight the urge to tinker.

Which brings us to today's build:

The fenders were the last touch, installed today for a drizzly ride, after I looked around the garage and realized I didn't have a single fendered bike. I also added my VO front rack as a simple way to mount the front fender. What's not simple is the rear fender: with the rear facing track ends on the QB, I can't install or remove the rear wheel without also unbolting the rear fender stays. Longer stays or plastic QR clips would be a better solution, but this is what I had on hand. So I just hope I don't get a rear flat, and I won't be flip flopping over to the freewheel side with any regularity.

The forward facing dropouts on my Surly and BMC were a lot easier to live with, even if they didn't have the ultimate adjustment range of the QB.

Dahon Enters the Fold

I've been travelling a lot with my latest work project, back and forth to Michigan every week since this past fall. Of course, this presented a reason for N+1, so I decided I needed to pick up a folding travel bike. I spent some happy time researching various wheels sizes and folding mechanisms, trying to find a cheap bike that would fit my 6'3" self. Finally, during a slow moment in the Super Bowl, I somewhat impulse ordered a used Dahon Speed 7 off ebay. It came packed up in this odd box: