Touring with Bromptons

[BobtheBuilder]

I'm heading off in a few months with my partner and 1 y/o son to travel the Eurovelo 6 from the Danube Delta to Saint-Nazaire on the French Atlantic coast.

I'm planning to take my Brompton, along with a trailer (probably the Radical Design Cyclone IV Chubby Bicycle Trailer). My partner may (or may not) have a Brompton. Our child will be in a Croozer trailer.

So, possibly two Bromptons, a gear trailer and a child trailer.

This means strapping at least some luggage to the Bromptons themselves - I've seen lots of pics and read some stuff about how people do this, but some of the stuff, like putting a backpack on the back rack looks pretty unstable.



The advantages of a folding bike are many: -

* compact

* can be packed as normal luggage (in fact some people take them on as hand luggage!)

* can be taken into tents / hotel rooms easily

* generally more portable when not in use

Possible disadvantages include: -

* less riding comfort over long distances

* less robust bicycle

* more proprietary parts, so harder to service and repair



Just interested if anyone has had experience of Brompton touring that includes some unsealed / dirt roads and has an opinion about whether taking a Brompton is a good or bad idea.

and/or

Any input about gear strapped to Bromptons or generally any comment on the above.



Your thoughts much appreciated!

regards,

Rob

[Telemike]

I’m interested in the answer as well, as i am vaguely planning to use 20” folding bikes from decathlon (tilt120s) for my 13 & 10yo kids when we go and ride Eurovelo6. I’m hoping the modest 52x14-28 gearing is adequate given the kids will have little to carry and the slopes are mostly modest.

[twowheels]

43 videos about
Brompton Bicycle Touring: https://www.y ... 8_UQyYy3rR

[BobtheBuilder]

43 videos about
Brompton Bicycle Touring: https://www.y ... 8_UQyYy3rR

Cheers mate - I've seen a lot of their videos, they are very informative on lots of aspects of packing, but they haven't, as far as I know, towed trailers.
They don't really comment on unsealed road capabilities or wear and tear issues, which is what I'm really interested in.

[twowheels]

He did run a photography business using a Bilenky long John cargo bike & towing a trailer. He seems quite open to fielding questions if you contact him.

[Less Baggage]

Hello Bob,

Im new here. I have done a lot of off road travelling with a standard Brompton. I am one of the RFDS doctors and every week for several years I flew to the Cape York Peninsula with camping gear and walked out of community into the bush/jungle to sleep the night in between clinics.

I took my Brompton with me.

I didn't need a trailer but I did ride up and down all sorts of tracks. I usually had a small load. One or two night set up.

The Brompton with Schwalbe Marathons was as you might expect. It was very poor on sand. Good on hard baked dirt.

I have also travelled around the world a few times with a combo of bromptons, trailers, luggage, buggy/prams and two kids. I did not try the specific configuration that you are considering but I did learn a lot.

When we travelled (starting when they were 1 and 3 years old) we found that repeatedly had to seperate. One parent with one or two children. Thus the other parent had ALL THE GEAR!!

My main tip with the two kids is to see if one adult can move everything. With well balanced wheeled luggage I found that I could quite easily set it up so that I could pull a train of luggage/trailer/packed-up-buggy through an airport. This made for so much more fun. I could queue along while the rest of the family got food or went to toilets or just played about. Forcing us all to stand in the same place with multiple pieces of luggage was hellish! My kids are older now and each time we travel we have tried different things.

I hope your trip goes well.

I am very interested top know what you think of your Cyclone IV Chubby trailer. I have wanted one for a while but I have never seen one in the flesh. The expense has put me off buying one without testing it.

Take Care.

Doug (Less Baggage)

[Less Baggage]

Oh yeah I forgot....

In terms of strapping stuff to the Brompton I have tried several options. I have now usually got it down to one bag on the standard "Luggage Block" on the front. One bike packing style bag under the seat post (Apidura) and one bike-packing handlebar bag (cheap apidura rip-off).

With these three I can carry enough for endless solo travel.

The best thing about using this style of bag is that you can fold your bike completely without removing ANY of these three bags. My trick is to put the handle bar bag on the wrong side of the handle bars. This is fine unless you are over 6 foot 2 inches when I suspect that your knees would strike the handlebar bag too much.

I like to be able to fold the Brompton as normal and only remove the bags if absolutely necessary.

Best of luck.

Tell me what you make of the "Chubby".

[BobtheBuilder]

Tell me what you make of the "Chubby".

Hi Less Baggage,

many thanks for both your replies, very interesting! We won't be doing much rough stuff and, with the trailers, won't be putting too much strain on the rear axle.
We're yet to do a dummy pack, but I think we should have weight fairly well under control.
Haven't got the Chubby yet (it's in the post), but ran into a couple last year who had one and they raved about it. The cost is high, but they have a great reputation and good re-sale value - and, in the grand scheme of things, the cost is not that high, considering the convenience and durability of the trailer. Over months of travel, I'm sure this will repay itself in many ways!

Bob

[Less Baggage]

Best of luck.

[BromptonCory]

Cyclone Chubby can also fit at least 12 pizzas.

[zebee]

reading old touring posts....

IF you are using 2 trailers then you aren't going to be half folding the B for parking. But... I found when taking a trailer that there were times I wanted to leave it somewhere, but I still had the stuff that was strapped to the B. If I used the B's own rack I couldn't park or fold it.

So I used a topeak beam rack. It doesn't carry heavy things but it does carry light bulky things like the bag the B flies in. It would be fine carrying a bag full of jumpers and raingear for several people for example. I can park the B with things on the rack and if you carry it low on the post it can rest on the B's own rack if you have one.

(When packing your stuff for flying make it baggage handler friendly! Easy to grab and easy to slide off other luggage so nothing sticking out. They have to haul stuff in a really confined space where everything has moved in flight on a punishing turnaround schedule they cannot baby your stuff no matter how many fragile stickers you have. Some people say put the B in a clear bag or even bagless so the bicycle nature is obvious and it will get stored with the wheelchairs and prams rather in the main hold.)

I rode to the airport, and got the B and trailer ready for flying while next to the oversized checkin desk... remove seat, racks, clamps, pad sharp bits, fold B and put in bag, fold trailer and strap to that. Trailer bag as 2nd item, T bag as cabin luggage. Yeah it means I had to pay for extra baggage but as a B and trailer and soft stuff like towels and jeans in there to pad it is going to be your first 20kg anyway...

At destination, get bags off carousel, re-assemble in baggage area, wheel out the door and ride away.