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My 9 1/2 year old Brompton is a bit knackered, needs about £350 worth of parts and £150 labour. No complaints about the cost - it's RRP and labour which is fair. and a convenience tax. What I'm not sure about is whether I should just sell it as is and get a new one - £500 is just under half the cost of a shiny new one.I use it for commuting and can get a 12 month interest free loan.
Some of the stuff I can easily sort myself (needs a new rack, seatpost, tyres), and possibly swap it to singlespeed (its 6 speed now) as that's fairly simple spannering I can do myself. So I could keep it and slowly fix it via ebay/2nd hand bits, while swanning around on a shiny new one.
What would STW do?
Sounds like an ideal opportunity to learn to do some more stuff for yourself, what exactly is included in that "£500" repair bill?
Plus the thing to set it against of course is the price of a whole new Brompton, they certainly ain't cheap these days...
Has the LBS given you an invoice/breakdown of costs?
If you post up whats required me may be able to advise further.
£150 labour is hefty and suggests maybe wheels need rebuilding or frame needs a bit of welding.
personally i'd fix it myself. It doesn't sound more than an evenings work and £350 sounds a lot for a bike rack and seat post, or are they heavily Brompton Taxed things?
I might feel different if it was an MTB, there's that desire to have the latest thing and it's a P&J purchase, Bromptons are just commuting tools.
£150 is a chunk but if it needs new wheels, cables, bb, headset, chainring, chain, sprocket and brake pads then it sounds reasonable as that would be quite a lot of work.
Obviously I'm just guessing. Wouldn't bother with new rack, if you're running Ez wheels and using brompton bag the rack is a waste of time.
Get the new one and sell the old. They go for good money second hand, even tired ones. Just be honest in the description. You'll probably make a good chunk of the difference between fix or replace.
the thing to set it against of course is the price of a whole new Brompton
Or a secondhand one. I paid about £500 for mine and it was hardly used when I bought it. Admittedly you have to be patient to wait for such a good deal to come up, which is dependent on how serious the problems with the current one are.
It's knackered - not helped by getting hit by a car. There's quite a few bits that add up - front and rear rims (so wheel builds needed), new drive chain (front ring, chain, two speed sprockets, jockey wheels on the gear pusher), gear cables (they're split) new rack (all 4 stays have broken), Needs new tyres, brake blocks, couple of new frame hooks, new seatpost. Some work on the rear hinge.
Some of this is definitely convenience tax stuff, or to be honest not needed, like the seatpost - its fine.I can replace the stays on the rack rather than getting a new one (I've snapped a bit of it and re-drilled and fitted an easy wheel so the LBS doesn't like it). I can buy tyres cheaper online and obviously swap them myself. Dunno.
Oh - That is a lot of work! If it was a horse, it'd be shot as a kindness. I've modified my opinion as I'm not sure you WOULD get much for it with that list of defects. Get a new one, and maybe just sell the frame if the hinge is too badly damaged.
Isn't the car driver's insurance paying for the replacement?
Nope, they didn't stop. Hit the back of the bike, so cracked rack stays but the other stuff is wear and tear, it gets ridden pretty much 6 days a week.
Theres loads of cool Brompton hop-up trick bits on aliexpress, fix it up with those!
sell it - someone might want a new frame or some other bits from it. Otherwise what are you going to do with it - dump it ?
I'm thinking fix it up with cheap bits as they appear, my Mrs would use it. Or more likely it'll sit neglected in the shed.
Have you tried going via MIB? They're an industry-funded safety net who try to provide cover for claims where the driver is either uninsured or untraceable:
https://www.mib.org.uk/
Get a new one - I might take the old one off your hands...
Thanks Bez, will look into it.
Ok Molgrips, let me know - this want a stealth ad as im undecided what to do!
SS it.
Or a secondhand one. I paid about £500 for mine and it was hardly used when I bought it. Admittedly you have to be patient to wait for such a good deal to come up, which is dependent on how serious the problems with the current one are.
You have to find a real mug to let you have such a good condition one for such little money to get one like that though, especially when the mug in question really could have done with it about 6 months after he sold it 🙂
Ours were in need of a pretty major overhaul too but still went for silly money second hand. I priced them at what I thought was fair and a Brompton eBay trader bought them both and resisted them for a few hundred more each. I was still very happy with what i got for them and knew how much work was needed so wouldn’t have wanted the comeback of selling them at the inflated price.
They’ve subtly improved pretty much everything on them in the last 9 years - treat yourself to a new one.
Stripped and cleaned up the frame is probably still worth £300
especially when the mug in question really could have done with it about 6 months after he sold it
Well now I feel bad 🙂
She’s been well looked after, though.
I priced them at what I thought was fair
I put one on eBay buy it now priced like this, also didn't want any comeback if someone paid over the odds on auction. Wasn't in as bad condition as colonel wax's sounds, and it was quite a few years ago now. Still,.....
£125. 🙄
Sell it and get a new one to enjoy riding. You say its ridden 6 days a week- so full justification for splashing the cash, it's not as if it's going to be a garage queen.
Events this year have made me realise you only live once so make the most of it.
Id buy a new one and sell the old on eBay...eBay service 👍
Stick it up on ebay, someone will buy it for a couple of hundred
Put that towards a new, for a few hundred quid you'll have a brand new bike that you can get plenty of life out of
Saying that, the tech itself hasn't really changed much, just little bits of finishing kit here and there (like grips and levers)
Where are you? I think I’ve still got a standard sized seatpost which you can have for postage, or collection from Edinburgh (I needed a long one so mine has had approx 5 mins usage).
Could you not use a bike to work scheme for a new one to bring the replace versus repair cost down?
What about getting your existing one kitted out with the custom gear @bencooper makes? Kinetics in Glasgow. May be more cost effective to do it when all that stuff needs done.
Thanks all for the opinions/offers. Collected it from the LBS on Monday, just for interest here's the breakdown:
From that its not as knackered as I thought, that's mostly consumable stuff that adds up. Not sure I can rebuild a rear wheel, or sort the rear pivot but everything else is do-able by me. Seatpost, tyres, front hook are all OK - will need replacing at some point but OK for now.
Building wheels is easier than you think, just read Sheldon's guide, take a deep breath and go for it. If it's only a rim swap it's easy and you shouldn't generally need new spokes. Plus, Evans quite often have Brompton rims and spokes (and some of the other bits on your list) on sale for buttons in their ex-display section. Nothing at the moment by the looks of it, though.
Building wheels is easier than you think,
Something I've never thought about, are small wheels, (like really small wheels) easier or harder to true and tension? Lacing all those small spokes is going to really bend them.