Originally Posted by
linberl
My 20" Dahon was just about 1" too long in reach for really comfortable riding; I could do it but it was tiresome. The swept back bars give me that distance I need so I didn't have to use an aber hallo (a device for bikes with no ahead stem to allow reach adjustment). I'm pretty sure even someone shorter than me at 5'4" would be able to make a Dahon work for them with either bar changes or an aber hallo, same for many of the other brands.
Thank you everyone for the comparisons! I was finally able to test ride the Dahon Mu D9 2018 today! The reach was definitely long, but manageable, considering I'm used to riding improperly sized bikes. The store where I tried it was not too helpful - the manager tried to sell me the bike as if it were the current model, not knowing that I'd done extensive research, the employees didn't know how to fold or adjust the folders, and they also suggested sliding the seat up to compensate for the reach (which I didn't know wasn't a good fix until reading this post, so thank you for the heads up!) There's another store that I've visited previously that is great and is able to order it for me, so I'm going to talk to them about options for eventually modifying the handlebars.
linberl Would you mind sharing what the cost of your mod was? And is it something that a newby (new to bikes but generally not terrible with mechanical problem solving) could do from home with a few tools, or is it something I should get done at the shop?