Joe Remi

The Helix should be pretty stable with 24" wheels, but I think Bromptons get a bad rap from test rides. It's an unusual feeling if you're not a regular rider of folders, and won't go away with a trip around town. After two weeks you'll still be aware that a Brommie has quick steering - negated somewhat with a bag on the front as designed - but I don't think it counts as a problem. The same goes for recumbents when people first try them: The problem isn't the bike, it's the rider coming from a different style and needing time to adapt.

Revoltingest

Engineers all sound the same.
What's not to believe?

Joe Remi

Oh I don't care, mate..it looked odd to me is all. May you speak engineereze to your heart's content. Enjoy!

Revoltingest

Actually, I was holding back on the jargon. Not one mention of prefamulated amulite or retro encabulation.

RatonLaveur

Joe, sorry we got you confused. It happens to me all the time...someone joins a conversation and freak out that he actually has split personality. No one could blame you, really.

To clarify my hypothetical design:

- novotny frame (skewed and weird and beautiful)
- helix rear triangle
- helix front lefty fork
- replace helical hinges by standard hinges

Envisioned benefits:

- vs. Novotny: no pokey bits, 24" wheels, the ensemble doesn't look as weird and unwieldy once folded.
- vs. Helix: no helical hinges. simplified manufacturing and maintenance.

Is it needed: probably not, helical hinges aren't exactly design failures.

@ MrFlamey: thank you for believing on our individuality, glad if our comments do not make things worse for you.
@ Joe: agree fully with Brompton taking some getting used to. My switching from 26" to Tern 24" was already weird, but it's now my new normal. Come to think of it, even racing bikes with a different rake will throw you off your game temporarily. Too bad Brompton, being such a radical change, is perceived as impractical by one-time testers.
@KentS: I still don't exclude the BMW and Girlfriend theory completely. Sorry MrFlamey.

KentS

Folding bike designs are a dime a dozen. It's one of those problems that designers love to think about. Folding bike designs are continually winning design contests and then.... nothing. Nothing happens. The problem is that you really have to work the other way around to successfully make something. The design has to be driven by production considerations. Peter Boutakis should be thought of as a hero for even trying to produce such an excellent design, unlike all the other designers who do paper and a sloppy prototypes and win an award. Certainly the success on kickstarter made Helix even more ambitious, but at some point production realities and costs start to kick in.

There is nothing you can change about the unfolded design of the Helix without ruining it, except maybe also making it in steel for strong poor people. There is very little you can change about the folded design without ruining it. For instance a folded Bike Friday is a sloppy mess of pokey parts. The only thing you can really change is how you get from A to B. The helix has three design criteria: 1) A perfect unfolded ride, 2) A perfect solid fold and 3) complete convenience in transitioning from unfolded to folded. The only place I can see where you could afford to compromise without wrecking the design is in the transition. Hence my original question about just removing and reattaching the front wheel. Similarly, perhaps there is an "non-automatic" solution to the problem of shifting the rear triangle relative to the front triangle. It does not *have* to be a helical hinge.

In any case, if bicycles were as cool as BMW w/Girlfriends there is no question that the Helix would be viable. Suppose it makes a decent margin at $3499. If bicycles were cool, and Apple was selling it, how many would be sold? It really is a work of art. But $3499 is too much for me to spend. And I don't mind removing and reinstalling the front wheel. Or fiddling with a lateral shift of the triangles.

MrFlamey

Yeah, maybe I should have given the Brompton more of a chance, but I was certainly not going to get used to it without having it for a while, and although there was a bike shop near here that was lending out carbon fibre racing bikes for up to two weeks of testing to potential buyers (I just took one into the mountains for a couple of hours, hated how hard it was and returned it), the shop with the Bromptons didn't have that particular offer. However, I have noticed from my Tern Verge that one of the problems with small wheels, other than steering twitchiness, is that you are very vulnerable to even small potholes. This has made riding at night a somewhat fraught experience, and I have had one nearly disastrous incident with a large pothole on a longer ride once. Since I do fairly long rides (700km over 4 days is the longest so far) on my folder, I decided that larger wheels and a more comfortable ride were more important than fitting in a tiny space. I'm hoping that the larger wheels of the Helix are going to be much better insurance against potholes and even just rough road surfaces, while the more compact fold and backpack accessory have me very excited at the possibility of hiking over mountains near where I live and then riding back around instead of taking the train Just hope I actually get my bike.

I'm quite interested to see what the final retail price will be. Assuming backers get their bikes, I think they will be getting a bargain. The pre-order price seems pretty good too, but I assume there might be another $300-$500 added for retail pricing.

KentS: Do you really think Helix will be sold at over $3k? Since bicycles are not as cool as BMWs to most girlfriends and Apple are not making them (if they were, which bikes would they be making?), what price do you expect it will sell for?

Joe Remi

Flamey: You definitely don't need a Brompton..only an insane person would use it for the adventures you're describing! I hope you get your Helix, hopefully at a decent price.

Yes, I think they will eventually be going for around $3k, which is the only way Mr. Boutakis has a shot at sustaining a business with them. I'm not sure there would be much of a market at that level, but it's a fair price.

Revoltingest

Anyone planning to accessorize their Helix?
I plan....
- Handlebar ends (dealing with wrist issues) which will minimally interfere with the fold.
- Vision 2 headlight
- A bell (not selected yet) to alert slower traffic
- Buying it seatless to use an old Terry Fly.
- Thudbuster seat post from another bike.

KentS

If Helix is a business with the intent of making money they will want about a 30% profit margin.

The cheapest "Bikes Direct" Ti Bike is $1500. But in a sense the Helix frame is actually two Ti frames, one for the front and one for the rear. Helix itself is welding the frames, but as far as I can tell right now the other custom components are supplied by third parties. This includes the custom hub for the front wheel, probably portions of the fork assembly, the 5-axis part and the helical hinge assemblies. By using a third party, each of these custom parts has a marked up cost. Helix acquires them for at least twice their manufacturing cost. Using the Bikes Direct bike as a reference guess that a Helix with no custom components could retail for $1800, adding $300 for the complexity of the two-frames-in-one design. Then add what you think the retail value of each of the custom components should be. Being strictly arbitrary: (1) The lefty fork $150, (2) the rear helical $100, (3) the front helical $100, etc... I suppose the bike could come in at $2500, but this is strictly a guess. There are many $2500 Titanium bikes with none of this complexity or any of these custom components.

The $3500 number was not cost plus profit but "perceived value." There are many $3500 bikes being sold and the Helix is right up there with them in terms of desirability. Anyway, the bottom line is that when you guys get your bikes you get a really good deal. On the flip side, you also get to be the ones who do the durability testing.

MrFlamey

Yeah, this is something I'm just a teensy bit concerned about. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I bought a Tern Verge x10, which had had some recalls due to dodgy welding of the frame that led to some catastrophic hinge joint failures with customers falling off their bikes pretty hard. Didn't hear of anything really serious injury wise, but obviously it could happen. My bike was not among those recalled, but the pictures and stories sometimes pop into my head when I'm riding, which definitely reduces my enjoyment of the ride somewhat

Helix has the fold in a less critical location than my x10, and they seem very serious about their weld quality, so I'm less concerned about being one of the first couple of thousand people to get one (fingers crossed). Of course, that's not the only thing that could go wrong, but I'm not so worried about other things, and have personally never had anything happen to me while riding that was the fault of the bike I was on. First time for everything though

I'm probably going to have to pay import tax on Helix too, so I don't actually know what I'll have to pay. I just hope it arrives before consumption tax goes up here to 10%. Should still work out as a good deal unless the retail pricing is really aggressive.

Nightdiver

Doesn't the fork fold in half?

RatonLaveur

Yes but it has been designed with a tube in tube lock. Probably the most simple and safe approach in such a case.
Tube inside the top part can be inserted inside the bottom part to lock the assembly in place.

For example look at his kickstarter video, first move to unlock the bike is a lift a lever.

Nightdiver

I was just jokingly pointing out that the fork is a pretty critical location.

MrFlamey

Yes, you're right, I guess I should have phrased it differently. The Tern Verge has it's fold directly in the center of the frame, which seems like a place under far more stress (in all directions) than where the folds of the Helix are. If the Verge's fold fails, the whole bike would just split in half and you'd hit the dirt really hard. I'm sure things wouldn't be pretty if the Helix broke in either place either, but it just seems like the folds are in safer positions, ignoring mechanical differences. Maybe not the fork. Meh, I guess you are right

Revoltingest

Purchasers ought to check their account on the Helix site.
Much new info. Things are moving along, albeit slowly.
Btw, I'd like to see an air pump hiding in the seatpost.
Does any company make one for Schrader valves?

I've one big complaint.
He misspelled "lose" as "loose".
This is a common error, but it really burns my bacon!

RatonLaveur

Thank you for letting us outsiders know he stays vocal.

Regarding seat-post pumps, surprisingly the offer out there seems limited.

I know that Tern's offshoot brand BioLogic made one specifically for Tern bikes, I don't see why it shouldn't be compatible, c.a. 560 mm long. Probably heavy like most tern stuff. Outer Diameter would need to be compatible with Helix's seat-post tube ID.

Otherwise I found the ToPeak Ninja-P which may or may not do the trick. I like it branded as ultra light.

As an alternative to purpose built devices, I know bike touring nuts usually find ultra compact emergency pumps (not the most practical but will do the trick) which I imagine would be easy to fit in the seat-post.

Now, to go back on the slow progress, I'd like to share a little bit of my experience as an engineer, having worked already at a few SME's and interned in a couple of big companies. Everything takes TIME. A lot of it. Trivial tasks are surprisingly long in the professional environment.
Sometimes I get the impression that a month's work could have fit in a few intense days. And yet I still find that we meet the deadlines. By industry's standards, what I often believe to be a shoddy performance on my side (in quantity of work, not quality) is actually most times equivalent to my peers and other companies.
I'm still working at adjusting my perceptions, and I'm sure Mr. Boutakis is grappling with the same issues.
Proper project design, goal definition and expectations management can improve all that of course. But I find even streamlined and robust timelines end up being much longer than we expect. Anyone feeling the same way?

Pine Cone

A seatpost pump would probably add years to the Helix delivery date.

Peter needs to get his test bikes finished. Then he needs to have them pass the tests. With luck that should happen sometime in the 1st Quarter on 2018.

I wouldn't be surprised to see the first backer bikes ship in the 2nd Quarter of 2018. It would be nice if it happened sooner, but I am not expecting my Helix to arrive before the 3-year anniversary of the Helix Kickstarter funding.

DaKineDatFolds

Wow, you've got THAT right. Peter gets a gold star for really opening up and laying out all the delays and mistakes, which includes a few hiccups over the past 2 years. 7x more content than the last update - impressive if you're looking for transparency.

"With two full years behind me I would like to think that I have gotten better at estimating timelines, but because of the pace at which this has all happened and the shear number of subprojects that were required I am still making mistakes."

"I ask you to not loose faith, once these parts arrive we are ready to go. In the meantime, we are conscious of this supply chain bottleneck and are working on a solution."

Okay, yeah. The communication was heartfelt and professional, but the 'speeling' and punctuation can be a rake across the chalkboard.

Jipe

Bigger wheel doesn't mean more stable, there are race bikes with ETRTO622 wheels that arent's stable at all, in downhill for instance. What makes a bike stable is the frame geometry and stiffness.

The Brompton is actually very stable, the "quick" steering is due to the small size of the wheels but doesn't mean that the bike is not stable.

About the comfort, the Helix has no suspension and will only rely on the width of its tires to provide some comfort assuming that the frame size will fit the rider size which with the short saddle-handlebar distance of the Helix is a major concern (it is similar as the one of the Tyrell bikes that are known to be designed for Asiatic riders, not for US/European taller riders).

The titanium frame isn't a guarantee for comfort, there are uncomfortable titanium frame bikes.

And last point, a steel version using high end stainless steel like Columbus Xcr or Reynolds 954 would provide a very good frame, probably much better than cheap, low end, Chinese titanium and with less manufacturing risks than titanium.

Joe Remi

I do not agree that you can say a bike with quick steering from small wheels still feels stable. My Brommie tracks straight and true as long as I avoid heavy inputs into the bars, but it's never going to be a "set it and forget it" ride where you can forget about the steering and start daydreaming. Sure the Helix can be made to have the same characteristics if Boutakis completely screws up the geometry, but assuming he doesn't, the 24-inch wheels will likely provide a less twitchy ride than Brompton.

Jipe

The touchy ride isn't due to the wheel size but to the bike geometry and 24" ETRTO507 is less small but still small compared to ETRTO622.

My Brommy is reactive on the steering which is very pleasant once you are used to, but stable, even with an heavy load in the front bag, I can ride very fast downhill without feeling insecure like I feel insecure with some race bikes.

Note that the saddle-handlebar distance of the Brompton is bigger than the one of the Helix what better fits for US/European riders.

Joe Remi

Well you're describing subjective things like "feeling secure", and promoting them as statements of engineering fact as if they would translate to everyone. As a general rule bigger wheels tend to feel more stable than smaller to most riders, in spite of the fact that I love my Brompton and feel fine sailing it down the very steep hill I live on.

linberl

I daydream on my Bike Friday all the time. (sorry, couldn't resist).

Revoltingest

Riding off road is where larger diameter & wider wheels have a stability
advantage. Were it just in the city, I'd consider Brompton. But the Helix has
the biggest wheels of anything I can effortlessly fit into a regular suitcase.

Note that comfort & stiffness come from the bike's design, not from the material.
But each material has its advantages, & is selected based upon balancing competing
factors, eg, cost, stiffness, strength, weight, ease of fabrication, market preference,
corrosion resistance, appearance, fatigue life, damping, availability.