Jipe

It is definitely M6. Therefore that you can mount easy wheels made for the Brompton.

These factory installed easy wheels prevent to mount rear pannier far enough to the rear to avoid to hit them with the heels.

To install rear pannier, you need thin easy wheels mounted close to the rack.

Some pictures (it was last year with original rear wheel, other easy wheels and my former H&H rack now replaced by the original R&M rack but its the same with this R&M rack):

CEBEP

it’s M6, length is 79mm or probably 80mm when it’s straight

CEBEP

Stock wheels are not an issue for me as I’m using this excellent Vincita bag with quick release and it fit’s just fine.

CEBEP

Is there a way to (quickly?) remove these cords to facilitate the bag on the rack?

CEBEP

Is this kickstand position is normal? Seems to be way forward and bicycle leans on the side too much

Schwinnsta

The screw looks to be too long. Did it come that way, stock? It is usually a bad day when you put a screw into bending. They are designed to take shear and tension. Check the difference between your rack and Jipe's.

CEBEP

Yes, stock rack.

Schwinnsta

Still, that is the problem. The screw and the spacer are too long. That it is why it bent. Again, look at Jipe's configuration.

CEBEP

If you refer to Jipe’s picture few posts back it’s not a stock rack and the reason why he opted for eazy wheels is because he uses panniers and not because they bend. Mine got bend during shipment in the airplane, not because of a normal use. Once I’ll replace the screw I’m sure stock wheels will be just fine.

Schwinnsta

Cool then. I have experimented in shopping cart mode with my Brompton. That also uses M6 bolts, and your configuration would likely not work on it. If it works for you, then cool. It will provide more stabilty, but there may be the possibility of snagging it.

glye

There's no quick way to remove the rubber bungy cords afaik. But it's quick and easy to pull them under the middle bars, and up onto the last one. Then it's out of the way when you don't need it.

My kickstand is behaving the same way, the bike seems to lean too much and you can see the flat plate at the end of the kickstand isn't flat against the ground. But the bike doesn't fall over, so I haven't done anything about it.

The wide wheel configuration is stock from R&M, but was perhaps not tested well enough. Like CEBEP I use a racktop bag which does not interfere with the wide stock wheels. But I think I'd like to swap to bigger radius wheels like Jipe has, for easier rolling on not perfect surfaces. I will also remove the side spacers and reinstall with shorter bolts, because I see one of my bolts has also bent slightly, and the bike has not been handled by anyone but myself. This will likely make it less stable side-to-side when rolling, but I guess that's not a major problem or Jipe would have noticed it.

2_i 

This looks like a stock stainless bolt with a button head. I would take the bolt to a hardware vendor and get an identical one. Button heads may be less popular in some countries than other and longer bolts too. However, I remember Istanbul having a neighborhood of hardware vendors with an abundance of stock. (I still have some stuff I bought there in my basement.) If you cannot get the button head, get hexagonal or socket. A straightened out bolt should be OK for a while, just run a nut several times over, and best a die, to make sure you do not screw a damaged thread back in.

CEBEP

I had few shorter M6 bolts and:



to show the difference:



Looks a alot cleaner but definitely less stable. Even stationary tends to lean on the right. Wheeling will probably depend a lot on the surface.

CEBEP

like this? Not gonna work for my bag as the rear end needs to be flat to the rack. Are these bungee cords are useful anyways? Don’t look like they are. Ones on my Brompton are really useful, not sure about these on Birdy.

CEBEP

I could order M6x80mm stainless bolts from the internet, so all good. Thanks.

CEBEP

Can’t go any higher than that, can I?

glye

Pull it under all the 3 middle bars. You could even give the "handle" a half twist so it attaches upside-down at the end, then it's very low profile.



I find it useful when I want to go light, and only bring a jacket, for example.

glye

Not if you value your safety, no

It may be possible to use an extender like this: https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=fol...ages&ia=images
or riser handlebars like this: https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=ris...ages&ia=images

CEBEP

This helped, thanks a lot.
Rack is rated at 15kgs which is pretty awesome as Brompton’s is rated at 10kg max.

glye

I also had some shorter bolts lying around, and did the same mod. We'll see how it works out. At least there is less chance of damaging the rack threads or breaking a bolt now.

CEBEP

I’m not rolling it around much since I use bikes for fun and recreation only. So should probably work for me. And let’s admit it, with this setup the rack and the bike looks a lot sexier!

If you will decide to leave it as is, it would make sense to use the blue thread locker on the bolt threads. At least this was applied to the stock bolts.

Jipe

My Birdy had also the Minoura kickstand that I dismounted, I do not use a kickstand.

I also permanently removed the rubber bungy cords of the R&M rack I have now. I never had the original easy wheels with extenders (they aren't delivered with the rack and I prefer rear pannier with the load placed lower to a top bag) so I cannot compare the lateral stability

The H&H titanium rack you see on the pictures is crap, it has plastic bushes that do not last and a lot of lateral play, the two pieces titanium bolts with a very short M3 thread do not remain tightened, its a bad design, one more Chinese expensive crap component to absolutely avoid.

I bought it from Boxbike in Berlin about one year ago, its still under warranty but the shop doesn't honor the legal EU 2 year warranty, bad product sold by a bad bicycle shop!

CEBEP

I wander how did you manage to remove them unless you cut them off. I didn’t find an easy way to do it.

I’m normally against any design changes to the bike as I assume designers had a reason for everything they do. Same goes for awkwardly placed wheels on the Brompton rack, one on the inside and another on the outside. There is a reason for that so I didn’t change it. I believe designers put the spacers on the rack for a reason and since they don’t interfere with my bag I think I’ll keep them once I receive replacement bolts.

2_i 

You want the roller wheels to be placed symmetrically with respect to the center of mass of the folded bike. That center shifts to the right of the drive side when you fold over the top of Brompton, hence the asymmetry the roller wheels on the Brompton rack. I moved these wheels even more in direction of the drive side, than in the original design, for even more symmetric placement relative to the folded center of mass and a greater stability of the rolled folded bike.

CEBEP

Exactly