Paratrooper Folding Bike
I bought one, and I have been zipping around on it for a few weeks now. Figured it might be of interest here. For a little context, my other bike is a 1990s Schwinn Beach Cruiser I bought in Florida for $100 from a Walmart, so I am definitely not a bike guy. But my son wants to start taking on some gravel and mountain bike trails, and I want to keep up with him for the general exercise. I also wanted something I could stick in a work truck or rental for when I am travelling, hence the folding bike.
I had planned to get the $800 green Paratrooper, but nobody had them in stock because Covid. I ended up with the Montague Paratrooper Highline, as it was the only one in stock at Freedom Folding Bikes in Boulder at the time. About $400 more expensive than I had planned on, but once I saw it, I quite liked the way it looked. And also, it was right there, right then.
It is nicer than any bike I've ever owned, and more expensive than all of them combined. That said, I am not a bike nerd, but the bike nerds told me that absent the folding component, it is middle-of-the-road at best. Still, it has stuff I had not realized were used on a bike before, like hydraulic disc brakes and fancy trigger shifters, and giant tires. So that's cool.
Mine is the medium frame. Same stand-over height as the large frame, just 2" shorter in length. At 6', I was right at the line of the medium and large frames, but the medium won out because it was actually at the shop. I am more or less an even split between legs and torso, but I can see feeling crowded if I had longer legs. My biggest issue was that the bars were ridiculously low and much too narrow for me to be comfortable with. I almost bit it just riding around the store parking lot. The store I bought it from slapped on a 3" handlebar riser, which was better, but the wider handlebars I added later really made the difference in comfort, at the expense of being compact. I added Ergon grips and a kick-stand to the riser, and had the cables extended. The local bike shop suggested the Ergons because my hands were going numb even on short rides. They were so awesome and comfortable I bought a second set for my cruiser. With all these additions, it rides as upright as my beach cruiser, although I have recently learned a lesson about how that might not be optimal.
Anyways, on to the folding. Pop the tires off, and the rear triangle folds around towards the handlebar. The result is still fairly large, but it takes up width rather than length. A lot of the videos I saw on this thing show people leaving the back tire on. In experience, particularly with these tall tires, that didn't do very much to make it fold well. It folds at an angle with the rear tire mounted, instead of parallel, and while you can stuff the front tire into that space, the whole package is still pretty large and unwieldy with the back tire on. I could stick it in the back seat of my truck, but it consumed a lot of space. I found it took very little time to pop the back wheel off, stick a chain keeper in there, and then fold it up much more compactly. It is still a full-sized bike, though, and with the forks sticking way out, it is fairly tall.
I mostly plan to stick this thing into rental car trunks and the space between the desk in the back of our work Transits, but I was curious if I could fold it down enough to fit into a suitcase. Took about five minutes and an Allen key to pull the wheels, fold the frame, remove the handlebars and the fork. Pedals are quick-release. At this point, it fit well enough in the suitcase that I could zip it up, but the crank-set shoves it hard against the bag sides. If I remove one side of the crank-set, it will fit very easily with room for additional padding, but that will take more than an Allen key to do, so I need to put some thought into it.
Reassembly was also very quick. Slap the fork on, and the handle bar.
Mount the front wheel
Mount the back wheel
Attach the pedals and adjust the seat.
About 5-8 minutes from suit case to rideable.
The wheels can be deflated and fitted into a wheel bag which is airline-size legal, but I haven't bought one yet. But it is doable. Not certain this offers me much over just paying the $100 bike fee, but it can be done.
Also stores pretty easily when I need floor space.
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Originally Posted by JohnnyEgo
