I took my sweet old rigid MTB commuter with front basket to a recent trade show/motorcycle rally. The boss loved having it around for running to grab food for everyone, grabbing ice, getting to far-flung parts of the rally faster, etc. Has authorized me to “build something cool like your bike that we can take to rallies”. I’ve got a few hundred dollhairs to work with -the closer to $200 the better I am guessing.
Does not need to be a folding bike, but would be great if it was knock-down in some form or other, basically so we can easily ship it on a pallet along with our other trade show booth materials. Actually I think a folder would generally not be robust enough for the late-night shenanigans that happened on the bike at the most recent rally.
Current plan is to find something like this old Specialized Ground Control, pull the shock and insert a rigid block, swap the fork for a rigid, add easily-removable basket.
Took me a minute to get it, but this sounds cool provided the mechanics of the swingarm are friendly to that. It will kill your budget to have to do anything significant to it.
I don’t think a folder is the worst idea. I borrowed a Dahon from for a while and it was pretty burly. It will also fit a greater variety of people. For your application it does not need to get that small.
Well you guys are right of course a cheap Montague with up-to-date maintenance woudl work fine. I like the idea of a normal-ish bike with a dedicated coroplast case for throwin on the pallet too. Gotta take some measurements and then gonna scour craigslist over the next several months for something neato, not in a rush on this one.
Still thinking through derailleur/chain issue and/or IGH or SS. Whatever frame I end up with might dictate. Not really concerned with assembly being quick/easy as the setting this will be used in allows for a bit more complexity on that front.
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