Front Gear Swap? Is it possible?

[SoundSenior]

My wife and I recently purchased this foldable tandem bike which we love. The problem is it's severely underpowered. We reason that we could get better performance if we swapped out the front gear for a larger one, maybe even swapping out the single gear for a triple gear.

Is it possible to swap out the front gear, for a larger or multi-gear.

Thank you for your time..

 

[Dogtrousers]

@SoundSenior
Nice looking bike.

Unfortunately I don't know anything about tandems. @biggs682 might have an idea

 

[T4tomo]

if its underpowered, that is due to your collective legs.

the front chain called the timing chain need to have exactly same sized chainrings on both the pilot and stoker cranks, otherwise your in a whole world of hell where your pedal strokes and cadence will be continuously out of sync.

if you think it needs higher gears then you could change the chainring that drives the rear wheel.....
but given you tricky tandems are to cycle up large hills, bear in mind you will make your lowest gear higher as well and that could be a much worse problem than being a bit under-geared on the flat.

I suspect it needs a bigger range of gears but that will involve a extra "drive" chainring and a front derailleur and then it almost certainly wont fold as neatly, if at all.

most tandems have the timing chain on the opposite side. This can't, otherwise it wouldn't fold, hence the "bodge" of using a double chainring to act for timing chain and the drive chain, which almost certainly precludes the use of a double / triple arrangement on the rear cranks, as any FD would foul the timing chain

 

[biggs682]

@SoundSenior
Nice looking bike.

Unfortunately I don't know anything about tandems. @biggs682 might have an idea

I echo @T4tomo thoughts

 

[Punkawallah]

There looks to be a rear derailleur. It looks of an age where it would have a cassette on the rear wheel. Have you looked into replacing the smallest cogs with smaller ones?

 

[roubaixtuesday]

Wot Tomo sed, and two points:

First, "underpowered" could mean radically different things eg "can't go very fast in the flat" or "can't get up steep hills". Can you be much more exact with what the issue is?

Second, worthwhile upgrades are likely to be very difficult if not impossible. It's hard to design and build a high performance tandem at all, and much more so a folding one. Changing the rear chainring and/or rear cassette are as far as it's likely to be possible to go. In order to give any advice on that we need to know exactly what rear cassette (teeth numbers in the cogs), rear derailleur (there should be a model number in it somewhere) and good photos of the rear chainring arrangement.

I'd suggest enjoy it as is for what it is, but if you want a significantly better performing machine, buying a second hand non folding one would be the way to go.

This is the nearest I could get to a spec for your machine.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Meghna-T...-Tandem-Adult-Beach-Cruiser-Orange/5442874234

[Addendum: "beach cruiser" title of that link gives you a good idea of the range of use you should expect from it]

 

[roubaixtuesday]

the front chain called the timing chain need to have exactly same sized chainrings on both the pilot and stoker cranks, otherwise your in a whole world of hell where your pedal strokes and cadence will be continuously out of sync.

I think there's a freewheel type bottom bracket in this one, looking at both the position of the cranks and the description form my link - "able to pedal independently..."

 

[Sharky]

Noticed that the cranks front and rear don't seem to be aligned?

 

[roubaixtuesday]

Noticed that the cranks front and rear don't seem to be aligned?

Read my post immediately above yours