Project: Birdy

[Justinitus]

Just picked this up. 21 speed (3 spd hub, 7 deraileur) and in pretty good condition but needs a few bits - cables, brake levers etc. The pivot bushings, bottom bracket, hubs, paint etc are in great order. Seems to be lightly used but stored in a damp shed as the brake levers have bubbling paint!

I think I’m going to remove the rack and mudguards and run it “bare” Should tidy up nicely.

Does anyone know the exact model, or indeed how old it is?

 

[Cycleops]

Nice one. Just proves Brompton isn’t the be all and end all of folders.

 

[Justinitus]

Just weighed it on the luggage scales as it felt quite light - 10.2kg. Quite surprised! Will be interesting to see the weight with some lighter tyres and sans mudguards and rack

 

[midlife]

How does it fold?

 

[cheys03]

Birdy Blue, I think. The specs were colour-coded to the frames. We had one in the family around 2004, also a Blue and bought second hand maybe 2002 model. The mudguards and rear rack on the one we had looked slightly more fitting and it was 3x8 speed so I would hazard a guess that the one in the pic is slightly earlier, maybe 1999-2001.
Excellent bikes, bigger folded package than a Brompton of course but decent front suspension. The front steering geometry always felt a little odd to me and I was never fully confident round bends but probably says more about me than the bike.
Interested to know how much you paid if you're willing to share

Folding vid
View: https://youtu.be/3kyfpH1zDaI

 

[berlinonaut]

The Birdy blue got invented at the end of 1996. As your's does have V-brakes it's earliest build date is around mid 1997, probably a bit later as it seems to have mounting points for a low rider on the fork, invented at the end of 1999. On the other hand it seems to lack component changes for model year 2001, so I'd have as a kind of best guess year 2000 - however, I am absolutely no expert for Birdies. However, your bike does fit the pics in the year 2000 catalogue pretty well incuding the style of the decals (that were different on older versions). The seatpost is btw. not original.

On this somewhat oldfashioned German Website you'll find a lot of information about the Birdy, including a model history/changelog and a bunch of older manuals, catalogues and docs of all kind. Here is the manual for your model: https://birdy-freunde.de/birdy/doku...tungen/Bedienungsanleitung_Birdy_bis_2002.pdf - all in German unfortunately, but probably better than nothing and things like i.e. the recommended torque values should be understandable anyway.

 

[Justinitus]

Thanks for all the info, much appreciated Yes, looks to me like a 2000 model. The seatpost is stamped R&M so I presume an original part from a later model maybe.
It all works fine and rides very nicely.

 

[berlinonaut]

I paid £120 for it.

Sounds like a bargain!