[update]best advice came from habi, as per usual 😉 he said, test-drive!
so true. and so hard to do. for a few of these bikes i would have to travel to the netherlands or denmark, i guess.
so i went ahead and bought an old postal bike for sfr 80.-, it needs some work.
but this will do while i look for another option:
wait, how did this get posted here???
lol, i think i set up automatic posting on my posterous and it just started to work…
anyway, here’s the tumblr post
last week i fell in love with this bike from trueunique:
my internet searches came up with the following options:
velorbis: short john (no price information yet, 3-speed, front and rear brake)
workcycles: fr8 (sfr 2225.-, 8 gear shimano )
pashley: courier (sFr. CHF 1680.-, 3-gear handbrakes)
t’mannetje: elefant (€ 995.-, 3 speed and coasterbrake, € 1295.-, nexus 8 speed and handbrakes)
visually i quite like the short john and the fr8, as far as best deal i think the courier is very interesting. the elefant may have front wheels that are too small.
hmmm….
I’d go for the Elephant. If you’ve got a heavy load on your front wheel you’ll be happy it ain’t big! But of course I’d only buy it after a test ride…
ah, good points there, habi, cheerz. actually the short john also has a smaller front wheel, although a little less pronounced, so can’t wait to hear a price quote for that one. but test driving the elefant will be hard, unless i go to haarlem in the netherlands…