Kilometrestones - Chapter 2

My 2021 Brompton H6R: 4,000 kilometres To see this post on the blog go to https://life2wheels.com

I've been riding my Brompton for close to four-and-a-half years now.

Four-and-a-half years and 4,000 kilometres.

In reality it's been even more distance than that on the Brompton because I picked up the bike on March 12, 2021, but I didn't start logging the distance cycled until November of that year with hundreds of kilometres already pedalled. Some of that wandering happened as far afield as Vancouver, Montreal, and Ogunquit.

The four thousand kilometres I am celebrating here, with you, is the portion of that distance both travelled and recorded meticulously, thanks to an Excel spreadsheet that tracks my activities, and my trusty CatEye Quick odometer.

I’ll be the first to say that Bromptons are strange cycles.

The odd aspects begin most obviously with the small wheels, but on closer inspection, every other aspect of the bicycle is even stranger. The frame is odd, all low-to-the-ground and gracefully curved. The seat post stands out because it’s so darn long. The handle bars are shaped with their own weird curves, or not, depending on your choice. Then there’s the gearing. Six gears split between a rear derailleur and a rear hub transmission, and there are other gearing options as well. Oh, and I should wrap it up here, but wait… what two-wheel bicycle has six wheels???? My Brompton does.

But the best strange feature, by far, very, very far, is that the Brompton folds, and it folds in mere seconds!

All those weird aspects I mentioned, without exception, are carefully engineered to allow the Brompton to fold very efficiently.

Folded, Bromptons fit in an airplane’s overhead storage compartment; two Bromptons fit in the trunk of a Smart car; they fit in suitcases; under restaurant tables; in crowded subway trains and buses; two fit in a hallway closet without interfering with coats and jackets; Bromptons live happily in the trunk of any car or taxi…

The list goes on, but I’ll happily stop there.

The appropriate focus for the appreciation of any two-wheeler is, and ought to be, not its appearance, but how it rides.

As odd as the Brompton is in all elements of its being, almost none of all that strangeness translates into the ride.

The only exception worth mentioning is that it takes a couple of kilometres to adjust to what we’ll call its “twitchyness”. I got used to that very quickly, most likely because I had been riding a Vespa motor scooter for over ten years, and Vespas also have small wheels.

The very first time I rode a Brompton was at the dealer when I gave it a test ride. I didn’t really know what to expect. What a surprise that was!

All the Brompton’s strangeness completely disappears once you’re in the saddle because your experience is not what you can see, it’s what you feel. And what you feel is a bicycle. A perfectly normal bicycle.

I can’t blame you for doubting my assessment since you may think I’m biased.

If I have sparked a little curiosity, consider the Brompton cyclists who take their bikes on the road for incredible long-range expeditions, from England to Sweden; from London to Paris; from Amsterdam to Belgium, France, and Spain; through the Himalayas; throughout northern Japan; from Toronto to Montreal; from England to Poland; to South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and Singapore, and the list goes on, and on. The adventures are abundant, and well-documented on YouTube.

Search on Youtube for Susanna Thornton; the Brompton Traveler; la petite réinventerie; Lady Brompton; Rizal Sapi; and 2bikes4adventure. And that’s not all. There are many others for you to discover on your own.

All to say that 4,000 kilometres on a Brompton, seen here in that moment, is... really nothing.

Nothing... but the joy and true pleasure of life on two wheels.

Bookbinding challenges - End papers

To see this post on the site, go to https://life2wheels.com.

I suppose it's fitting that the last purchase of needed supplies I finally made, after glue, sewing thread, beeswax, an awl, clamps, pressing boards, a homemade book press, brushes, a curved sewing needle, a skiving knife, book board, cover leather, book cloth, colour printed signatures, a sharpening stone, headbands, and bookmark ribbon, was end paper. 

Trust me it wasn't deliberate for it to come last towards the end of the project. It's just semi-co-incidental, that's all.

End papers are important mostly because they are the key ingredient that attaches the book to its cover. If the cover were to fall off and get lost, how else would you judge the book?

If you have a hard cover book handy (any one will do) open the cover but turn no pages. What you see is the book's end paper. Typically it's quite a bit heavier than the pages of the book, and in the vast majority of bindings, it is content-free. By that I mean there is nothing written on the end paper (if there is something there, it's likely on the back end paper, and courtesy of a librarian). The only aesthetic aspect is usually its colour.

I was planning for something more interesting. The book and the title are printed in red ink, and there is a myriad of red hearts... in the title, and towards the bottom on every love note page. So of course I thought red or white end papers covered in contrasting red or white hearts... that would be nice, no? Ideally in Japanese paper?

Well both my wife and the Japanese took issue with those suggestions. Impossible for me to find genuine Japanese paper featuring hearts (cranes and flowers yes, hearts no), and my darling who is the inspiration for this book (and my life) suggested cream or ivory, not red.

Last Friday we finally paid a visit to the leading arts supply store in Toronto, Above Ground Art Supplies, appropriately located on McCaul Street south of the Art Gallery of Ontario, and in the imposing shadow of OCAD U, Canada's oldest, largest and leading art and design university, located in downtown Toronto since 1876. 

I was leaning towards sturdy cream-coloured Canson 100 GSM paper from France, but Susan chose ivory Mingei Chiri Japanese paper instead:

A great choice. Japanese paper is among the very best in the world. Not only is it beautiful in appearance, it is also very robust, because it's made of strong Kozo fibre. That's the good news that makes it well suited to being end paper. The challenge I expected was the translucence of the paper.

I was confident that I could make it work, but I would have to run some tests.

[time passed]

I ran some tests and I feel that these end papers will work. I am hedging against possible failure by lining the cover with the same cream-coloured book cloth I used for the cover art.

The journey continues.

Kilometrestones - Chapter 1

First up: Brooks B17 Special saddle after 900 kilometres. To see this post on the Blog go to https://life2wheels.com.

I bought this saddle in early September 2023. I love the way it looks on my bike, and that it matches the leather ergonomic handgrips. I had no illusions that comfort might be imminent when I installed the saddle.

Comfort is not the most important thing in the near term, but it is in the long term. There are perhaps hundreds of YouTube videos on the Brooks B17. The topic of comfort along with estimates of the time it takes to break in the saddle to reach that comfort zone, are constants in virtually all those posts.

I have to be honest, the discomfort of breaking in the B17 has been substantial. I started tracking the kilometres ridden on the saddle right from the start. There were a number of times that I considered going back to the Brompton stock saddle. The Brompton saddle was comfortable from day one. The Brooks was definitely not.

At this point, 722 days in from September 2nd, 2023, the first day I rode on the Brooks, I can't really perceive much, if any, change in the appearance of the saddle.

There is no doubt however that now that my butt has inflicted precisely 900 kilometres of punishment on the Brooks (as of August 23, 2025 at precisely 15h21 - I stopped when the odometer registered the 900th kilometre), I have progressed to a degree of comfort.

And what degree is that, you might ask?

Well, we're not talking the kind of eye-rolling, grin-inducing, deep-sighing comfort of plopping yourself down on a plush, soft, leather-upholstered, down-filled couch. After all, we're talking bicycle riding, not watching a sitcom.

I measure the comfort of my Brooks after 900 kilometres according to four scientific metrics:

1. Can I ride on old wrinkled pavement without lifting weight from the saddle?
   Yes, now I can
   
2. Can I ride on a sidewalk and not wince at every joint in the concrete?
   Yes, now I can
   
3. Can I do a 6 to 9 kilometre ride without lifting weight from the saddle periodically?
   Yes, now I can
   
4. Can I do a 6-9 kilometre ride without thinking about my butt?
   Yes, now I can

So there you have it. I am finally pleased with my Brooks B17 Special saddle, and no longer yearn for the Brompton stock saddle.

Now that I recorded this Brooks-ish kilometrestone, I felt entitled to take a break and admire the urban horizon within just a handful of feet from where I took a break in 2018 to take some moments of tranquility after my last Ontario Bar exam. This time I sat on the bench, mere steps from the where the Brompton hit the 900 saddle kilometres, and enjoyed a few sips of water. If you look carefully you can see my red water bottle between the bench slats.

Next up: My 2021 Brompton H6R: 4,000 kilometres 

Bookbinding challenges - Folding

Am I folding?

What a question! Have I ever folded?

I have never played poker, so there's that. I do help my better half fold sheets, so there's that. I don't think I have ever given up though. I admit I came close once or twice. But this, thank the powers that be, whoever they may be, is not about giving up.

For those who don't know, bookbinding involves a lot of folding!

The printer I am using offered not only to print the 24 signatures, but possibly to fold the signatures as well. To be honest I am a little conflicted. I want this ultimate version of the book to be as close to perfect as possible, and getting a nice almost perfect series of folds would be a step in the right direction. I also wanted to be 100% behind every step. Hence the conflict in my mind.

As I pondered, I decided.

I will not fold... well... what I mean is, I am persisting, not giving up... I will do the folding and you are joining me on this journey of twenty-four folds. All you need to do is read on.

The key to this journey is first to get your hands on the first signature. In this case it will be four sheets of letter-size paper (8 1/2" X 11").

As mentioned in the post on imposition, the page sequence is critically important. The first signature of the final version of my book looks like this in Excel:

The thick horizontal line represents the sheet of paper. The information above the thick horizontal line is what is printed on the top of the sheet of paper, and the information below the thick horizontal line is what is printed on the reverse of the sheet of paper. The numbers are simply the page numbers.

Make sure that the sheets are in the exact sequence shown above in the Excel plan. Carefully and gently fold the 4 sheets together and inward but without creating a crease. Then take a look at what sequence the pages will be in when you proceed to the final fold that will have the crease. If the sheets are in the correct sequence, with their tops up and facing you, you will see that the booklet is correct.

Now to complete the fold, bring the edges of the sheets together and make sure that they are perfectly aligned. I plan to use a square ruler to guide the pages. Once you feel that the alignment is as good as can be, run an index finger down the middle of the sheets to create the beginning of the crease. Once the crease begins, run your finger to the left and right to complete the crease.

Now use your bone folder to press down on the crease to make it as sharp as possible.

You will notice that the page edges are not perfectly aligned. Close maybe, but not perfect.

The good news is that while it is important to aim for perfection, there are later steps in the book binding process that allow perfect edges to emerge (see the post entitled Bookbinding challenges - Ploughing and sewing), and even shine (that is not a joke, I will show you shining page edges as part of the gilding process).

That's it for now. The next step in the process of building the book, once all the signatures are folded, is to pierce holes in the signatures and sew them all together. Lucky for you I already published a post on that, so if you don't already have a migraine you can continue the journey here: Bookbinding challenges - Building a piercing cradle.

There will be no more talk of folding in the face of challenges.