Maintenance

Certain maintenance tasks may be found in the Common Problems section.

Crack in Aardvark
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Important Upgrade: Seatmast Safety Brace

In 2009 Bike Friday identified a flaw in the design of the aardvark (the lower half of the seatmast). Rider stress will eventually a specific aardvark arm to crack. The basic problem is that the arms of the aardvark do not form a complete triangle, and are thus essentially torn apart from one another by rider weight and pedaling stress. The typical location of the crack is shown in the image at right.

Safety Brace (silver).
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Courtesy of Vik Banerjee

If you have an old-style (pre-2010) aardvark, you should install the tikit safety brace immediately prior to riding the bike. The brace solves the problem by completing the triangle, preventing the two arms from being torn apart. Contact Bike Friday to get one for free.

Additionally you should examine the aardvark to see if a crack has started. If it has, contact Bike Friday about replacing the aardvark. You may be able to feel a crack easier than see it. Cracks also show up better under focused light such as from an LED flashlight.

Brace Wrapped in Vinyl
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The safety brace unfortunately hampers the ability to pick up the tikit by its rear handle: it has sharp edges and bites into knuckles. This can be solved by wrapping the brace in tape or vinyl tubing. The vinyl tubing solution is shown at right: in this case, three pieces of aquarium tubing were slipped over the brace.

2010 aardvark.
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Courtesy of Vik Banerjee

Another option is to upgrade the aardvark (at cost) to the new 2010 design. The 2010 design has a curved handle which attaches to both arms in question, thus completing the triangle.

Greasing the Pac Man Clamp

The inside of the pac man clamp on the handlebar stem should be greased every few months to keep it smoothly coming off the hinge when opened. This is particularly important for the Hyperfold tikit.

Replacing the Hyperfold Cable Bearing

Hyperfold cable bearing.
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The Hyperfold cable bearing is a funnel-shaped spinning object located on the underside of the fork at the steering tube. It is the interface where the hyperfold cable goes up the steering tube. The device is a trumpet valve (the funnel) stamped into a standard sealed cartridge bearing to enable it to spin around.

To operate properly and prevent damage to the cable, the funnel must be able to spin freely. However the pressure from the cable eventually causes the ball bearings to pit and the funnel will start spinning in a grinding fashion, then eventually seize up.

This can happen as often as once per year depending on usage patterns. Consider it routine maintenance to install a new cable bearing occasionally via a dealer (Bike Friday can sell you the bearing directly: it is inexpensive, but labor may not be). When replacing the bearing, check the cable for signs of wear, particularly if the bearing had seized up. Bike Friday also sells replacement cable assemblies.

If you'd like to replace the cable bearing yourself, Bike Friday has a video showing the steps necessary to perform the procedure.