Friday 30 October 2015

Elephant Bike - A review of a refurbished Mailstar

This isn't a blog about charities so I'm not going to lecture you about this being a good cause (although it is). If you want to know about that I can't do better than the Krizevac Project have already done - its a great idea, well worth reading about.

This is a blog about cycling, and the typical post here is a little bit political and ridiculously sarcastic - thats all going to be on hold for the moment while I tell you about my new bike. This bike here: 


Its an Elephant Bike, a not entirely informative name from a cycling perspective but brilliant for the charity. It wasn't made for elephants but it feels like it could have been - in my riding of it so far its the most ridiculously robust and rugged thing I've ridden. As you'd expect of a bike built to carry a heavy load and do hard work day in, day out.

These are bikes with a bit of history behind them. I'm sure many of you were as irrationally upset as I was to learn back in 2014 that the Royal Mail were phasing out the use of their Mailstar bikes for making deliveries - a sign of the times as posties struggle under the weight and ridiculous excess of packaging in the modern online ordering era. Manufactured by Pashley and sold as the Pronto, its not only hard to find one in a shop its also very (or 'reassuringly' as some maintain) expensive to buy one new. But the great thing about these critters is that with a bit of TLC they just don't need to be new - they're rugged as hell and built to survive judgement day.

And this is where the Elephant Bike comes in - for £250 (or £280 with the rack on the front and basket - why would you not?) you get a little bit of cycling history. An ex-posties bike refurbished to a high standard.

If I really go looking I can find the occasional spot where there's been some corrosion on the bars - but the frame is beautifully repainted and absolutely rock solid. The wheels, tyres, forks, racks and cables all seem immaculate. It took very little assembly (pedals screwing on, basket screwing on, saddle adjusted, handlebars straightened and I was ready to go), and I must say its one of the smoothest bikes I've ridden.

So, the positives - its gorgeous. Look at it, just look at it. Tell me it isn't gorgeous. And as I've said, its tough - after the holocaust there'll be nowt left but cockroaches getting around on Pashley bikes. Its built to take a hefty load, which makes it the ideal shopper or run around for the allotment. And its very low maintenance - hub brakes and hub gears that minimise work. This isn't a speedster, it was built for easy, mid-to-slow speed cycling with a load, and it is in my experience un-matched in that role. Especially at this price. And its the kind of bike that gets a following, there's already a wikia forming around the idea of using and maintaining these bikes

The negatives - while I love the look of the wicker basket, I don't immediately get why its more useful than the black plastic ones that decked out the Royal Mail ones. If the choice of the wicker basket is just aesthetic, I get it, but I'd have rather had the plastic one too (even if I'd had to pay a little more for the 'original' box as well as the wicker one). I also loathe the saddle - I don't know whose derriere it was modelled on but its not the right shape for me, and I'll be replacing it imminently and trying to resist the temptation to go Brooks. I'm also not entirely convinced that the gear tension is right, but for it would be churlish indeed to grumble if that's all that's wrong with a bike coming through the post.

So good causes aside, if you've got the money and the space for a load-carrying bike, I really can't find much to fault this bike on. It really is a glorious bit of kit, other than maybe the choice of a wicker rather than tough plastic box on the front. 9 out of 10 - just shy of perfect.

17 comments:

  1. Do they not have a parking brake or can you fit one? For the price and free delivery I'm very tempted :)

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    1. I'm not sure what brake levers these have, but Sturmey do a left and right hand S80 lever (you probably need one of the other but not both) which incorporates a "parking button" i.e.locks the lever "ON". SJS have them at £10.
      CD will be able to say what sort of levers they come with, but peering at the photo, they look like S80 or an earlier variant.
      They're incredible value, and I'd go for one of these, but I already have a similar PAPER bicycle which fulfils the same purposes (and I've run out of excuses to the wife).

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    2. Well I haven't found a parking button, but I'll make sure later. Don't think its got one.

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    3. Sturmey S80 levers come in two flavours-with and without parking buttons. These are they as sold by SJS:-

      http://www.sjscycles.co.uk/page/find/?name=sturmey%20brake%20levers&page=1

      I think that they are easily interchangeable.

      Having a proper parking lever is great, but in the past I've made do with wooden wedges, super rubber bands made of old inners and other things to hold down a brake lever, on the rare occasions I've needed to do that.

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  2. If I had the money right now I'd buy one. And fit a chain guard (enclosed case?), a dutch style rear wheel lock and dynamo lights.

    And possibly a plastic box too

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  3. I bought one when they were visiting Cambridge earlier this month. It's fantastic. Following Al's train of thought, I fitted a chain guard, £8 from ebay, and bought a dynamo and front & rear lights from germany. I initially found the gearing quite slow, so tried changing rear cog from 20 to 16 tooth, but now it's geared too fast and I can't push gear 3 except downhill, so I'll go back to 18 or 20. I think it's fantastic. My only gripe is that some of the new parts fitted, such as chain & pedals seem quite cheap. The chain gave out on my first ride (very quickly replaced by Elephant Bike - great customer service). The pedal bearings are starting to fail already. But these gripes are minor. The bike itself - frame, wheels, hubs, steering, carriers is bombproof and will, I suspect, outlast me!

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    1. I've just ordered one and I'm planning on fitting a dynohub and front and rear lights. I'm interested to know where you've mounted the front light. My first thought it is to fit it onto the front rack (similar to some dutch bikes), but this doesn't seem quite right because the wiring will need to allow for the movement of the wheel relative to the fixed rack (mounted to the head-tube). Alternatively, by mounting the light low on the existing fork brazon, I'd lose the advantage of the nice wide illumation that modern LED lights give.

      Mounting on the bars would be my least preferred option, so interested to know how you've fitted yours. Cheers.

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    2. Very boringly, rear light I've put on sassle post, front on bars. Not a perfect solution but fits in well for us because we use cateye lights on all our other bikes, so just buying more brackets means that the lights remain interchangeable. Keep us posted on where (and how) you put yours though!

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    3. Very boringly, rear light I've put on sassle post, front on bars. Not a perfect solution but fits in well for us because we use cateye lights on all our other bikes, so just buying more brackets means that the lights remain interchangeable. Keep us posted on where (and how) you put yours though!

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  4. "It wasn't made for elephants" - but the colour really was chosen to not be attacked by elephants: http://elephantbike.co.uk/buy-one-give-one/

    (I believe the Royal Mail also required that Prontos sold in the UK not be a red that could be mistaken for actual mail bikes. I don't know if that still applies, or can be enforced in any way.)

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    1. It seems odd that red is a forbidden colour by elephantbikes - I saw a ref to this within the last few weeks.

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  5. This is the blog that gave me the heads-up on these bikes. As a result I now have one - impulse buying of the most "dangerous" kind. :-) I'd certain agree to their bomb-proof build - a cockroach riding a Pashley would indeed be a sight to see. Agree also on the excellent after sales support. Mine came with cracks on the front carrier. A replacement one is on its way with instructions to find a new use for the cracked one as they don't want it back. Anyone want a basis for a giant hanging basket display? As far as lighting goes I've fitted a modern tail light to the existing mounting plate on the rear carrier. For the front I've retrieved an old-skool Ever Ready unit from my carefully catalogued components store/random junk pile, cleaned it up, fitted a modern replacement LED bulb and popped it onto the bracket on the fork. Nice and "retro". I won't be using the bike on unlit lanes so for everyday "be seen" lighting on urban streets it'll do the job for me.

    I understand that there are only five thousand of these refurbished bikes to be available so if you want one, be quick.

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  7. I like this elephant bike very much.

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  8. I've bought one of these with the whicker basket & the plastic tray. It is just wonderful. Very practical and surprisingly easy to ride given the weight. I agree about the saddle which I may replace at some point.
    I bought it for shopping & the allotment,basically as a cargo bike.
    It is just gorgeous and fun and wonderful.

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  9. I have an orange Elephant bike , I use it on a 20 mile round trip to my work. I also use it for my 10 mile pub run on a Wednesday evening in Hertfordshire.

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    1. Wow, thats a little further than I normally ride mine, great stuff :)

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