Outdooritis: Compacting The Already Compact XDS FA-20 Bicycle

My XDS FA-20 bicycle fold before
the more compact fold.

The thought had came to mind several days ago: How to fold the XDS FA-20 bicycle more compactly. When folding the bicycle, the bicycle's handle post could only be folded inside the folded frame body; resulting the handle touching the rear wheel's arm, crank, pedal and stand; hindering the crossbar frame of folding more compactly. In comparison with a Brompton bike, the handle post is folded outside of the folded frame's body so that the handle does not obstruct the crossbar frame to fold as compactly as possible. Brilliant.

My XDS FA-20 bicycle in the more
compact fold.

After a light stroll with my XDS bicycle, followed by my 2 elder sons on their BMX and push car, I adjusted the height of the handle bars so that it does not touch the rear wheel's arm, crank, pedal or stand when the bike was folded. The result? Awesomeness. The fold was so compact that the front and rear wheels' hubs are slightly less than 1 cm apart. If not for the "horns" of the handles touching the wheels, the 2 hubs would actually touch. This is the compactness limit the bike could be folded, any more compact than this would require the bike to be dismantled.

After the more compact fold, the wheels'
hubs are slightly less than 1 cm apart.

I saw why the Brompton wheels are not precisely adjacent to each other when the bicycle is folded. This is so that front wheel arms do not touch rear wheel hub, contributing to the Brompton's much compact fold. In comparison with the XDS FA-20, the front and rear wheel hubs are precisely side-to-side with each other.

I also saw the Brompton uses it's own proprietary rear gear hub which has a slimmer profile compared to normal hubs like the ones on my bike. However, using propriety hubs also limits one capabilities to modify the hubs if a person feels the Brompton Wide Range (BWR) 6 speed gearing isn't suitable for them. I guess that that is the tradeoff between compactness and flexibility.

Still, I'm getting to love my XDS FA-20 bike more and more and more :D

Update 13 October 2014

The seat is turned slightly sideways so that the handlepost stub
could move closer to the seatpost for the most compact fold.

After searching a bit for the cause in this post here, I found a way to completely make the XDS FA-20 bicycle front and rear hubs touch each other which I did not notice before. I noticed that when folding the bike, if you pushed down the seatpost to as far as it can go, the handlepost stub will touch the side of the seat, prohibiting a compact frame fold. By turning the seat slightly sideways, the handlepost stub could move closer to the seatpost, making the overall frame fold compact to the point the front and rear wheel hubs kiss each other.