Front Child Seats – Bobike Mini and OK Baby Orion – Kalkhoff Tasman and Pro Connect

[JamesC]

The decision to cycle with a young child on board is a very personal one, needing careful thought regarding the strength, development and personality of the child, together with the quality of the cycle equipment, the confidence of the rider and the type of cycling conditions (traffic, surfaces etc) that will be encountered.

There are some excellent blogs and accounts of that personal process out on the internet, including great info from forum member essexman and his cycledad blog (many thanks).

If, like me and my son and daughter-in-law, you come through the process of deciding that riding with a young child can be both safe and enjoyable, then you may also feel that a well chosen ebike might be just the ticket for sharing the extra load of child and equipment (seats and/or trailer).


Here I should say that we all live in and around Peterborough on the edge of Cambridgeshire. The city has a good network of cycle paths, including the Green Wheel which goes around the city, with good links into the centre, the living areas and business parks; and, of course, it is flat.

Within the city limits, the cycleways can be quite narrow and occasionally interrupted with zigzag safety barriers, which favours the use of cycle seats rather than trailers.

For those interested, the Ferry Meadows CC campsite sits right on the Green Wheel cycle route around the area.

So, with grandson Billy showing all the right signs of developing sufficient strength for a cycle seat, and being an adventurous sort of lad, it seemed the right time to look at child seats. We wanted a front seat so that we could talk and point out things easily, and Billy likes to wave and smile at people anyway.

Phase 1 was to establish whether he enjoys cycling, by fitting a seat to Grandad’s Pro Connect.
Phase 2 would be to select an ebike and seat that would suit the 6 mile commute along the River Nene cyclepaths to work and nursery.


Handlebar Stems, Frame Tubes and Cables
Front child seats, between rider and handlebars, attach to the bike in a variety of ways. Most attach to the solid frame of the bike and at least one attaches to the handlebar stem.

Here is a quick reminder on the 2 main types of stem:
1.The “threadless” or “ahead” stem: the Kalkhoff Pro Connect uses an Adjustable Threadless Stem
2.The “quill” stem: the Kalkhoff Tasman and Agattu use an Adjustable Quill stem

Page down on this link for a quick reminder on the names of the cycle frame tubes.
The front seats that attach to the frame are clamped to one or more of the Head Tube, Top Tube or Down Tube.

Beware if your cables for gears, brakes or electrics run down the outside of the top tube or down tube, as these can be in the way of seat clamps. The Kalkhoffs are good, as most of the cables run on the inside of the frame tubes.

Pictures and details in second post.

 

[JamesC]

49cm Pro Connect Diamond frame + OK baby Orion seat

The OK Baby Orion is made in Italy and is designed for children from 9 to 15 kg. The standard mounting, supplied with the seat, clamps around the head tube and is unobtrusive when the seat is removed.

However, this mounting requires a minimum of 17 mm of plain tube (no weld ridges) on the inside of the head tube, between the top tube and the down tube, for the clamping plate.

On the 49cm diamond frame Pro Connect, top tube and down tube meet at the head tube with no space between them (larger frames might be better in this respect).

For this situation, OK Baby make a seat mounting block which clamps around the down tube, and is fine for the ProConnect. The bracket fits just below the cable entry points, and includes angle adjustment to suit the rake of the downtube.

This bracket would NOT clamp successfully on down tubes which flare as they meet the head tube (typical on many wave frames – see the Tasman below). The tube needs to be parallel at the clamping point.

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In addition to the harness, the seat includes a very effective, hinged handlebar across the front of the seat for the child to hold. The hinged handlebar can be removed as the child grows.

There are three different heights for the footrests.

At the time of purchase, I could only find the dark blue colour in the UK.
Seat and downtube mount.

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And a windscreen that clamps directly to the handlebars is available, although I had to order this direct from Italy. The screen can be removed easily, leaving half the yellow bracket still attached to the handlebars.

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From the child’s perspective, this is a comfortable and well finished seat. The long metal bracket between the seat and the clamp on the downtube gives the child a softer ride than might be expected on the unsprung Pro Connect. (I am one of those that conceded to using a Thudbuster seatpost to soften out some of the bumpier rides)

The windscreen works well, but is a little bit flexible in high winds. Not a danger, but a little bit noisy like Rolf Harris’ “wobble” board.

From the rider’s perspective, the upper body area is fine with the child nicely positioned within the arms.

The seat position does interfere with the knees at the top of the pedal stroke, requiring the knees to be bowed outwards to clear. This seems to be a common situation with seats that are fixed to the frame, particularly on bikes with the short, low head tubes used on threadless stems.

Keep in mind that a significant benefit of an assisted ebike is that there is less pressure on the rider’s knees, so a less than perfect posture with a child seat, for relatively short distances, can be managed.

Nonetheless, in choosing a bike that would be used frequently with a front child seat and maybe over longer distances, the Bobike Mini attached to a Quill Stem, overcomes this issue very successfully.

 

[JamesC]

49cm Tasman Wave frame + Bobike Mini seat

Billy’s main transport is now his parents’ Tasman, fitted with a Bobike Mini Seat complete with handlebar and windscreen, all attached to the quill stem. Both the bike and the seat are excellent for the task, and should be seriously considered as a very good startpoint.

The bike rides very smoothly, and the gear range of the Nexus 8 (std 23T sprocket) is great for the comfy rides along well used cycle paths.

Bobike are a very popular Dutch manufacturer of child seats, and well used to the more upright style of practical cycling that can be seen in Holland and Germany.

Good information is available from the Dutch Trading Company in Brighton.

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Having positioned the handlebars to suit the rider, the Bobike Mini bracket clamps cleanly and firmly around the quill stem, sitting on top of the threaded stem locknut. The bracket, with seat and windscreen attached, follow the movement of the handlebars, meaning that there are NO issues with the handlebar hitting the seat on tight corners.

The bracket contains 4 sleeved holes – the seat plugs into 2 at the rear, and the windscreen plugs into 2 at the front. This view looking down onto the stem is without the plugin windscreen in the front holes.

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Completing the picture with windscreen and child’s handlebar / headsupport,the cockpit looks like this.

Note that since these pictures, the Cateye Velo 5 has been moved along the handlebar using the Cateye long cable/sensor kit. The standard cable length is too short to route neatly with the Magura brake pipes out of reach of the child’s feet, and the child seat obscures the central area of the handlebars.

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The Bobike Mini is very well made and complements the good looks of the Tasman. Billy seems very comfortable, and the high forward position remains stable and balanced.

Untested as yet at the higher end of the child’s 9 – 15 kg weight range.

The windscreen becomes less significant when the child is old enough to wear some form of eye protection against wind and bugs.

For cold weather, Bobike have designed a cosymuff (called Bike-A-Way) that fits very neatly over the seat and covers the child’s lower body. In these conditions, the child would be wearing an anorak to keep the top half warm, but the cosymuff has a built in cape and hood that can be quickly flipped over the child’s head if it starts to rain.

Useful to note that the bottom half of the Bobike cosymuff will fit over the bottom section of the OK Baby seat, but the height of the OK Baby prevents the cape and hood being used.

The riding position is very good, with no contact between knees and the underside of the seat.

Regarding frame size, I choose to ride with the saddle significantly lower when Billy is aboard. With the child seat taking space between saddle and handlebar, it is not possible to slip forward off the saddle when coming to a standstill, so it is important that your feet can reach the ground firmly whilst still astride the saddle.

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[JamesC]

49cm Pro Connect Diamond frame + Bobike Mini seat using Ahead set mounting bracket

To complete the picture, the Bobike Mini seat can still be fitted to bikes with threadless stems, using the alternative mounting bracket which is sold separately. This bracket clamps very securely around the solid head tube, and does NOT move with the steering.

Note though that the bracket is designed to take the seat only, and does not enable mounting of the Bobike windscreen.

As with the OK Baby seat on the Pro Connect, the solid frame fixing on the threadless stem immediately lowers the seat by 8 cms, requiring the riders knees to move out sideways at the tip of the stroke.

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Conclusion

For a high standard of comfort for child and rider, the wave frame Tasman (or Agattu-C) coupled with a Bobike Mini seat is a great combination.

Front mounted child seats fixed to the frame on threadless stems give the same pleasure of having child and rider in close proximity, but leave less clearance for comfortable riding over longer distances.

In my opinion, the Panasonic style of crank drive is ideal for providing assistance to the rider in a safe and undramatic way whilst caring for the children on board.

The range of the Nexus 8 gear hub on the Tasman provides good capability for the weight to increase as a family grows – one on the front / one on the front and one on the back / two in a trailer.

Good cycleways and disciplined use allow parents to enjoy cycling with young children.


Safety note concerning the quality of components

It goes without saying that the Bobike Mini seat does rely on the strength and maintenance associated with the quill stem; looseness, corrosion and fatigue cracks are all possibilities.

It is very important to have the stem checked on an older bike, and possibly replaced with one of steel or stainless steel.

On new bikes, Bobike are comfortable for the Mini seat to be fitted to the modern style of forged alloy stem, but only if the bikes are built to the standards associated with the EU norms EN 14764 (city and trekking bikes) and EN 14766 (mountain bikes) to insure the correct quality of components have been used in construction.

Kalkhoff e-bikes are built under a standard that covers these norms.

James

PS View all the pictures in this post here

 

[flecc]

Thanks for these excellent reports James, they should be useful well into the future for parents and grandparents.
.

 

[pl1974]

coincidence...

James,

Thanks for the info.

Very strange that I'm just looking at buying a front mounted child seat for my Powabyke X6. I'm more or less set on the Weerider, mainly due to availabilty over the Bo-bike.

Even more coincidentally, I live at Stamford and work in Peterborough and have been looking at various ways to increase my bikes range, including second battery or Life4po, to allow me to commute, I'd cut into Ferry meadows at Castor.

I think I may have already had a seat bought for me (birthday this weekend), so I'll let you know how it performs too.

Paul

 

[Tim]

Very, very useful. I may well be referring to this page if the missus gives permission to take my son out later this Summer. As she's not a cyclist though, the uphill struggle is going to be trying to convince her that our little one will be OK perched up there.

 

[JamesC]

James,

Thanks for the info.

Very strange that I'm just looking at buying a front mounted child seat for my Powabyke X6. I'm more or less set on the Weerider, mainly due to availabilty over the Bo-bike.

Even more coincidentally, I live at Stamford and work in Peterborough and have been looking at various ways to increase my bikes range, including second battery or Life4po, to allow me to commute, I'd cut into Ferry meadows at Castor.

I think I may have already had a seat bought for me (birthday this weekend), so I'll let you know how it performs too.

Paul

I look forward to hearing how it goes - it is not easy to find a seat shop in our area that has a range of front seats to look at. Most have one make at best.

I enjoy the countryside around Stamford - do you go via Burghley House and Barnack to reach Castor and into Ferry Meadows ? The path along the Nene Valley railway from Castor takes you nicely into the Orton area.

Lovely riding, and I can see the need for a second battery.

James

 

[pl1974]

James,

Thats it, Burghley, Barnack, Castor Ferry Meadows and follow the Nene Valley line right up to 'Charters'.

I got the weerider and I can confirm that it fitted very easily and my 2 year old loves it, she was giggling away at the bumps in the road on her first trip out.

Paul

 

[JamesC]

James,

Thats it, Burghley, Barnack, Castor Ferry Meadows and follow the Nene Valley line right up to 'Charters'.

I got the weerider and I can confirm that it fitted very easily and my 2 year old loves it, she was giggling away at the bumps in the road on her first trip out.

Paul

Lovely stuff - good to hear that she enjoys the bike.

I imagine that you enjoyed it too; there is always plenty to see and I expect that the "commuters" with children quickly get to know each other.

Keep an eye out for Billy on that trip - orange and black stripes, similar to a giraffe.

James