Manufacturer announces recall of nearly 150,000 folding bicycles

Posted: 29/09/2017

Brompton, the British manufacturer of folding bicycles, has issued a voluntary recall of bikes manufactured between April 2014 and May 2017 due to safety concerns.

Chief executive Will Butler-Adams said on a video on the company’s website that the problem has been caused by the ‘bottom bracket’, which is the part on the bike into which the pedal cranks are positioned. Manufactured by FAG, the bracket has demonstrated a higher than expected number of reported incidents, and has resulted in 1 in 5,000 failures. A failure of the bottom bracket could cause the rider of the bike to lose control and fall off.

There have been an increased number of incidents, sufficient to cause the company concern over the safety of its customers. One cyclist has broken his calf bone as a result of the fault.

Brompton estimates that 144,000 bikes have been recalled. It has advised that all bikes purchased between April 2014 and May 2017 should be returned to an authorised dealer for the bottom bracket to be replaced, free of charge. The affected serial numbers are between 1403284144 and 1705150001.

Arran Macleod, a solicitor in the Penningtons Manches product liability team, said: “Brompton bikes are used by thousands of cyclists every day. We are pleased that the manufacturer has issued this recall and has offered to replace the faulty component, although it is worrying that the CEO has said that he had been aware of the issue for the past three months but had presumed it was “bad luck”. This has potentially put many of its customers at risk of injury.

“As a product liability team, we will be monitoring the situation and can advise anyone who feels that they have suffered an injury because of a problem with the bottom bracket on this type of bicycle.”

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