Codename NeWT - First Look.

First impression on the bike currently Codenamed NeWT.

The shipping box was a bit smaller than I though it was going to be, and that's just naivete. I mean the bike is designed to be small. So why wouldn't it be in a small shipping box?

Wow.. Packed well.
5minues later.. Ok.. I get it, I get it, igetit.. Enough with the bubble wrap! On one hand, I've been dreamin of this bike for months. On the other hand, I've been unable to sleep for the last few days because I had a tracking number. On the third hand, I want to ride this beauty!

NeWT was built by hand, by someone (or someones I suppose) that really gave a shit about what there were doing. That in and of itself is something odd in this world of underpaid whinners that thing the world owes them... sorry different blog. Nice clean welds. Wheels are true and the reach on front brakes and rear breaks is equal. That's the kind of attention to detail I was seeing as I care fully pulled off bubble wrap from just about every surface.

I work in the tech industry, and was assembling the bike (assembling is a bit of an over statement) in the receiving/engineering bay. Easy access to the alpha geeks of my company.
The bike is sold without a saddle or pedals, primarily due to the vast range of individual tastes for these parts. I knew this and had purchased a new (flash) saddle and used pedals for the occasion. I left these parts at my desk (upstairs) and was too eager to check out the bike, not really to install parts that I had seen already. A small parade of Engineers and 7" forehead types came over to check out my new ride. I ended up explaining the special folding properties of the bike a few times. Nearly all of them made some mention of the missing saddle.
Dang, can't get anything past this group. *grin*

The stem seemed awfully tall.. I hadn't bothered to see if there was any instructions or anything of that sort.. just started putting everything where it needed to go. I must admit that I was a bit worried about the height of the stem, and worried that I'd answered one of bikefridaywalter's questions wrong or that he had checkmarked the wrong box. Leetle worried.. Not much. I'll bug bikefridaywalter tomorrow.

Folds fast fast and fits very nicely in the backseat of my Impreza (didn't get the chance to get the milk crates out of the trunk).

More to come,
Maarburg