Small Wheels may make you look like a bear in a circus but it also brings all the children out in the neighborhood when you ride through. They love it. Seriously, after using the bikes for a couple of years, I find the small wheels of very small disadvantage while discovering large advantages for them as the next pictures will indicate. Though it may look like a childs bike, the components are of adult strength and do a great job on all surfaces except gravel. For a year I was moored at the end of a very long pier and it made short work of the long trek. Then a cyclist friend showed me that it was even possible to tow a dock cart behind by holding the handle of the dock cart with one hand and the bike handlebar with the other and after that I never took a dock cart down or up by hand if the bike was available.

Folding Dahon with 16

For storage on a boat, the bag is needed. First, it makes it a lot easier to handle since it has handles like a piece of luggage, (about the size of a medium piece) . Also, it is a lot easier on you, the dinghy, the boat, and the bicycle, to keep all of the sharp corners under wraps.

Folded bike in storage bag

The H33 is not known for large amounts of storage space. When I first got the bikes, they rode on the cushions of the quarterberth, accessible enough but taking up some good interior cabin space and losing the use of the berth in the process. Now they are stored in the otherwise empty space directly aft of the rear quarterberth partition.

H33 quarterberth

Snug fit here in the space beneath the cockpit and between the cockpit and the hull but doable. Here the advantage of the small wheels becomes very apparent. A larger package going with full size wheels just wouldnt fit in the space available. As it is, there is space just enough but no more. Takes a little practice stowing and unstowing the bikes, but the cabin is uncluttered and the bikes are available when needed.

Bikes in their storage location

A heavy duty strap with locking buckle is used to cinch up the lower (inboard ) bike. This bike then serves as a lower retainer for the outboard or upper bike. The buckle anchors the whole thing and is screwed into the fiberglass and plywood support of the cockpit sole with a couple of 1/4 x1 panhead screws.

Retaining strap mounting

Critical in storing in this particular area is to keep it all out of the steering quadrant. The slope of the bottom of the hull of the H33 is such that anything unsecured ends up in the center of the hull or against the rudder stock or steering sector.

Steering clearance

The small wheel allows a useful sized storage basket to be mounted on a luggage rack.

Small wheel advantage 2

The small front wheels allows a very big bag to be attached to the handlebars. Here a common grocery plastic bag is being carried. I have carried as many as three or four of these bags at a time hung like this for three or four miles from the grocery to the boat. One has never broken and spilled the groceries. The bike carries them with amazing stability and ease. When the alternative is walking, it is like a miracle

Groceries on the Handlebars