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TECH NEWS

Exclusive first look: Charge Lazy Susan

Dutch bike with attitude from urban chicsters Charge

We hotfooted it down to the smoke yesterday to have a look at the latest creation from Charge Bikes. The Lazy Susan (there's more stuff in the kitchen you can nick for a bike name than you might think) is a bike that sits somewhere between a Charge Plug and a Pashley Princess – a Dutch bike with a bit of attitude.

There is a men's version but really the Lazy Susan is aimed at the laydeez, and it's a practical bike as well as a nice looking one. You get full mudguards and a half chainguard, and low-maintenance hub brakes. Shifting is courtesy of Sturmey Archer's dependable three speed hub, and Charge have presuaded Sturmey Archer to resurrect the old graphics for the shifter... aaaah, the memories.

You also get a Kona Africabike style rear rack that's part of the alloy frame, (the fork is Tange steel), and there's a platform on the back too for giving your mates a quick lift up the road. Practicality was meant to extend to a basket as well but that ended up being prohibitively expensive: Charge told us it would have added £90 to the cost of the bike. Look out for that as a probably future accessory.

The rear rack on the production models will lie flush with the frame and the galvanised mudguards won't be polished - the Taiwanese factory polished the ones on the prototype because they like their metal shiny. Production bikes will also come with a kickstand.

Expect the Lazy Susan to come in at under £500 when it hits the shops.

The male version – the Steamer (pictured below) will be the same price too.

More from the Charge do coming up later…

road.cc's founder and first editor, nowadays to be found riding a spreadsheet. Tony's journey in cycling media started in 1997 as production editor and then deputy editor of Total Bike, acting editor of Total Mountain Bike and then seven years as editor of Cycling Plus. He launched his first cycling website - the Cycling Plus Forum at the turn of the century. In 2006 he left C+ to head up the launch team for Bike Radar which he edited until 2008, when he co-launched the multi-award winning road.cc - finally handing on the reins in 2021 to Jack Sexty. His favourite ride is his ‘commute’ - which he does most days inc weekends and he’s been cycle-commuting since 1994. His favourite bikes are titanium and have disc brakes, though he'd like to own a carbon bike one day.

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8 comments

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OldRidgeback | 15 years ago
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I think the tat's rather nice actually, been meaning to get a new one done for a while myself. Dunno if my wife would want to give up her trusty Specialized mountain bike for that three speeder.

As regards swine flu, numerous kids the sons know have been off school with some sort of flu. The general reaction from the NHS seems to be to load up child sufferers with tamiflu.

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Fringe | 15 years ago
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ha ha ha ho.

(BTW has anyone had swine flu yet, as i suspect ive got a mild dose..runny nose, green snot, sore throat..and dont normally get hay fever, unable to ride bike in straight line).

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Tony Farrelly | 15 years ago
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haven't you got a play to review instead of making personal remarks about real people with real feelings  39

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TRs Blurb n Blog | 15 years ago
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odd jobs wife?

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Tony Farrelly | 15 years ago
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That's no fella, that's a lady person

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jezzzer | 15 years ago
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it's the fella in the background that worries me...

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Denzil Dexter | 15 years ago
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At my Swiss finishing school they taught me that a gentleman never mentions a lady's tatts

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neilwheel | 15 years ago
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Bike will hold its looks, but those tats won't look so hot once the 'bingo wings' kick in ... //road.cc/sites/all/modules/smileys/packs/Yahoo!/sick.gif)

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