659.99 for aq piece of c**p green bike designed for the military to be DISPOSABLE. I've seen and ridden these and £660 for a £180 supermarket MTB with a hinge is a joke. The only people dull enough to buy these will be poor suckers who believe eveything they hear on the Gadget Show.

I have a Montague Paratrooper model as well as a number of other mountain bikes. I can tell you it rides as well as my Trek 4500 and actually shifts more smoothly. But best of all it folds and fits right in the boot, so no issues with a rack. I have upgraded a few items, but this is a solid bike overall that I would highly recommend.

It is obvious to me that “fireballx15” has no experience with Montague bikes. I ride a Montague Paratrooper and it will out perform any of the department store brands that my children had when they were young. The frame of this bike is not cut and there are no welded hinges to cause problems. When you ride this bike, there is no sense or feeling that it is a folding bike. I ride 15 + km a day and I like the fact that I can store it in the trunk of my car without attracting the attention of bicycle thieves. Some day I hope to own an SwissBike X90.

I have the Lx se version of this bike.

Pros: Good solid bike, no creaking of folded joint even when out of saddle. can fold to but in boot of car. Suitable for light trail riding only, and use on tarmac.

Cons: Bike very heavy at over 29 lbs.

Straight shock forks make it twichy at slow speeds,(also very heavy)

The main problem with these bikes is the price. I paid £699- for mine. and to be honest the main components are very low end shimano alivio, at best, cheap rivoted suntor chainset, (not able to replace chainrings). cheap formula hubs, cheap promax disk brakes. And worst of all only 8 speed.

To be honest shimano do a 9 speed alivio groupset for the same price as the 8 speed.

Bikes suffer from synical marketing, and cost cutting from Montague bikes.

Summary: good solid bike. Works well in off the shelf configuration. Feels very durable. But the budjet components used suffer a terrible weight penalty. If you want a really durable full size bike, to use for training or light trail riding, then look no further.

These bikes use the same frame, throughout the range.

As you go higher up the range the prices get silly, and frankly bare liitle relation to what components are fitted to the bike. ( A complete rip off). That tends to be what happens with American corporations, profit first, product second, customers third.?

Reccomend buying the frame from the montague website, and spec it with Shimano SLX or decent Sram Groupset. Why Monague don't do this ?, well if they did they would make less proffit. This a real shame as with some light weight components this bike could be realy good.

Also bike could do with heavier duty skewer for locking mechanism. No problems with existing skewer yet. But to take it off road I would like a heavier duty version, since dont feel happy with only a stanard quick release skewer.

Overall: A really solid durable folding bike, let down buy synical marketing, and cheap compnents.

Bike still gets Five star rating for what it can do, and how it performs.

The Monague folding bikes have quite a following worldwide, and the 700c Road bikes introduced in 2010 only increased that. Commissioned by D.A.R.P.A of the US Military, the bikes were designed to fit through aircraft doors and to carry one soldier as well as a second (possibly injured?) and both their respective gear. With that pedigree the company has decided to, as faradaycage above, points out, make a great frame that does its job of folding easily as well as being rock solid when riding, but outfit it with components that dont make sense at the various price points, and are sometimes not too good. The flip side is that Montague bikes hold their value and often sell for 80% or more of the initial investment several years later which makes them a tried, true and unchanging design that is well-known and in demand. I take mine on the back of my motorcycle and also overseas to the Amazon region of Peru and other places and find that its strong and when outfitted well, lightweight and a blast to ride. I appreciate that i can take it with me inside places (especially in poorer countries) to prevent theft. Great frame, keeps value, trick out as you like! Ive heard that their is one chap in the USA who is building aftermarket parts just for this bike!