Wilko junior boys bike has a pedal-back brake with between 1/4 and 1/2 of a rotation before it picks up. Its a Hotrock 12″. Is this normal? It doesn’t seem right, he struggles to get the thing going because of it and its knocking his confidence. I dismantled it last night and everything seemed to be in place. Cleaned regreased and put it back together and its exactly the same. I bought it second-hand a few years back for my daughter but she grew out of it before she showed any signs of wanting to pedal a bike so never really tried it until now.

between 1/4 and 1/2 of a rotation before it picks up

do you mean forward?

It can be ‘normal’ my shimano nexus is much better but most older/ worn/ dutch bikes are like this.

I guess the roatation is made worse by the presumably lower gearing on a kids bike.

Errrm good question – if I put the pedal at say 1 o-clock and he pushes down on the pedal, it doesn’t pick up until 5 o-clockish (4 hours later 😉 )

Edit: read yours again my answer below isn’t helpful at all! not picking up till the bottom of the stroke sounds like it would definitely hinder learning moving off, means barely any forward motion from first pedal, needing to get the other foot up and pedaling straight away, with not much momentum to help balance. Good luck!

Previous non answer: not really an answer, but I hired a bike in Copenhagen with a coaster brake and I hated it. Well, got mildly annoyed by it. setting the pedals just before coming to a stop at traffic lights – sudden jolt to a stop – usually alarming wife just behind.

Back pedaling to set left foot forward to keep front up while popping off a kerb – hilarious consequences.

Basically a few habits that were totally unconscious from years of riding bikes, that kept tripping me up. I can imagine it wouldn’t be as bad if you were learning with one from scratch, but I can imagine having a coaster brake being off-putting.

Indeed. I’m really not that enamoured with the idea of a coaster brake at all. Especially as he’s totally got the hang of the rear brake on his balance bike. Looking around for something else for him at the moment – he’s a tiny bit too small for a cnoc 14 so I’d like a cheapish lightish 12″ bike to get him going until he fits a cnoc. Anyway, I digress.