Birzman Mini Apogee Hand Pump

The Birzman Mini Apogee Hand Pump is really small, light and nicely made, with a crackingly good head. Made to Birzman's usual high standards, it's a tidy bit of kit.

• Pros: Small, light, excellent valve-holding and air-sealing, rebuildable with two spare seals included
• Cons: Getting to the maximum pressure is hard – and keep an eye on the brass ring

We've reviewed many Birzman mini pumps over the years, and they typically rate well – the Apogee head is a proven winner of a design. The Mini Apogee is its smallest and lightest pump, designed for a pocket or frame bag – definitely not a bottle cage mount. Hence there's no attempt at any sort of dust or mud cover over the head or pump body.

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At 136mm long it's shorter than your average-sized modern mobile phone, and at 79g about half the weight. So physically it disappears into even the tightest or shortest jersey or shorts pocket alongside your other kit. Depending on design, it's pretty likely it'll fit into your saddlebag or pocket tool pouch too.

The build is pretty much all alloy, with plastic reserved for a few internal parts. It's a single-action pump, meaning it only inflates on the inward stroke – doubling inflation time but reducing complexity, size and weight. There's also no pressure gauge as on some other Birzman models, so the Thumb-O-Meter it is.

The Mini Apogee's party trick – as with most other Birzman pumps – is the globally patented Apogee head. This beautifully engineered masterpiece of miniaturisation comprises a threaded outer and a floating spring-loaded piston, which moves to fit the valve centre pin, then locks in place as the head collar is pressed down. There's a handy 'Unlocked' stamped in white on the head when the collar is pulled back.

Once pushed into place and locked, the whole head is threaded down onto the valve – one 360-degree twist for Presta, or three turns for Schrader ('car tyre valve'). The Schrader needs more threaded-on depth as that then pushes down on the valve pin, opening the valve allowing air to flow in. This extra threading then needs to be unthreaded to remove, whereas for Presta valves you can simply pull back the collar and remove the head.

If all this sounds complicated, there's a funky video linked to by a QR code on the packaging that explains it.

One point of note is that the brass ring that threads onto a Presta valve can come loose over time, and using a different Birzman pump with the same Apogee design I have inadvertently left it behind on a Presta valve. This led to a calamity of lost tubeless air the next time I tried to inflate a Presta valve, but that's a whole different road.cc story that isn't really Birzman's fault. It's this brass ring that you remove to fit a replacement O-ring once the original wears out, and it's easily tightened with a flat screwdriver or any thin implement. Personally, I'd recommend a tiny dab of Loctite on the outer thread, just to be sure it stays put. There are two spare O-rings included in a packet with the Mini Apogee, along with the reminder to replace them with the O-ring groove facing inwards.

> Buyer's Guide: 6 of the best mini pumps

Inflating a 23mm 700C tyre took 200 easy strokes to get to a get-me-home useable 63psi. From then on it started to get more difficult, 250 strokes measuring 78psi, at 300 strokes a rather painful-to-hold 90psi, finally hitting 102psi after 350 strokes. By this point you really need to be wearing gloves with decent heel padding, as it becomes hard to hold the slick alloy barrel, and the palm of the hand holding the head and valve still is getting mightily punished by the small circular head. With gloves on you can push on another 100 strokes to 125psi. So, kudos to Birzman for making a pump capable of exceeding its advertised maximum, but you do need to work hard to get there.

During this entire fun-fest, the Apogee head remained solidly locked to the valve and didn't emit a whisper of air – impressive given its small size, light weight and the amount of welly needed to progress past 90psi. A few practice insertions and removals at 100psi were just as impressive, only the expected small psssht of air escaping from the internal valve-head cavity.

> How to choose your tyre pressure

I really can't think what's not to like about the Mini Apogee. Clever, functional engineering, small, lightweight, spares included, and a two-year warranty. And most importantly it inflates securely, as quickly as can be expected given the size, with no loss of air. The £23 price tag is wallet-friendly too: it's on a par with mini pumps from other reputable brands, as highlighted in the roundup above, but all of these pumps are considerably longer/heavier than the Mini Apogee. It's definitely one to consider as your fast-and-light roadside air option.

Verdict

Very small, light and functional way to get rolling again, for both valve types