raleighnut
Legendary Member
- Location
- One of the 'Elite'
Still got mine (well actually it really belongs to my Cousin)
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Elswick Cotterpin
Veteran
- Location
- South Wales
Also a Raleigh Flyer, but purple with yellow graphics, shorty mudguards, Brooks saddle. £50, I think, early to mid seventies?? I forget, but I paid for it with my paper round money.
Illaveago
Guru
- Location
- Chippenham,Wiltshire.
This was my first road bike I bought in the early 70's although my parents bought me a Sun Mist in the 60's.
I still have my Holdsworth which originally came with as a 5 speed with a steel crank. Also the rear wheel was replaced after I came off and buckled it .
I still have my Holdsworth which originally came with as a 5 speed with a steel crank. Also the rear wheel was replaced after I came off and buckled it .
Salar
A fish out of water
- Location
- Gorllewin Cymru
My first proper road bike was a Raleigh Flyer, in purple.
Salar
A fish out of water
- Location
- Gorllewin Cymru
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Arjimlad
Tights of Cydonia
- Location
- South Glos
I had a racer as a lad which my Dad bought at a Police auction in about 1984.
We "did it up" together which involved him stripping it, regreasing everything , and it had new tyres & tubes, new cables, and the frame was sanded down & painted by hand with blue Hammerite. We bought black plastic solid slide-on grips rather than tape. It had Weinmann centre pull brakes and a 6 speed block on the back. You could do all that with a Raleigh bike tool and a set of spanners.
I cycled to school on it - about 4 miles away, and later to holiday work in Southsea over Portsdown Hill, around Cowplain delivering medicines to patients and nursing homes for the local pharmacist, and my pals and I used to head off to Hayling Island, and similar locations on our "racers". It had 27 x 1/14 wheels and I seem to recall 700c was becoming more popular. We used to burn past the BMX boys as they spun along furiously, and take on Honda Melody mopeds for fun.
Eventually I outgrew it & was offered a steel-framed "Sun" bike in orange & red. That was a little heavy but it fitted me better. It lasted about 9 months until during my first year at University (heavily influenced by a Bristol bike-enthusiast art-teacher landlord Mr Geoff Molyneux) I bought a tatty used Lotus racing bike at Blackboy Hill Cycles which we had stove-enamelled in black. It had been in a prang & we bought new chrome forks for it - the originals were bent but the frame itself was OK. It had a lovely old Shimano groupset with floral casting decoration.
That bike lasted me throughout university until about 1996 when it was getting so little use that I sold it to buy a new shotgun.
I missed cycling, needed to lose some weight and ended up buying a hybrid in 2005, a Giant FCR flat bar bike in 2008 or thereabouts, and then jumped back on a road bike Giant Defy in 2012.
We "did it up" together which involved him stripping it, regreasing everything , and it had new tyres & tubes, new cables, and the frame was sanded down & painted by hand with blue Hammerite. We bought black plastic solid slide-on grips rather than tape. It had Weinmann centre pull brakes and a 6 speed block on the back. You could do all that with a Raleigh bike tool and a set of spanners.
I cycled to school on it - about 4 miles away, and later to holiday work in Southsea over Portsdown Hill, around Cowplain delivering medicines to patients and nursing homes for the local pharmacist, and my pals and I used to head off to Hayling Island, and similar locations on our "racers". It had 27 x 1/14 wheels and I seem to recall 700c was becoming more popular. We used to burn past the BMX boys as they spun along furiously, and take on Honda Melody mopeds for fun.
Eventually I outgrew it & was offered a steel-framed "Sun" bike in orange & red. That was a little heavy but it fitted me better. It lasted about 9 months until during my first year at University (heavily influenced by a Bristol bike-enthusiast art-teacher landlord Mr Geoff Molyneux) I bought a tatty used Lotus racing bike at Blackboy Hill Cycles which we had stove-enamelled in black. It had been in a prang & we bought new chrome forks for it - the originals were bent but the frame itself was OK. It had a lovely old Shimano groupset with floral casting decoration.
That bike lasted me throughout university until about 1996 when it was getting so little use that I sold it to buy a new shotgun.
I missed cycling, needed to lose some weight and ended up buying a hybrid in 2005, a Giant FCR flat bar bike in 2008 or thereabouts, and then jumped back on a road bike Giant Defy in 2012.
My first road bike was a "Designed by Ernie Clements" Falcon given to me in the early 70s (I think - I can't remember exactly when), which I rode right through to the mid 80s. The tubing was not labeled, but it was definitely something better than the plain steel tubing of friends' "racers" which felt heavy and clunky by comparison. It had a mix of components, with Weinmann centrepull brakes, can't remember what derailleurs (nothing special) and a Campagnolo chainset.
Then I got the first (and only) bike I've ever bought new, an Orbit Gold Medal in 531c tubing. Remembering that I bought it not long after I moved to Dorset, that must have been round 1985. I still have it, and I rebuilt it a couple of years ago and I'm still riding it. It currently has 700c wheels (from the original 27" ones), and with modern tyres (though an ancient me) it's pretty nippy.
I also have a Raleigh Royal tourer which I built up from a locally-bought frame, again a couple of years ago, and that gets most of my miles these days.
And to close the circle, I also now have a 531 Falcon frame that's slowly being turned into a fixed-wheel bike - I say slowly, as I got the frame (for £40) about a year ago, and pretty much all I've done so far is install a headset and put some wheels on.
Then I got the first (and only) bike I've ever bought new, an Orbit Gold Medal in 531c tubing. Remembering that I bought it not long after I moved to Dorset, that must have been round 1985. I still have it, and I rebuilt it a couple of years ago and I'm still riding it. It currently has 700c wheels (from the original 27" ones), and with modern tyres (though an ancient me) it's pretty nippy.
I also have a Raleigh Royal tourer which I built up from a locally-bought frame, again a couple of years ago, and that gets most of my miles these days.
And to close the circle, I also now have a 531 Falcon frame that's slowly being turned into a fixed-wheel bike - I say slowly, as I got the frame (for £40) about a year ago, and pretty much all I've done so far is install a headset and put some wheels on.
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My first road bike was a 'handmedown' low rent Raleigh Equipe back in the mid-80s. No photos, but it would have looked like this.
After messing around with BMX, MTB, cars, women beer and drugs, it would have been my Trek SL1200, one of the most ill fitting bikes I have ever owned
After messing around with BMX, MTB, cars, women beer and drugs, it would have been my Trek SL1200, one of the most ill fitting bikes I have ever owned
Salar
A fish out of water
- Location
- Gorllewin Cymru
I tried the white flares once, but they got caught in the chainset
If you look carefully at the pic there's something odd under his armpit?
The bike was a mixture of good and not so good parts, decent leather saddle, some alloy parts, but then a bloody heavy cotter pin crankset.
I did many, many miles on that bike in the 70's, commuting, charity rides etc only 5 speed but it served me well. I always keep an eye out for a good one on fleabay, but I probably wouldn't like it these days.
I'd been saving up to buy the ex an engagement ring, but I needed transport and the bike won.
Vantage
Carbon fibre... LMAO!!!
- Location
- Behind everyone else, Bolton
I had one of those after the demise of my flyer.
mikeymustard
Guru
My very first road bike was in about 1965 or '66, a hand-me-down from my cousin. The first bike I ever bought myself was a Carlton Criterium (I worked fro a part Raleigh-owned finance company at the time so I managed to get a "repossession" which had never been ridden), and the first bike I bought after an enforced 20 year lay off was a Claud Butler flat-barred roadie - I didn't like the bars so bought a Genesis Volant instead
