Nostalgic Raleigh or forget it and move on...

vonhoolio

Dirt Disciple
I remember a guy called Mick when I was about 12 years old, around about 1983. He was a few years older than the rest of us in the street and was painfully cool with his fit blond girlfriend, Adidas trainers, and giant Spandau Ballet fringe hanging over one eye. Mick had a black & gold Raleigh record that matched the JPS he smoked and I was in awe of it. Unfortunately Mick left it outside the shop one day and it was taken, not that he was too bothered as he soon moved on to "total legend" status by getting a black and red Fiesta XR2. Being in my early teens I assumed this meant that women's underwear would spontaneously drop to the floor when he drove by in it. :shock:

As the years have gone by I have realised that the XR2 had no such powers of persuasion, but I occasionally look at black & gold raleigh records with a nostalgic glint in my eye, you see them on e-bay between £50 and £400 (!!!) and I'm occasionally tempted (by the mid-priced ones!). Now I find myself looking for a road bike to fit a specific criteria. It must be realistically usable as a sunday run bike, handle the occasional sportive (not fussed about fastest times etc..) and it should be early 80's as I have L'eroica planned in the future and I already have enough bikes in my life to get in my way.

My question is this: should I move on and look at something a tad more exotic and interesting for my new retro toy, or will the Raleigh Record fit my bill? (for what its worth, I'm not really tied to a budget priced bike)

PS. Mick still lives around here, he's about 50 now with no hair, and a substantial gut hanging over his extra large jeans. His once fit girlfriend must be a size 24 and works in the chippy. :D

...he still drives a fiesta though
 
Hello,

Cool story. Nice when someone's choice of bike has a bit of background to it, especially when that background involves the fall from grace of a cool kid :D

I think there's something to be said for this kind of nostalgia project. A friend of mine just bought the exact model of bike he really wanted when he was a kid, but which he missed out on because his dad made him get a more 'sensible' bike. We all know the story....

Anyway, the guy is really happy with his bike, it only cost him about 50 quid I think. It can be more fun than spending 1000s on a perfect top end build with all NOS bits that you're then too scared to ride for fear you might scratch it.

Johnny
 
I say buy one, keep an eye out and get a mid priced one and ride it as much as possible :cool: :cool:

I like a lot of people had Raleigh bikes when I was young, I had a very basic old Raleigh which I rode everywhere. I always wanted a Reynolds 531 Framed bike but never had the chance. Then I moved over the dark side of mountain bikes.

Last year after visiting my Cousin we got talking and he said he had a 531 Framed Raleigh Clubman in the garage un-used for many years but in decent nick. I managed to get it for free, gave it a lube and some new cables and have rode it over a 1000 miles and its been a pleasure :cool:

Although I could have bought a Dogma if I had a £1 for every time someone said isn't it time I bought a newer carbon bike :roll:
 
Looks like I'm certainly not alone in this then. I still look at the top end bling of course....I am merely a 43 year old child after all. But I just can't get past that black and gold finish....I think i'll buy one and run it as a training bike.
 
that's a great tale - you can certainly paint a vivid picture and i guess we all knew similar cool folk when we were impressionable young chaps!

the raleigh record sprint was one such model that my pal had in the early 80s. it was a great bike back then but i'm not so sure you'd think that if you saw one in the flesh today. pretty basic with gas pipe reynolds 501 tubing. move on and get yourself a nice steel eddy merckx bike instead...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Eddy-Merckx-C ... 7wt_458801

or a nice colnago...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Colnago-Super ... 2wt_446229

:cool:
 
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rusty bodie":2byo1zqo said:
the raleigh record sprint was one such model that my pal had in the early 80s. it was a great bike back then but i'm not so sure you'd think that if you saw one in the flesh today. pretty basic with gas pipe reynolds 501 tubing. move on and get yourself a nice steel eddy merckx bike instead...

Err, what makes 501 Gas pipe? It's double butted cromoly, there's about 300g difference between it and 531 for a tubeset. (though I'll be buggered if I remember which 531 variant)

There's one good thing about muppets convincing themselves that 501 is rubbish: I can pick 'em up cheap.
 
Have to keep the gold. If you don't like it, there's always the later versions that look like batman lost his licence.
 
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