1987 Raleigh Triathlon

Pastmaster

Retro Newbie
I purchased mine back in the early summer of 1987 at the age of 25.
The cycle is 100% original never crashed or damaged and from day one the only extra i had on bike was the mileometer which now only shows 171km total ever travelled!. The Triathlon has been in my garage loft for the past 18 years and was protected by a coat of WD40 and grease which has preserved it 99.9% perfect.
For memory ithink the bike cost me £339?, i still have the original blue booklet and guarantee forms in their plastic bag. Just recently a cycling fanatic friend fancied a retro bike, he pestered me about it so i dug it out wiped it down and inflated the [original] 700C tyres. Not being desperate for the money or really needing to sell i lost interest as he dithered about making a descision... so it will be returned to its darkened storage once more prehaps to return to daylight again many years from now!.
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That looks great.

Do you not ride now? Seems a shame to just keep it in storage.

As your other post, you're in the right place to find whatever information you are looking for through asking on the 'Classic Road' section, or looking in 'Magazine and Catalogue' bit.

Lots of knowledgeable people on here - unfortunately I'm not one of them.

Nice bike you have there though.
 
Hi Ally
Sadly i just do not have the time nowadays, i also have a Alloy thick frame MARIN which was used in a TV ad for Prudential back in the early 90s and a Dawes Hybrid from 1997, all unused [now] and perfect original condition. My cycling interest goes back to childhood and teens when in 1974-1978 was involved in veteran and vintage cycle restoration.
 
Raleigh Triathlon

Today i found the original blue Raleigh handbook, guarantee and Shimano operating instructions.Inside the booklet was a production card with a photo pic and signature of the guy who built the bike at Raleigh!, best of all was the original reciept dated June 87 at the cost of £273.
Quite a lot of money then but then looking at the Raleigh website today the equivalent bike now is £2000? :LOL:
 
Pastmaster

Just curious, your post says you were interested in vintage cycle restoration in the mid 70's.....

In those days the only people interested in retro were the penny farthing crowd as they were the only "retro" bikes as every thing else was modern.

Is that you?

Shaun
 
Hi
My brother and i collected old bikes, mostly given to us by old people who had owned them since the 1920/30s and 40s, some were recovered from old barns and outbuildings some even found at tips or simply just dumped.
We belonged to the Southern Veteran Cycle club and to this day i still have the black enamel and chrome badge.
An annual event was the Benson Rally in Oxon where like minded folk would dress in period clothes and ride a whole menagery of cycles from Bone Shakers and Penny Farthings to Golden Sunbeams, Lea Francis, Rovers and the more well known Triumphs, Raleighs and Rudges.
My brother had a genuine Penny Farthing and could ride it and we both restored dozens of cycles to ride as everyday bikes.
It was highly interesting to take apart a SA 3 speed hub or to rebuild rod brakes and oil bath gear cases and great satisfaction when the bike was complete and you could ride it as if it was new again.
But you must remember in those days the Mountain Bike, BMX and Hybrid were yet to be invented so we had our fun on a "Dirt Tracker" with no mudgaurds, knobbly tyres and "Cow Horn" handle bars.
My best bike then was a Dawes Flambeau which was my pride and joy, in white with weinman centre pulls, met red bluemels? plastic mudguards and with the addition of straight handle bars, the gears then wre Simplex 5 spd deraillier which from memory didnt wear so well...
 
Raleigh Triathlon

I took my bike out last night for a 5 mile ride, the first time in many many years.
After inflating the tyres to 100psi and running through the digital gears i was off.....several keen cyclists looked and admired the bike as we passed [or was it me?] but what an enjoyable ride it glided along on its narrow rims and the brakes were sharp and quiet, all in all an enjoyable 30 minutes or so.
 
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