1989 Raleigh 8901 in 653

KondratievsBike

Dave Yates Fan
Back in the mid 80s I was bought a Peugeot Premiere and discovered the joys of riding a bike after years of trying to be cool and impress girls... it was massively too big but I loved it anyway and eventually (as a student) I got my first *proper* road bike second hand from Paul Milnes Cycles in Bradford, UK. It was a Raleigh 8901 frame in pink and lilac and silver faded from the 1989 Lightweights catalogue... with a mish mash of old parts.

I gradually upgraded it and then eventually made two terrible mistakes. The first was to have it resprayed a gorgeous flam red and flam blue to match the team colours of the bike shop where I worked (Chevin Cycles in Otley which was right next to a Burmah filling station whose colours were the same and the manager designed the kit while looking at the hoardings out of the office window!). The second was to sell it to a mate!!

A couple of years ago a friend introduced me to his bike which was the same frame but roughly the size of the Peugeot! And so began the search...

Anyhow, on Saturday, on the way back home from the triathlon club relays in Nottingham where our whole team rode old British steel bikes and wore speedos (but we’ll gloss over that) I took a detour to go and collect this... my size, really good condition and affordable (but not car boot sale price).

So now to start to build it... have to decide between a Shimano 600 Tricolor groupset (which is what it was eventually upgraded to) or the Campag Athena/Chorus groupset I couldn’t afford at the time.

Sporadic updates will no doubt follow.
 

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So yesterday was a lovely sunny day spent taking apart and cleaning old parts...

Settled on the 600 so I could get it finished while the weather is still nice-ish.

Any thoughts on whether to do for a Shimano 600 seatpost or the fluted kind so beloved of SR and ITM that Raleigh actually lit on everything at the time (last pic)
 

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Really liking this frameset and the 600 suites it perfectly. Really liking the colour.
I'm not sure on the seatpost but probably leaning more towards the 600 than the fluted for this.

Jamie
 
As always the retrobike hive mind is infallible...

Nicely polished 600 seatpost found...
 

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Re:

Love this. Such a great colour scheme. I guess it's from Raleigh's twilight years, but it's a beautifully made frame and it looks so fresh.
 
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