Raleigh bomber klunkeresque

[legrandefromage]

No snobbery here, it is still junk! This frame would have been slung into the metals skip for recycling and instantly forgotten about.

There was no popular films or tv shows with these in, no magazine or comic characters with bombers so I simply dont get where or why these are suddenly 'culturally significant' - Nobody had them where I lived, Grifters, BMX and the tail end of the Trackers so no Bomber hand me downs or paper round bikes to get passed around

Maybe, if Raleigh had cared about the bike more at the time it would have been built better and more popular but it certainly 'aint no Chopper!

Its up there with the Activator and the Activator II (The Revenge), a lesson in how to cheat the public into buying absolute dross

 

[mk one]

I like bombers, this one is a very poor example to be fair, though the price they are up for when cleaned up and a coat of paint hides the rust/patina is interesting.

 

[The History Man]

I’m with LGF.



When I was a lad I had a purple chopper…………


Punchlines on a postcard or self addressed envelope to bbc television centre, Wood Lane London W12 8QT

Or call 01 811 8055

 

[The History Man]

I’m going to build a ‘tracker’. Although I never called it that. A racer built up with stupid wide bars, high front end, the fattest tyres you could beg steal or borrow, perhaps a front brake and a fixed or sturmey back end, strong enough to bump up an old school curb without buckling. This had to be wheelied the length of and on leaving the school car park to impress your mates.

 

[yakboy]

They were called Scramblers 'up our end ( North Nottinghamshire), but good plan.

 

[The History Man]

I thought you were from Lancashire Jim?

 

[yakboy]

Jim...who's Jim

 

[The History Man]

Winter klunker/tracker esque project REYT PACK RIDER

My Northern compatriots, Bowen and Hobbs esquires are building British clunkers trying to create mythical nostalgia from bicycles that weren’t on my radar in the 70s. I was building ramps for Choppers and Grifters to crash land from, cracking pavements as we went. Remarkably a number of us went...

www.retrobike.co.uk

 

[hookooekoo]

They were called Scramblers 'up our end ( North Nottinghamshire), but good plan.

Yep. Me and my mates called them scramblers too. We used to ride them all the places we wouldn't take a decent road bike or touring bike. Generally that meant through deep mud, streams, sand and everything else that would wreck a decent bike.

Our scramblers were always single speed, and the only tool we always carried was what we called a dog-bone spanner. I can't remember if we carried a spare tube or puncture repair kit, but I do remember that one time someone removed their tyres and tubes and rode on the rims.

 

[enc]

Just as they had cashed in on the BMX scene with their "Burner" range 12 months earlier, the bomber was more likely their take on (cash in) the emerging 26inch wheeled cruiser class racers in the US. All the big BMX names had them, Redline, Torker, SE Racing etc. I guess with the Bomber, Raleigh was going for mass-market appeal and bringing to the market "what they knew" and were already set up to produce ie: Sturmey archer hubs and lugged frames.

The Raleigh Bomber has more in common to the early 26 cruiser below than any of the early MTB clunkers.