I need a wedgie.

It's Tour de Fat time again here in Fort Collins, so I though I would re-assemble the Raleigh and take it for a ride. Sadly, it was not to be. The rear wheel Axle was bent badly and the quill stem is missing the wedge that keeps the stem in place.

So Tuesday after work, I'm going to ride over to the nearby bike shop, Brave New Wheel and see if they have anything I can use. They do a lot of resto/repair work on vintage bikes, so hopefully they'll have some parts or at least some guidance for me.

I knew there was a fair bit of rust on this bike, when I bought it, but yikes it's really bad. I'm going to be spending a lot of time cleaning & polishing parts.

I'm also trying to gather more info about this bike, but some of the things I'm discovering don't make a lot of sense in the overall context of Raleigh bikes.

In 1982, the Huffy Corporation began building bikes for USA distribution, under license by Raleigh of England. The new Raleigh Cycle Company of America bikes were sold in the US, and the rest of the world received Raleigh of England bikes.

As of 1984, all USA Raleigh's, except the Team Professional and the Prestige road bikes were being manufactured in Japan.

From the very little information I can find on the internet, I believe my bike is circa 1981. Too early to have been officially made in Japan. Other weirdness is the serial number location and format.

According to Kurt Kaminer's website, Raleigh serial numbers between 1973 and 1982+ all follow a standardized location and format. Serials were stamped on the rear of the seat tube, near the top of the tube. Mine is on the non-drive side of the seat tube, located near the bottom bracket. It was also obviously stamped after the frame was painted, but every photo I've seen of a Raleigh serial number clearly shows they were stamped before painting.

My serial number, S1A1748, cannot be accurately decoded using the standard for the era. The problem here is, the serial for my bike only partly matches this format. My serial is S1A1748. To match the format correctly it would have to be SA1748.
So. I have no accurate idea of when or where my bike was built. It's not a huge issue, it would be nice to know though.

That's it for today, I think.

Project Raleigh Super Record 2013/2014

I recently bought a vintage (1981?) Raleigh Super Record on eBay, and I'm planning to use it as a "learn to wrench for myself" project this winter.
Currently, the bike is sitting in its shipping box, but, here's a photo from the original eBay ad, to give some idea of what I'm working with.

As near as I can tell, This bike was built in Japan around 1980/1981. It's difficult to know for sure as there just isn't a lot of information on the internet about the Super Record. It wasn't a top of the line model when new, in fact, it was closer to bottom of the line. It's still a decent bike, it's just not really "valuable" like a Raleigh Professional or Team Professional would be.

The bike was originally equipped with Raleigh-branded Suntour parts, and while everything seems to have a slight coat of rust on it, all the parts are there and in usable condition, except for the chain which will require replacement, and possibly the cables.
I really could just put it back together, clean everything up really good and ride it; and I may do just that.

I sort of have the urge to tinker a bit though. I'm torn between upgrading it with higher-end vintage stuff like Shimano 600 Arabesque, or equipping it with modern Shimano 105, or even some combination of both.
The cost looks to be roughly the same from what I can see on eBay other websites.
Hopefully the bike will tell me what it wants as the project moves forward.

If you would like to follow the progress of this project, I'll suggest that you use the "subscribe by email" link at the bottom of the post. Updates will be fairly infrequent until later this fall when I've managed to accumulate the tools and parts I need. Hopefully once I get going the project will move forward on a regular schedule.