smokeysurvival

About a year ago I bought an old Raleigh Tourist type bicycle from a shop that was soon to go out of business (Hudson Urban Bicycles in the West Village area of Manhattan). I had seen this bike a year prior while searching for an upright style bicycle at a few shops in the area. I ended up purchasing a Gazelle Toer Populair from Rolling orange Bikes over in Brooklyn at the time. So this bike sat at Hudson Urban Bikes for almost a year when I visited again during a small tweed ride that was happening. I ended up asking about the bike and they had put it away for sometime since no one seemed to want it. I ended up getting it about a month later.



The story is that it was brought to the shop by someone from Bermuda. This bike apparently was used as a rental bike for a resort or hotel of a sort and dates from the 1920's. I don't know here this place was and I'm not sure of the bikes history in detail as I haven't been able to contact the owner of the bike who gave it to Hudson Urban Bike's

The Bike came with a Eadie single speed coaster brake rear hub, a nickle plated crankset, a leather or oilcloth chaincase cover, a very large Persons metal pan bottomed saddle, and a Raleigh generator type headlamp (no generator).



Since I've had it it's been cleaned, both wheel's rebuilt, new bearings throughout. The original chaincase was very worn out on the bottom and the frame these chaincases stretch over for attachment was rusted through and broken in places. As well the chaincase material was very dry and brittle, in some spots was sticking to the rust, it had to be removed. I am planning on making a custom replacement for the original.

In addition I've acquired some Kerosene lamps for it to use instead of the generator lamp it came with. The internals of it were rusted out and some parts broken so it wasn't fixable. I did modify it to take a cree led lamp inside but I didn't feel it was appropriate for the bike.



The only things that have been changed are the crankset (to a Raleigh branded one, still cottered but with removable chainrings, same tooth count as the original). The original crankset had a lot of rust on the arms, worn teeth, and nickle flakes came off regularly. The rod brake pads in the front have been changed to kool-stop inserts. The tires are now Schwalbe delta cruisers (with the original tubes still installed with it's threaded schrader valves). The saddle was changed to a b73 but is now a b190 which looks more like the original.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlcN0-6Acyo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0S3IAE20GA

The lamps shown are a Miller Everlit headlamp, and two Lucas no.29t rear lamps. One is a friend of mine's who let me borrow it for sometime and then I managed to find another and made an attachment bracket for the left chainstay.

Just felt like sharing, thank's for looking!

smoothness 

Thanks for sharing, Smokey. After I first found out about loop frames and "jeweled lights," I've always wanted to see what it would look like all set up. Your videos of you actually lighting them are great; do you think you could demonstrate how much light they throw out from behind?

3speedslow

Like Elton John sang " Well She's black as coal and She burn like a fire"

Nice Island Girl!

John E

Wow -- 90 years old! I guess I'll stop bragging about the ages of my bikes.

Wildwood 

Super cool.