Lascauxcaveman 

Just fixed my '72 Super Course which was a different bike about a year ago on this thread. I guess I just can't leave well enough alone.

Anyway, flip flop rear wheel, wood fenders, slightly dinged up B17, really dinged up paint, hard, skinny tires; all the good hipster claptrap on this one. If I rode this thing around in Williamsburg I'd practically be a celebrity. Here she is posing on a frigid fall morning (9am already and it's barely 50 degrees!) on the local public pier.



Sure, lots of guys can say they have artisanal wood fenders on their vintage fixies. A few can even say they made them themselves. How many can say they made them from wood they personally cut on their own woodlot? Well, me for one. [/pats self on back/gives self high five] Don't forget those wood-dowel fender stays. Fragile? Maybe. but at three for a dollar materials cost, I can afford to make a few spares. Ha, I should hand-craft a little leather quiver to carry a few on the bike at all times, like spare spokes. Pass me a pumpkin-spice latte and some artisanal goat cheese, all this smugness is making me hungry.


Oh, and artisanal mounting hardware crafted from the finest 6061 1/8" aluminum flat stock.


The 'finishing tape' is actually an underlayer of green hockey tape I used to make the bars a little chunkier, and the color was right. If you buy Velox Tressostar cloth bar tape, keep in mind they are pretty stingy with the length; wrapping from the stem down, I barely made it to the ends with the rolls I had, using very little overlap.


Lots of space under those fenders to put some beefier tires, I'm thinking 28s would be good, when I get around to ordering some. Extra-long brake cable housings are handy for snagging low flying seagulls which are my main form sustenance these days. Actually, they were the ones that came on the bike, and I didn't really notice how long the were until I started wrapping the bars. Typical of how much thoughtfulness and precision goes into my builds. I'll probably find some brown cable housing someday, and run it a bit shorter.

afabed

Carried about 40lbs. of weight in the basket the other day (picked up some co-op supplies) and apart from my arms being really tired, it handled really really well. I even rode no hands for about 50 ft.!

"better than it needs to be" applies again!

nlerner

Nice artisanal work, @Lascauxcaveman! I have made my own wooden fenders, but my starting point was the wood bin at home depot. And those wooden stays are an interesting component. I'd think they'd be effective as break-away components!

Lascauxcaveman 

^ Glad you like 'em. They may not be quite as fragile as they look. The threaded parts were all flooded pre-assembly with gloss varnish (Minwax Polyurethane) so as to be more waterproof and little harder to strip. The first batch I made, I also coated the skinny ends with clear epoxy to make them so they wouldn't crack. I couldn't find those original ones when I put all this together, so I'll just make some backups with epoxy dip and have them ready to go if needed. (Though probably not stored in a little artisanal hand-tooled leather quiver.)

kflagg 

Great work caveman!

nlerner

I was thinking more along the lines of taking up a stick in your fender, which has exploded a couple of plastic Bluemels on me and once rolled up an alu one. Metal stays just bend in those cases, but the wooden ones would likely snap. I'm not saying that's a deal breaker as it's somewhat of a rare occurrence, but during a ride today with lots of leaves and sticks on the ground, a buddy and I were speculating about break-away stay technology.

Lascauxcaveman 

^Ahh! I get it. The stays are definitely weaker than the fenders themselves, in my case. A feature, not a bug. Breaking things is second nature with me.

The fenders are effectively 5/16" plywood encased in a hard plastic coating, so they're pretty darn tough.

nlerner

BTW, here's a pick of the alu fender that got rolled up on an off-road ride. The bike is a Super Course MkII, so appropriate for this thread! I rolled down the fender and kept riding it that season until it cracked in half at the folding point.

auchencrow

Egad! - Disposing of 2 perfectly good pieces of rear fender?

Haven't you ever heard of duct tape, man?

nlerner

Oh, don't jump to conclusions that I disposed of that fender. On the contrary, I kept part as a stylin' shorty fender in a nod to @Velognome's favorite aesthetic and the other I flattened and reshaped into an aluminum keepsake box, which is now for sale on Etsy.

auchencrow

Now you're talkin' - like a man after my own heart!

GrayIS

Just put on Weinmann Concave rims.

auchencrow

Oooh Ahhh.
Nice one. And concaves are wonderful ridiing rims!
(Now all you need to do is to rout those cables behind the bars so they flow more naturally).

BTW - How do you like your Avocet saddle? I usually like Brooks mostly, but I have that same one on my Green '72 SC, and my tush likes it a lot.

GrayIS

Thanks Auchencrow. I will reroute those cables. I have the original Brooks and I got another on a Schwinn Super Sport. I much prefer the Avocet for comfort. The Brooks saddles are show pieces

Teej1

I acquired this recently and needing assistance placing a date on it. It was sold as a 73, the sn is a 7digit "00" on the rear DO with a shorter sn on the BB shell. The Lugwork is a much simpler version. I is absolutely unscathed and I haven't even started to clean it yet. The FD was supposedly broken immediately after purchase. The Brake pads haven't even seen a serious stop yet.

nlerner

I'd guess it's a 1972 or 73 model based on the Reynolds decal, the components, and the Raleigh decals.

Teej1

Thanks... I appreciate the info...

daf1009

In case you have not seen it...try this website, along with the serial number...

Raleigh Serial Numbers & Charts

It is often very good at helping with dates...

Duane Behrens

I hope you didn't strip it. From the photos, the bike appears to be in beautiful, original shape. How can we know it's a low-mileage original?

1. It still has the chrome locknut on the headset. An aged bike will usually show signs of wear here. Often, like me, the owner will replace it with a new locknut that will accept a regular wrench.
2. It still has the original, silver OEM brake cables and brakes. I ended up replacing these with Ultegras for ease of service.
3. Take a look, but it probably has the original Araya wheels. Mine had a low spot at the seam that translated into a pulsing brake, so I replaced these with new Weinmans.
4. And you've still got the original Shimano shifters. Good luck with them. The originals on mine could not keep the chain on a rear cog under load; the chain would begin to wander down to a smaller cog UNLESS the shifter was tightened beyond anything reasonable. So I replaced it with a NOS, Suntour Power Shifter. It was the best and most important change made to the bike.

Anyway - what a fine bike you have there. Hope you'll let us know its current status. Best. DB

Duane Behrens

It got one. :-) And it also received a number of other new components as shown below. (I've carefully labeled and stored all the original components.)

1. New Cane Creek brake hoods feel much better to the hand, especially when climbing. About $40.
2. New Ultegra brakes. Easy to service and work great. Expensive, but they do work very well.
3. New Brooks saddle, B17. Black. Brown would also have been fine, I think.
4. New old stock Suntour Power shifters. This is the single best change I could have made to the bike. I can now climb while standing without worrying about the chain wandering down to a smaller rear cog.
5. New front derailleur.
6. New pedals.
7. New rear derailleur.
8. New wheels, to eliminate the brake pulsing of the flawed OEM Arayas.

Grand Bois

I like it, except for the unsightly tape under the shifter clamp. It reminds me of the clear plastic covers on Grandma's couch.

Duane Behrens

:-) Thanks. Hadn't thought of it as "unsightly," but I suppose I could exacto-knife it offf . . .

daf1009

Looks ok to me...simply looks like a black band...and...it protects the paint!

Duane Behrens

Thanks. That's what I also thought - was surprised by the term "unsightly."

But not offended. A beautiful female derriere is probably "unsightly" to a gay man. To each his own.

daf1009

That one had me LOLing!!!!!