mswantak

Okay, I give up: What sort of headlamp mounts to this thing, and how?

randya

It takes a battery lamp w/ a square metal housing holding two D-cell batteries which mounts on the bracket, and round lamp w/ reflector on the front of the battery housing. The battery housing has a U-shaped bracket on the back which slides down over the headset mounting bracket. It looked similar to the headlamp in the attached photo, except the mounting bracket location is different...

https://www.the-richardsons.fsnet.co.uk/raleigh.htm

Here's another web site w/ raleigh parts for sale - that bracket is worth $25 bucks and they have a matching light for $40.00, see photo below.

https://www.bikeville.com/3speed.html

mswantak

So I guess on Raleighs of '60s and '70s vintage, the headlamp bracket is sort of a holdover from days past, eh? That lantern-style light wouldn't be appropriate on a bike from that period, would it?

Not that it matters in the end; I've come to regard that bracket as a sort of 'hood ornament'. It sort of belongs there whether it's supporting a headlamp or not.

randya

I'm pretty sure they still sold those lights in the US through the end of the 60's at least; by 1970 the 10-speed had taken over from the 3-speed English racer as the adult bike of choice in the US, but they still may have made those lights for the UK market, those Brits are pretty traditional...

Here's Sheldon Brown's page on all things having to do with old Raleighs:
https://www.sheldonbrown.com/raleigh.html

Here's some more Raleigh History from the Raleigh chopper web site:
https://homepage.ntlworld.com/catfood.../history1.html

A few more links (some duplication here):
https://retroraleighs.com/history.html
https://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~hadland/raleigh.htm
https://members.aol.com/oldbicycle/index16.html

Good Luck!