My commuter bike has a strange story. It's a 1971 Raleigh Super Course with nothing original except the brake calipers and the headset. The frame has Reynolds 531 main tubes and garden variety forks and stays. It has lax angles and a long fork rake.

I was heavily into Raleigh bikes from 1975 through 1984, so I know a lot about them and like them a lot.

I found the frame at the curbside two or three years ago. It had been loved for a long time but then neglected. It was missing the front wheel, and the rear wheel was trashed. Hubs were Normandy with quick release, rims were Weinmann alloy, 27"

The crankset had been replaced with a no-name alloy cotterless triple crankset with cartridge bearings. The original had been a cottered double crankset.

It had the original steel Huret derailleurs and downtube shifters and original Brooks B17. The seat was too distorted to be used. The derailleurs would work but I preferred to change them.

I put on a Brooks Professional saddle which might be 40 or 50 years old. I don't know its history, but a friend gave it to me in about 1982, and it was old then. It doesn't look good, but the shape is right for me.

I had just retired my 1975 Peugeot UO-8 commuter, so I took the parts from that, mostly. It also had very little original equipment on it.

The wheels are very nice wheels I built by hand in 1985. Miche hubs and light box construction rims of forgotten manufacture. Six speed cluster.

Derailleurs and shifters are SunTour BlueLine from 1985. The rear doesn't shift all that well, but I don't care. The gear range is too low overall. The lowest gear (36x28) is far lower than I need, and the high gear (46x14) isn't high enough. I'm living with it. No big deal.

The handlebars and stem had been replaced with some very nice TTT. I used them for a while but found they caused me to bend over too much. The frame is a 21" size, and I'm 5'9". So I put on North Road handlebars, upside down. The resulting reach was pleasantly short, but I was still too low, so I flipped them back up. Now I might be a bit too upright, so I'm going to try an all-rounder (almost straight) bar.

I put on my old Bleumels fenders and Blackburn rack. I had to grind down the head of the attaching bolt on the drive side because it interfered with the path of the chain going into the highest gear. Taking off the rear fender or rack will probably require using a power tool again.

Life with fenders is nice! It's tempting to put fenders on all my bikes.

On the handlebars, I have lots of equipment. I have a water bottle cage, a bell, a headlight, and a remote control for my sound system. The sound system is an iHome iH85b which is an ipod holder/amplifier/speaker in the shape of a water bottle. It's mounted in a cage on the down tube.

I haven't decided about pedals. I had PowerGrips then toe clips and now SPD-type pedals. I might change them again.

Brakes are the original Weinmann 750 centerpulls. They're adequate. The front pads are Kool Stop. Brake levers are new Tektro levers. I suppose these are the newest thing on the bike, besides the accessories. Replacing the brake calipers would be hard, since the reach is so very long. I'm fairly content with them, though.

The front tire is a cheap but decent Kenda. The rear tire is a new Panaracer Pacela. It's rated at 27x1" but it measures about 1-1/8" when inflated. This tire improved the ride nicely.

The finished product is far better than I had expected it to be. I thought it would be just OK, rather like my Peugeot. But it's not. The handling is balanced, if a bit conservative. Response, however, is excellent. It does not flex when I pedal hard. It's surprisingly good at hill climbing, and I have very torquey legs. I climb hills in fairly high gear. You would cringe to see how slow my cadence is.

Paint job is pretty bad. There is this white goo in places where I think the frame had rusted, and I think the goo is a stopgap. However, the lugwork is superbe. As you may know, the neatness of Raleigh's brazing went downhill in the mid 70's. There may be a correlation between the care put into the brazing and the quality of the ride. That's what I've been taught, but it's hard to do side-by-side comparisons to confirm this assertion.