Another Raleigh Marathon :)
 

Hi,

I just picked up a Raleigh Marathon, about a 57cmCTC, double on front, 6-speed on back, Suntour Blaze rear derailer, 36-108 gearing on the sticker, 27" tires. Serial number is 3?K0***, the question mark is either a 1 or an L and is partially hidden by the cable guide. The bike has the neat little flick stand on the down tube. On the almost invisible decal on the seat tube it says Made in Taiwan.

A couple of fairly recent threads I found with the search tool here titled "Late 80s Raleigh Marathon" and "Still confused about "huffy" built Raleighs" imply this bike might be a 1983 model, is that a good guess?

I kind of like the U.S. flag etched or stamped into the handlebar.

Thinking I might clean and tune this up, change out the foam handlebar grip for some cork or gel wrap, put on a new set of tires, and just ride it as is. The bike is a hair tall for me (long torso, portionately shorter legs) so I probably won't swap out the Sun Tour group for a 6-speed Campy group I pulled off another frame last year (probably save the Campy stuff for a better fitting frame whenever I find one).

I used to have a Raleigh Competition Carlton 10-speed that I still regret selling many years ago, so when I came across this one it sort of struck a soft spot in me.

Learning that it is a Taiwan mfg, not Knottingham England, and slightly too big for me, I still will clean and tune it but might pass it along to my wife's son to ride since he only has a MTB now and is looking to get into riding a little with his own two sons.

Not sure what this post is about except to share what I found and to verify the age of the bike. I'll try to post some pics by this weekend when the sun is up.

ps, is the RetroRaleigh web site still active? All I could find is one hosted on SheldonBrown.com, and RetroRaleigh links in some other threads appear to either be down currently or are down for the count. Here's a link to the Raleigh pages on Sheldon's site:
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/retroraleighs/

argh, posting issues, try try again, argh

this is a test
if it works i'll try to edit this post

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fail, try again
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(note to self: when posting, capture text prior to hitting the post or preview button "just in case" it doesn't work, argh)
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okay, one line at a time then
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Got the bike lubed up, got the derailers working good enough, had to slide the front derailer up the seat tube a little to get it to work right.
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i give up, will try a new posting
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alright then, that didn't work either
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I give up again, maybe monday will go better, I can edit or post this silly stuff but not the stuff I wanted to post, f r u s t r a t i o n
Re-wrapped the handlebars with some wrap wrap I had from a previous project , got rid of that foam grab-on stuff that was on there. Found a br

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h2...h/100_1174.jpg

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h2...h/100_1178.jpg

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h2...h/100_1176.jpg

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h2...h/100_1177.jpg

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h2...h/100_1179.jpg

Man am I having issues with posting text in this thread today....

I recently picked up a ladies Raleigh Record for my wife with a similarly formed serial number. I found your post while trying to find a serial number decoder for these mid-80's bikes. My wife's Record's serial number on the underside of the BB is 4DJ15... the rest is obscured by the plastic cable guide. I *believe* the first number in the serial number is the last digit in the year of manufacture, and I am only basing this on finding the men's version of her bike with the exact same silver and blue w/blue cables color scheme in a 1984 catalog. I have come accross others in these who have posted their serial numbers and catalog finds, and it appears that the "first number is the last digit of the model year" seems to hold true. This would mean that your bike is a 1983 based on the serial number fragment you provided. As to what the rest of the numbers and letters mean, I have yet to find out. My guess is the rest would somehow denote the location and month of manufacture, and the last four digits the serial or sequence number of the bike.
He's hoping one of us finds something more specific out!