AD-SLE

Thank you all for your encouragement. She even got a bath today and a bit of polish just to see how good or bad the patina would be. Tough paint but plenty of scrapes and scratches. But I get ahead of myself.

SirMike. My ride went to a child...how we love them...and the bike was left out for a winter and a snow plow pushed snow hard enough to bend the fork but NOT the front wheel. Oh well. She has been hung up on my collection of bike stuff for 5 years, disappointed. I should have been searching more actively for a fork. Taking the fork out would be plenty of loose bearings. But she is stripped and I have a measurement. I will post in C&V wanted.

Cyclespanner. I am not sure if you are having some fun with me or if you are serious. I was surprised at how many metric wrenches were required. Cotter nuts, 11mm. Front wheel nuts, 14mm. To use SAE would have been sloppy. I just assumed by 1970 Raleigh had gone metric. Don't know. My 205mm steerer tube is also a short 8.125".

Nlerner. I see a few 8" forks out there. Some I wonder if they are 26" forks? Since mine is twisted in about every direction I am not sure what the correct measurement from crown to axle would be. I will have a look. Hopefully someone will post a Root Beer Brown fork in the right length. One of the appeals of the bike is the large frame size.

Stopped by the local shop and once they got off the ground laughing.... Ya, I don't live in Portland OR that is for sure!

SirMike1983 

1959 Schwinn Traveler out for a ride this evening.

Cyclespanner

AD-SLE, hi.

Isn't 8.125'' = 8 1/4''? (decimal = fraction)
SAE spanners don't cut the mustard; you need Whitworth BSW.
Most if not all component dimensions should be to the nearest fraction.

I was 15 in 1970; we were just then being introduced to the 'future' Metric system at school.
The first pocket calculators were becoming available; these suddenly made sense of the Metric system.
As a consequence I still think in Feet & Inches, but revert to Decimals for fine tolerances.

1989Pre 

AD-SLE: I was looking at the headset cups on your frame and they do not seem parallel. You might want to check this. The crown race seems askew.

clubman 

It may be just the pic angle and the edge of the badge but the head tube seems to have a little wow in it. Difficult to measure even with a steel rule and it may affect the ride once built. Maybe two straight edges placed on the head tube milled faces may show deformation.

Salubrious

This message appeared in my inbox this morning; the Lake Pepin 3-speed Tour is two weeks off:

Road Fan

The 17 might be original. That is the original cog on my 1952 Rudge Aero Special, with a 46 chain wheel.. hub choices were AW, FW, and FM, but I doubt they all used the same chainring/sprocket sets

oldiron

8.125" = 8 1/8"

I believe a 21" ladies model may also have a fork that will work, Most used a taller head tube to give the ladies model a more upright bar position.

Panurgist

My question pertains to the false neutral on British AW hubs and is specifically technical. I have pulled down and successfully reassembled an early '50s AW hub so I "sort of" understand how they do their magic. I have read that early pre-AW SA hubs did not have the false neutral and that the newer Taiwan SA AW hubs don't either. So what exactly was and is now done differently.
And why did the mid-century hubs deviate from that. ( $$ or sturdiness or ease of service? )

JohnDThompson 

The original AW hub had a neutral space between 2nd and 3rd gear that could happen when the shift cable went out of adjustment. In the 1980s, Columbia Bicycle Company persuaded Sturmey-Archer to slightly change the design to eliminate the neutral position; this version was known as the "No Inbetween Gear" (NIG) hub. When hub production moved to Taiwan, the NIG design is what was used there.

SirMike1983 

One challenge that had to be overcome was preventing the hub from simultaneously engaging high and normal gears, which could potentially damage or destroy the hub. The model K avoided this problem through ramped engagement surfaces that forced the hub into one gear or the other, but prevented engagement of both at the same time. This held true from the introduction of the K right after WW1 through the 1935 revision.

The ramped surface engagement used by the K model hub has two drawbacks, one was that it added manufacturing cost, and the other was wear on the ramped engagement surfaces, leading to parts replacement. Modifications to the K in 1935 led to the no-drive position. This reduced production cost and reduced the engagement surface wear issue, but it introduced the issue of free spinning between normal and high. The trade-off was felt to be worthwhile because, as the thinking went, if you adjusted/maintained the hub properly and if you understood how to shift while riding, you wouldn't have a problem with the neutral position.

Several modifications made late in the life of the K hub found their way into the AW, including the no-drive position. The AW lived on with the neutral position inherited from the late model K until 1984. Evidently over the years, SA's assumption that the neutral position would not be a serious problem turned out to be somewhat misplaced. The neutral position caused problems with mis-adjusted AWs and proved a serious safety issue on the TCW series hubs. Columbia at that time was a fading manufacturer of bikes in the US and requested an AW without the neutral gear. SA made changes to the hub. Eventually the NIG became a standard adaptation to the hub. Much of this willingness to make changes was because of SA's dire economic situation in the early 1980s. The early 80s were not a good time for Sturmey Archer overall, and they needed to sell every hub they could and keep as many customers as they could.

Panurgist

Brilliant! Thanks much.
The sturdiness of the AW hub is obvious since I am still regularly riding on one from 1952 that has all it's original bits. I pulled mine down, cleaned out the nasty-fied oily gunk and re-assembled with fresh oil - works like a champ.
Unfortunately relying on a cable not to stretch or a clamp not to slip was not a realistic solution. For the non-mechanically inclined it only has to drop into freewheel once, at the wrong moment, to lose confidence in the machine forever.

woodrupjoe

Anybody else here enjoy seeing that beautiful Raleigh on Murder She Wrote?
I’m sure I’m showing my age, but these days I’m enjoying the old reruns. It’s always a treat to see her perfect condition women’s Sports in green with original fork-mounted generator headlight.
Anybody with me?

…or is it a Sports?
Superbe, or some other model?
I’m no expert.

Small cog

There are constant re-runs on UK television including a clip of the bike when they announce that an episode is coming up but I have never managed to note what model it is.

woodrupjoe

Light and pump, but no full chain case.
And is that an original rack underneath the aftermarket folding wire baskets?

clubman 

Looks like the original Prestube rack and it also has an original Raleigh kickstand. The light should be a Sturmey but who's counting.

3speedslow

Love those Raleigh kickstand! Such a smart design.

Salubrious

FWIW I've never had a problem with this. But I am careful to keep an eye on the condition of the bike. I adjust the shift cable by setting it for the minimum tension such that the toggle chain does not retract at all into the hub while in 1st gear. I've been told that the 3-speeds were built for a 100+ year service life but like so many things British from the middle of the last century (or earlier) there was a built-in expectation that the machine would be properly serviced. If everything is checked (properly lubricated, brake pads tested and adjusted, spoke tension tested with wheels aligned, shifter tested and adjusted, tires inspected with new inner tubes at least every 8-10 years, the seat (if leather) properly treated and adjusted, then 100 years is pretty reasonable. Bikes that have found their way into the US often did not get this treatment/respect.

SirMike1983 

Warm, humid evening here last night (for May at least).

tcs

The late Jobst Brandt said the AW was unconditionally unacceptable.

The late Sheldon Brown pointed out that tens of millions of cyclists employed the AW without issue.

The AW is not idiot-proof. Hmm. What on a bicycle is?

Salubrious

Seems like Mr. Brandt was simply wrong
He probably didn't know how to set it up. The AW has some arcane quirks.

SirMike1983 

Brandt was a very bright guy, but sometimes his advice focused on his engineering theory of a matter rather than how it actually worked out in practice. He tended to denigrate things he didn't agree with. I recall one usenet discussion where he basically told another person that the guy's old Schwinn 3 speed was not a real bike. Sheldon's explanation addressed Jobst's complaint about the AW.

Brandt was not alone in his thinking though. I remember once being laughed out of a bike shop in DC because I came in with a Raleigh Sports. There's always been a small but vocal group of "serious cyclists" who sneer at old 3 speed bikes.

Salubrious

Bad luck! Probably the sneering is from a sense of insecurity...

If you ever encounter such again, ask which is better for training!

Maybe they are just being nice but I don't get laughs at my 3 speeds when I bring them to my LBSs. But 3-speeds are part of cycling history such as my Bates or my '35 roadster. My bike that gets the most compliments when I'm out on a ride, whether road, mountain or whatever, is my 1972 Raleigh Superbe.

SirMike1983 

It has a lot to do with the culture of a particular shop. Funny thing was after that happened, I went next door to a competing shop, and they really appreciated the condition of the old Raleigh Sports. People tend to gravitate to others with similar perspectives. Two shops on the same block with totally different ways of looking at it. This was probably 21-22 years ago.

adventurepdx

Brandt was bright and also an iconoclast that did things in a very unique, deliberate, and sometimes confounding way. I read somewhere else that he got a new frame built yearly (or every other year) because he put so much abuse on his bikes, and that he always chose yellow paint because it would show cracks the easiest. Jobst would do serious "gravel"/MTB rides with high gearing and slick, narrow tires on a road bike. He would never carry water, instead he knew where water was and would stick his head into the spring or creek and drink. He also looked sideways when Tom Ritchey rolled up on a bike he had built himself, wondering if it would be up for the task. I admire folks like him, but just like I do with Jan Heine, I take their recommendations with a grain of salt.


But Brandt wasn't unique in the practice of denigrating three speeds. That was common practice amongst many American men who got serious about cycling in the 60s and 70s. This was an era when adult biking (at least in the 60s) wasn't a thing, so those who aspired to it looked at racing bikes from Europe for inspiration. Three speeds was what they'd find in department stores, hardware stores, or the basic bike shops, and admittedly a lot of the three speeds available here (that wasn't imported from the UK) were heavy and of mediocre quality. That bias got passed down through the ages, especially through the pages of bike magazines and books. Look at the bike books from that era--they might talk about three speed maintenance because they were common, but there was an air of "If you're serious about this, you'll soon leave that three speed behind and upgrade to a fine machine from Italy or maybe France." (Not Japan just yet.) And that bias is still hard to shake.