jan230

Finally have my early '70's Carlton Super Course (SN 280914) on the road.
I wanted to try some different bars as I have 6 other drop bar bikes.
Tried various flat,moustache and trekking bars and then found my old bullmoose bars from my '84 Stumpjumper.
These are the nice (relatively) light chromo ones made by Nitto.

noglider 

That came out well, @jan230.

North Shore of what?

big chainring

'77 Super Course. I switched to a Simplex derailleur, much nicer than stock SunTour, added my own Wrights saddle, and some ancient rattrap pedals. Nice solid rider.

jan230

North Vancouver , British Columbia the MTB Mecca

Slightspeed

Update on my latest Super Course. It's my second one. I love these things. There is an earlier post above of the bike in process alongside my green '73. Almost done now, and doing my longest ride on it tomorrow down PCH to Malibu. It's a '78, a $20 CL find, minus wheels, drivetrain and levers. Bar tape is temporary till I make final fit adjustments.

VGT Luxe RD, Cyclone II FD, 34t Megarange freewheel, Sakae SR crank. Plays well together with Suntour bar end shifters.

beicster 

@noglider, have you made any progress on your Super Course? I am curious what direction you have gone with it.

noglider 

Yes! I finished it today! It's a gravel bike!

Still left to do:

- Align the rear so it's centered. It's way off to the right after spreading it.
- Rack, fenders, lights.
- Handlebar tape, after I determine the brake levers are in the right place.
- Maybe change the handlebars or stem or both. The bars are high, and the reach is short.
- Eventually, I'll sand and refinish the frame.

Man, I'll tell ya. I do not like installing cables anymore, especially in brifters. My vision isn't serving me well there.

beicster 

That looks great. It is giving me ideas.

bulgie 

That's a common problem after spreading by just applying force to both dropouts at once, like with a piece of all-thread where the axle goes (one common way of spreading).

The problem is the right c-stay is weaker due to the indent for the chainring clearance. So all or most of the yielding happens on the right side. Less of a problem with symmetrical stays, such as oval or R-O-R where there's no extra indent on the right, but it's still likely that one stay is weaker and will bend more.

Proper spreading technique involves taking the crank and BB bearing out and holding the BB shell by the faces in a sturdy vise. Smooth jaws recommended, to prevent the vise jaws from leaving marks in the BB faces -- or a couple pieces of, say, flat aluminum, larger than the BB faces, can be fitted between the jaws and shell to protect the faces from typical rough vise jaws. OK to leave the fixed cup installed, if this is a trad cup/cone BB bearing unit.

Then you can bend each side out semi-independently. It's not completely independent since the cs and ss are connected by bridges -- bending one side does affect the other. So it's an iterative procedure, bending out each side some and checking, bending the other side and checking, repeat as necessary. Try not to go too far and back up, though a little bit of "too far and back up" is OK. Just not back and forth repeatedly, which will break the frame.

I use a 2x4 as the lever, with the seat tube as the fulcrum, another piece of lumber placed along the side of the seattube to spread the force out so it isn't all applied at one point. The 2x4 can press directly on the dropout.

BTW, on another subject: I think your cable housing at the chainstay braze-on may have the wrong size or type of ferrule. Looks like it's causing the cable to move through a somewhat sharp bend right at that point. Might cause the inner wire to fray, after an unacceptably-short lifetime.

My similar-vintage SC has a braze-on with a 5.35 mm socket. Almost all the ferrules in my vintage-oriented home shop are bigger than that, except for the ones that came with Campy derailer housing, the stainless steel stuff with no vinyl sheath. Nuovo-Record era and older. That ferrule fit nice, if a little loose, but definitely good enough.

The Campy part # for the short piece of housing with two plain ferrules is 622, or 617 with one plain ferrule and one step-down ferrule. You want the plain ferrule -- the step-down is to fit a different type of braze-on, often referred to as the diver's helmet, aka Campy part # 621, popular on Italian frames of that era. I only give the part numbers in case you might want to search for them, such as on eBay.

The Campy stainless housing and proper ferrules are hard to find now, or expensive when you find them -- collector's item prices. It might be better to use plain housing with no ferrule, rather than a too-large ferrule that won't go into the braze-on socket. A neatly-dressed housing end, of the right diameter to fit the braze-on, will probably work fine for many miles, as long as it's the old kind, nowadays referred to as brake housing. Not the newer derailer housing from the indexing era, which must be used with ferrules at both ends.

Yeah I'm a bit OCD about this stuff, and I don't expect everyone else to have the same obsessions. Ignore if not helpful.

Enjoy the heck out of the new/old bike!

-Mark

noglider 

@bulgie, thank you very much. I will use some or all of this advice, and I don't mind receiving advice that I won't take. It's all welcome.

You guessed correctly that I spread the frame with a threaded rod. I'll see if I can use my bench vise to adjust it. It's bolted down pretty well, to a very heavy bench.

noglider 

I rode the Super Course on a 7 mile very hilly route, giving it a good test of its handling, braking, and shifting.

Near our house in High Falls, NY is a road called Mountain Rd. It has a hill that climbs 345 in 1 mile.

The handling was very sure-footed at high speed going downhill.

The braking was OK but not great. I had already cleaned the rims with solvent and ground down the Kool Stop pads on the front brake. The rear brake needs pads to replace the ancient Dia Compe black pads. I might try new Kool Stops on the front, too.

The shifting in the rear is excellent, but there is a problem with the front. I need to investigate. It's as if there is a missing click-stop for upshifting to the big ring. I can get the chain onto the big ring, but the derailleur springs back to rub on the chain. Fixing the chain line might reduce or eliminate this problem. Maybe there is a click-stop in the shifter I'm missing for lack of lubricant or something like that.

beicster 

That old set of 3X8 brifters you sold me worked great in the back but I could never get the front adjusted right. From what I could find on the internet, it was designed with only three positions in the front and you had to set it so that it would rub the front derailleur in the lowest gear or two highest gear when in the middle ring. It still functioned and shifted just fine but I can't stand that sound of slight dragging on the front derailleur. Perhaps these are the same way? Of course, the internet could have been wrong and I just needed to let them soak in degreaser and lubricant.

noglider 

@beicster, but I have a two-chainring crankset, so this really should work. It's a complete group. @sloar sold it to me right after he took it off a brand new bike. The crankset and derailleurs and shifters were all together.

beicster 

Doh! I even looked at those pictures several times and missed that. That definitely is an issue. Hope you get it squared away.

tom_semp

So I just picked up a Super Course for what I thought was a fair price at $75. Not so sure now that I see that most of the original components are gone... But it rides, and I was mostly interested in getting a nice old frame for possible parts update anyway. The frame seems in really good condition except for the paint and decals (which I see from this thread were pretty low quality), and I love the chrome bits. I think it's around the '73/74 age in "coffee" colour and with Capella lugs.

My question is this: how much, if any, of the components are original? The Shimano bits are obviously not original, along with the cranks, but the rest I'm not sure...

Brakes: Suntour "Sprint" road callipers
Handlebars: Winpista - Japan
Stem: Super Compe
Headset: Shimano Dura Ace
Shifters: Suntour "Symmetric"
Derailleurs: Shimano (modern Deore)
Chainring: Sugino
Cranks: "Custom"
Rims: 27" Rigida "Chrolux" - Made in France
Hubs: I think have "Normandy" on them, but the corrosion makes it difficult to read
Cable guide on downtube: Campagnolo

Now the thing I'm probably most interested/worried about is whether the forks are even original? They are completely chromed, not just the tips, and I don't think I've seen any Super Courses on here that look like that...

Anyway, happy to hear your thoughts! And sorry no pictures until I have 10 posts it seems.

noglider 

@tom_semp, the bike did have Normandy hubs, but it didn't have Chrolux rims which were steel, so you don't seem to have anything original. No matter, as the components were not very good. It's just the frame that is good. It's a platform for building a bike.

Slightspeed

Not a new bike for this thread, my '78 Super Course, but a new picture, today among the flower fields. Started as a $20 CL project, turned into a great riding bike, my second Super Course.

capnjonny 

I picked up a 77 Gold Super Course at the Bike Exchange Wednesday . I'm almost finished with it and should have some pics in the next few days. I really like the Suntour Forged dropouts and Fork ends. It is in pretty good condition and mostly original except for the 700 c Super Champion rims. I have a couple of the concave Wienmans in the shop but one is 700 c and the other is 27" so I am sticking with the ones I have.

Looking at the sales brochure I wonder if anyone can tell me what they mean by "all new geometry". How has it changed from the earlier models?

bertinjim 

capnjonny-

I believe the older Nervex and Capella lugged frames had 71 degree head angles with steeper seat tubes but the later red and gold SCs had a 72 or 73 degree head angle and, probably different trail. I owned an early version and it had a very mellow ride on its Clement cotton tires and have ridden the later version. The red and gold SCs have more agile, quicker handling than the earlier version on the Michelin Elans I rode on.

Schreck83 

The 1977 Raleigh catalog claims a new frame geometry and the 1978 catalog lists 74°/74° angles. The wheelbase is listed as 39 5/16" for the 21.5" frame, and the fork appears to have less rake than earlier models: 1978 Supercourse Catalog

I measured my 23.5" 1972 ish SC and the head tube is 74° with a 73° seat tube angle. Wheelbase is 41", so I would think the fork and wheelbase have more to do with the ride than the angles. I wonder how consistent the early frames were from year to year and size to size, however.



as found

Real1shepherd

It's very interesting if you talk to the SBDU folks. They consider anything less than the International as gutter trash. Yet if you weren't a pro Raleigh racer back in the day being sponsored, you probably started on a SC or even a Grand Prix.....or maybe you had enough money saved to buy a Competition GS.

The non racing people who ride and collect SBDU Raleigh's if they were being honest, usually have very fond memories of riding the aforementioned bikes.

Kevin

noglider 

@capnjohnny, yours is closer to a racing bike geometry. Still very nice compared with the lanky older one. I saw a gold one like yours yesterday on the NYC Century ride, ridden by a tall, young woman.

Blightybiker

I have a Raleigh Grand Prix but have enjoyed very much reading this thread (not all of it, though!). Can anyone recommend a similarly valuable thread for Grand Prix owners?

curbtender

You can start a thread...If you post it, they will come.

noglider 

Here is a tip you can use. I ran this search, and this result seems best for you: The Ultimate (hopefully) Raleigh Grand Prix thread.