While Peter may have said it a bit more forcefully than I would have . . .
I have to say , that ALMOST ALL Raleighs were made well enough provide decades of pleasant experiences .
And SOME Raleighs were quite well made indeed !!
But you always have to keep in mind the prices charged , when they were new .
Let's take an inexpensive , "Bike-Boom" era , Raleigh model as an example . I've seen quite a few Raleigh Grand Prix bicycles from let's say the years 1971 - 1975 . Some of them were built MUCH better than others . Some of them would compare well with fairly fancy road racers from Italia !! Some of them were as bad as anyone cares to describe them . Still , they all did manage to survive years of use on the road . Those bicycles were made in a very broad range of what I will call , "worksmanship levels" .
( Although , no matter how well-made it is , a Raleigh Grand Prix is still going to have softer steel . It is after all "20-30" steel , which has been "hearth brazed" !! Do NOT over-tighten that seat-binder bolt !! )
And personally , I've certainly seen 3-Speed Sports ( and 4-Speeds too ) from Raleigh / Rudge / Humber , made during the 1950's , and 1960's , which were very well made indeed !!
And yes , I've seen Raleigh Internationals which were only half as well made as other Raleigh Internationals . It pays to look at the individual example , always !!
And most of all , thanks Peter . I'm still chuckling over :
" girly lugwork that looks like a tart's handbag "
:^)
I'm going to go admire a certain "Guard's Red Flamboyant" , with chrome highlights , one of those frame-sets right now . . .
And then I'm going to go admire a couple of nice old inexpensive Nottingham Raleighs too .
They're all mates together here at MY house !
Now I'll have to consider getting new handbags for all of them !
:^)
Raoul Delmare
Marysville Kansas U.S.A.
> ....Here we go again.. another crack at Nottingham made machines!! That's
> right the only British bikes worth having are the snob brands, the ones
with
> the girly lugwork that looks like a tart's handbag. Everything made by TI
> Raleigh was crap, everything second rate, poor workmanship, cheesy mass
> produced components.
>
> Twaddle.
>
> Peter Kohler
> Washington DC USA