Junk bike Part 1 -Disassembly (1983 Raleigh Record)

Based on the shape of the rest of this bike, it is surprising how good the head-badge looks, it practically gleams, as if to say I was once a proud road bike and didn't always look like I should be going to the dump!  As you saw from my last post I got a bit ahead of myself yesterday and starting pulling things off the bike, when you're already lacking the front wheel and the saddle/seatpost combo it doesn't take long.

I stole the penny in visegrips as a tool to remove crank bolt dust caps trick from Hugh's blog and it worked great on the drive side but the non-drive side was another story.

bad penny!

The cap was so brittle it just kind of broke in small pieces but not before bending my penny! -that might be a federal offense for crimes against currency - shhh.  I eventually, carefully, chiseled all the bits out and then the crank arm didn't want to come off at first but I persisted.  And that got me to yesterdays teaser shot with a few cups and bits still left.

The fixed bb cup is usually a bear to get out requiring tricks and cajoling but this time it broke loose with just some firm pressure.

And my special head set cup tool removes them in a jiffy with just a sharp hammer blow so now I had all three cups left over from yesterday out of the frame.  You'll note I put a bit of tape on the upper cup so I could tell them apart, on many frames its pretty easy to distinguish upper and lower but on this Raleigh they look identical.

I even took the bolts out of the water bottle cage mounts, more on that later, I thought this might be an aftermarket job but I checked the Catalog shot and this year Record did indeed have water bottle cage mounts. 

And so we are down to a very bare frame.

Fixed bb cup rusty and dry

 And man did I discover some neglect on this poor, left on the side of the road frame, in fact I doubt it saw a spec of grease in the 30+ years since it left the Raleigh factory.  Very dry and very dusty throughout.

The bb shell was dry, rusty and full of debris.

The bb was also dry and rusty

Like wise the headset, I use a zip tie to keep it all together and to remember the order, I need to size the bearing cages to be sure but they will almost certainly be getting chucked in favor of new ones.

I had to make a special trip for this rust inhibitor and at $25 I have spent less on whole bikes but seeing all the rust in the junk bike got me thinking and although in all the time I have been working on steel frames I have never used any, maybe its time.  If this can gets me through 5 bikes it will be worth it.  Not sure what affect it has on bikes where there is probably rust in the tubes already, but it can't very well hurt.  That's why I took out the water bottle braze-on bolts so I would have more holes to spray in.

While out I also picked up some Oxalic acid to try out for derustification, and I have lots to practice on; seatpost, headset cups, brake adjustment screws, shifter collar to name a few.  The brake adjustment screws are attached to the aluminum brake arms and I have read differing accounts on the web about using this acid on aluminum but I going to try it out.  Most of the concern is for anodized aluminum which mine is not and frankly worse case scenario it goes bad - oh well, it was a free and its just going to be a junk bike.

And I didn't forget the protection, be safe out there boys and girls.

Now me being me, I wanted to rush ahead and start with the rust removal and a bunch of other stuff but although I'm slow, I do learn stuff - sometimes.  I noted two areas of concern on this bike I wanted to address before diving in.  The first was the seat post, when I first brought this bike home the seat post and saddle just popped off the bike without me doing anything more than lifting on the saddle.  I was concerned that I might have one of the following:

• Seat post too small for seat tube
• Jacked up hardware store binder not doing its job
• Seat tube messed up

The 1983 Raleigh catalog is sadly lacking on seat post diameter details so it was caliper time.

First to measure the seat post width

Then compare that to the seat tube exterior

And finally flip the caliper and measure the inside of the tube.  Now I am not going to tell you I can detect a .2 mm difference in size but I was looking for something obviously wrong and as my Dad, a Federal Employee for 30 years, used to say "Close enough for government work".

My next step was to see if I had a binder bolt to replace the hardware store side show it came with.  I was sure I had one but couldn't find it when I looked last night.  I had plenty of other things to do on the bike but I was determined to deal with the seat post issue first.  I spent about an hour taking apart all my boxes and storage of bike parts and in the end I found it!  Tomorrow I will test it in the seat tube collar which is a bit banged up and if I can seat it. And then I will see if I can get the seat post to stay in place.  If it doesn't end up working then I might try a 26.0 post or I might move on and I will have saved alot of time and effort.

Speaking of searching I was also able to find the previously used sealed square taper bb I also couldn't find last night.  It has a 113 mm long spindle so it should work with the double chain-ring crank this bike has, and after seeing the shape the original bb was in (Toast) this should be an improvement and a time saver.


My second big concern is the rear wheel, the nut and spacers, and possibly the axle, are rusty and based on the rest of the bike I am sure the hub is dry so I want to address the hub and see if I can get it cleaned up, lubed, and turning half way smooth before proceeding.  I might have a replacement but again I want to figure out if I have a deal breaker before I spend a lot of time on this bike.  It doesn't have to be prefect for the Junk bike but it does need to work.

It hasn't all been wrenching, I have been taking advantage of the warm and sunny weather , this was Tuesday.

It was so nice I got iced coffee which I rarely do.

Today I just rode straight through with no stops, the only downside is I have had a bit of neck stiffness after both rides, neither of which was over 11 km, it didn't last long but I will have to watch that.  I find it especially odd as both bikes, I am trying to share saddle time so no one gets jealous, are set up with the bars above the saddle.

Hopefully more to come on the Junk bike, as always Ride.Smile.Repeat.

1983 Raleigh Record Rebuild...?

Almost exactly a year ago today I found this forlorn incomplete bike on the side of the road while seeking french toast on Mothers Day.  I pulled it out of the bone yard for an assessment today.  I have this half formed idea that maybe I could get it up and running by next Monday so I can use it to ride back and forth to the Mariners game I have tickets for.  It would kill two birds with one stone; 1) get a bike up and running that I can sell and 2) have a bike to ride to the ball game that if, worst case scenario, it got stolen then I wouldn't be out much.

My goal for this build is to have what one of the blogs I followed early in my refurb journey (MyTenSpeeds) refers to as a "Junk Bike", essential a bike that looks like junk but is mechanically sound.  Good for say riding in winter or when you want to ride downtown and want to lock up your bike without worrying about attracting thieves, especially effective it you park it next to something nice.   I would really like to spend as little as possible doing this and to that end I have a number of parts on hand I can use; cables, chain, etc.

front brake

rear brake

I may break out the wallet to buy some oxalic acid and gloves for the rusty parts, I have heard good things about how it deals with rust and want to try it out.  I am not concerned with shining parts up but I don't want them so rusty they don't work either.

replacement front wheel

Tri-Cross tires

This bike came with no front wheel but I have one left over from a previous build, where I went with new wheels, I can use.  I am going to go with the lightly used Specialized Tri-Cross tires that came with the Schwinn Passage and its tubes too.

Passage original cockpit

funky stem

Speaking of the Passage I am also going to use its cockpit, I think if I am careful I can also use the bar tape after unwrapping to run brake cables.  Then I don't have to deal with safety levers and I think that the funky triangular Raleigh branded stem might be worth something on Ebay.

Clunky replacement binder

This bike wasn't left out for free by accident, in addition to no front wheel the seat post binder was replaced by hardware store parts, and the seat -post itself popped right out when I got this bike.  I have a real binder bolt around somewhere that I am hoping will solve this -if I can find it!- so we'll see.

Rusty FW and barely hanging on RD

The rear derailleur isn't connected correctly to the frame because its missing parts but I think I can over come that, the Free-Wheel is pretty rusty so if I can't get that cleaned up I may use something from the boneyard

Boneyard FW

or something new in the box that has been in the parts bin forever- pictured above in box with the collection of parts - a 6 speed Mega range FW.

I won't be worried about waxing the frame -its primer- or shining up parts but I will be rebuilding all the bearings, except for the front wheel which has already been done.  I may also use a old sealed shimano square taper bb I have rattling around rather than rebuild the existing bb.  I will also be running new cables, lubing up the drive train and replacing brake pads and probably adding the Vetta rear rack I got off the Gitane that wouldn't work on the Passage.

One thing I am not prepared to do with this bike is deal with a bunch of obstacles beyond the ones that I have already discussed.  I won't be asking much for this bike so I don't want to spend alot of extra time and if things go south there are plenty of parts I can pick to use it as a donor rather than try to build a complete bike out of it.  That's my story for now anyway.  Ride.Smile.Recycle.Repeat.

PS  (about an hour later) I got bored...

I was just going to do a few easy things....I do still have to remove the fix bb cup, and the headset cups, but otherwise its stripped down.  I ran into a few issues, which I'll go into in the next post, but I got it all apart.  That is all.  I think.

Rack Hacking.... Ack!

One of my favorite Comics in my late youth/early adulthood was Bloom County and Bill the cat's catch phrase (ACK!) sums up how I am feeling about trying to get a rack mounted on the Schwinn Passage.  When Bloom County came to Facebook last year after decades long absence it was like getting a Christmas present, but as usual I digress.

All I wanted to was to recreate the front rackage of the Handsome Devil on the Schwinn Passage so I could swap my bag back and forth, how hard could it be?   Well as you know from a previous post  an old canti fork and new canti rack aren't really simpatico.

My first step was to measure the stock hardware so I knew what to look for when I went to the hardware store.  Since stock was about an inch and it was too short I needed something a bit longer.

And at the super mega big box hardware store I found it -a 1 1/2 inch bracket, which wasn't perfect but was a start.

More of a V than an L but hackers can't always be choosers and the length was working.

To make this work I was going to need to cut down one side of the "V" bracket and, as I discovered when test fitting, make the outside hole on the long side bigger to accommodate the canti post bolt.

To make those modifications I would need a bench vise to hold things steady, I had the hack saw and drill but no vise, however my ex graciously let me use her garage when she was out running errands and since the house is only a couple blocks away I was in business.

Since this was my old house, the  garage has my dad's old bench vise in it.  If I ever have the space again the vise will come with me but its in a good spot for now.   That old vise was on a work bench in the garage of every house I lived in growing up, 5 that I remember, so its an old friend and I got custody of it when my parents went from house to retirement community back in 2006.  Anyway, I gave it a little workout.

And produced the desired result..

I had purchased a sack of 4 brackets for 2 bucks and change and modified 2 of them.  I used a wire brush mounted to the drill to clean up the sharp edge where I hack sawed as well.

Did a quick compare before mounting up both modified brackets and fitting to the bike

Ok so "fitting" is not the right word -I now have the opposite issue I started with, I could mount a mix of "new" and stock hardware but then the piece that mounts to the hole in the fork crown would be off center, or maybe I can find someone with a drill press and make a proper slot, rather than holes, in the modified bracket like the originals has ..but

rack interference with brake - penalty! repeat first down.  Oi vey! I think the front Canti-rack is not going to happen.   There are other front racks out there,  Soma makes a couple that mount to the fork eyelets and hole in the fork crown but for now I have other options.

I still have the rear rack from the Gitane Tour de France that I parted out so lets try that.  Turns out under that ugly black plastic deck (which just snaps on and off) is a nice alloy Vetta made in Italy.  I cleaned it up and got a few nuts and bolts from the local True Value which has a great selection of metric fasteners; nuts, bolts, washers, hex head, button head, Philips etc.  I mounted it up and realized that I needed to loosen up the rear brake to accommodate the rack bracket that mounts to the brake bridge...

Even though the Tektro CR 720s have a very long straddle cable it wasn't going to allow me to use this rack with how high the rack bracket was.  I had some thoughts about bending it or drilling a different hole but it dawned on me I had a bike that would suit this rack as it, the 1983 Raleigh Record that I found forlornly at the side of the road almost exactly a year ago.

The bracket on the Vetta rack should fit behind the brake bridge and use the brake bolt just like it did with a center pull brake on the Gitane, so I took it off the Passage and put things back to normal and stowed the rack until I can get to the Raleigh Record.  Rack fail number two! My friend Annie is way ahead of me with rack hacks.

I got to thinking and realized that Passage, as a touring bike, has eyelets galore including some below the seat cluster and if I found a rack that had two stays that connected to the eyelets my brake cable and straddle could go between them and not be affected.  I was also the recipient of some unexpected severance from my last employer today, so I went on Amazon and found a modest $25 rack that should suit, fingers crossed, mounting to the rear of the Passage.

Stay tuned.  In other news riding, yes still pedaling after the event ride.

We had back to back 70 degree days this week, the only 70 degree days we've all year, so I had to dig in the closet and break out the board shorts and sandals.  I enjoyed espresso shakes..

And sunny skylines

Of course Mother nature doesn't want us to get greedy, I was getting rained on by end of my ride on day 2 of warm weather and last night we had a full on thunder and lighting storm and heavy rain and today we are back to this..

Oh well, there is supposed to be more Sun in the coming week.

I got an offer from my credit union for half off tickets to the Seattle Mariners so on May 15th I am going to a game.  Although the stadium is close, using a car and paying to park and dealing with the congestion is a nightmare, the Bus is a good option but that means lots of waiting/crowded seating on the way home after the game so I am planning to ride my bike.

Through Annie's blog I discovered Rootchopper and have enjoyed his blog "A few spokes shy of a wheel" about riding in and around the other Washington, Washington D.C.  He has written a number of times about biking to Washington Nationals games where they have a bike valet.  I don't know if anyone named Hargroves wearing white gloves will park my bike ( I say Hargroves be a good chap and park my bike won't you) but I did read online that:

Safeco Field has secured parking for over 150 bicycles in the Safeco Field Garage located on Edgar Martinez Drive east of Occidental Avenue. There is no charge for bicycle parking. Additional bicycle racks are available next to the garage on the west plaza and on the Centerfield Gate Plaza on the north side of the stairs...

Its about 5 miles from my house to the stadium but unlike the not-quite-reality of riding on smooth flat bike paths I will be riding on roads with traffic in the city to get to and from the game, but it is mostly bike lane or path on the route, so my bigger issue will be the hill on the way home.  All the more reason to keep riding.  I even ordered a new hat for the occasion when I realized that my current M's cap is in season 19 of use..

Ride me out to the Ballgame, smile and repeat.