1988 Raleigh Magnum

[kingoffootball]

Probably not of much interest to most and not so much a build thread as a service thread, but I thought since I had the pictures I may as well document it. You never know when there might be a little detail that's of use at some point.

My mum bought this bike new from Cliff Pratt in Hull in 1988, around the same time I bought my first mountain bike (Raleigh Lizard, which if my memory is correct was £168 compared to about £185 for this). It was put through many years of faithful service, though mainly on roads, before being retired to a garage for a long time and "temporarily" replaced with a gifted bike that was in running condition.

It looked quite rough, but there wasn't too much that required fixing:

I took off the tape that had been put around the frame to "protect" it from the child seat that was mounted on it:

And cleaned off the 27 year old residue, mainly using GT85 and cloths.

I stripped down the weird wide-diameter bottom bracket which was still pretty smooth, but I figured it was worth degreasing and rebuilding to make it smoother:

The nut that held on the metal cover to one side of the spindle was seized and being narrow and recessed it took a fair bit of Plusgas and swearing to get it off.

My mum wanted everything that could possibly still be used to stay on it, so I got to cleaning everything, rather than the temptation of using already serviced parts. She specifically wanted to keep the same tyres, despite my suggestion they were past their best, so since I didn't manage to get them to fail by putting a high pressure in them to test ride it, they stayed too:

I'm sure in the catalogue it advertises the mudguards as a selling feature, which is odd as I had memories of my mum paying the shop to fit some when she bought it. Anyway, I re-assembled it, replacing just the cables, chain and one of the innertubes:

(my garage is less tidy than it looks there)

It's far from a restoration. Some of the chrome was entirely lost beneath rust, so although I cleaned it up as well as I could with aluminium foil and water it's still pitted and scruffy, but it's fully ridable again now and it looks a bit better than it did:

When I get a chance I'll try to add a spec sheet at the start for reference and as an excuse to weigh it. It's certainly not lightweight! But although some of the components are cosmetically past their best it's impressive that they are pretty much all still functionally perfect. Built to last.

Frame: Raleigh Magnum with ATT23 main tubes

Fork: Raleigh Magnum with ATT23 fork blades

Headset: Chromed steel
Stem: Sakae MTB
Handlebar: Chromed steel
Grips: Original

Brakes: Dia-compe 981 cantilevers
Brake Pads: Original -Dia-compe?
Brake Cables: Fibrax
Cantilever cable hangers: Dia-compe
Brake Levers: Lee Chi

Shifters: Sunrace thumb shifters
Front Derailleur: Sachs Huret Rival
Rear Derailleur: Shimano Tourney RD-TY10
Derailleur Cables: Unknown red cables
Cassette: Maillard? 5-speed 14-28
Chain: KMC Z
Cranks: ? Made in France alloy cranks
Crank Bolts: Original
Chainrings: Original steel
Chainring bolts: Original steel
Bottom Bracket: Weird oversized thing that is actually very smooth
Pedals: Wellgo

Hub Skewers: Bolt-through
Rims: Weinmann 525
Hubs: Maillard
Nipples: Original
Spokes: Original galvanised
Tyres: Cheng Shin
Tubes: 1xoriginal and 1xContinental

Saddle: Vetta? marked Made in Italy
Seatpost: Raleigh chromed steel
Seatpost Binder: Raleigh

Weight: 16.64kg / 36lb 11oz

 

[The History Man]

Memories. Misty water coloured memories.........

Of the way we were.

Been waiting for this. Nice work.

 

[kingoffootball]

Thanks

The paintwork came up quite nicely with some T-cut, apart from the rather dulled, scuffed bits where the tape on the down tube was.

 

[kingoffootball]

By the way, did you have a huge-framed one of these? Because the standard seatpost is pretty short - it's at it's max on the final picture, which made test riding it less comfortable!

 

[The History Man]

It was indeed mahusive.

When I was 22, it was a very good year.........

 

[retrobikeguy]

Re:

My first mountain bike, my father bought meit from a second hand bike shop in tang hall ,York. Heavy as hell- non indexed, although alloy wheels and factory mudguards were standard on this model.

Nice to see one still going

RBG

 

[doctorstewie]

Fantastic Nicely done. I love that it's still running.

 

[kingoffootball]

Thank you. I'm glad I did it, but also pleased it's now finished and I can get back to working on my own bikes more

 

[kingoffootball]

Known components and weight added

 

[kingoffootball]

I just took it for a final on/off road test before handing it over. All running smoothly and the weight really didn't seem that noticeable, except maybe under braking. It rides better than I remember my Raleigh Lizard riding, though that's probably more to do with changes in the rider. Anyway, it put a grin on my face and that's what bikes are meant to do, right?