A really nice but tired looking SBDU

[KermitGKona88]

Re: Re:

Wish I had 3 rooms to give over to such an amazing collection, I just have bikes in the shed, bedroom, kitchen, and shower room

Sure this will look fantastic with a light sympathetic restoration.

I used to work in a Raleigh dealership in the 80's most fantastic thing that passed through was a late 70's SBDU Time trial special frameset, beautiful workmanship, and the deepest gloss black I have ever seen.

I know what you mean about the gloss black - this is the original gloss black on SB6398, I only gave the frame a quick polish and the front derailleur is nicely reflected in the shine

Gorgeous like looking at raw bitumen

 

[Midlife]

Thanks for the info about chainstay stops . As everything went slant pantograph the stops tended to sneak backwards . Have you a link to the downturn braze ons.... During my time they crept nearer to the head tube, ruining the aesthetics lol

 

[originalshinkicker]

Yep, here is a link...

https://raleigh-sb4059.com/2018/05/11/s ... sitioning/

They started well down the down tube but at a point at the start of 1984 the SBDU raised them right up by about 40mm, the tips of the levers were skimming the head tube, but then by 1985, they relented just a bit and dropped them back down. This image shows the 3 stages...



The bike I've just posted about is a 1985 bike so the lever is in the later position (higher up but not overlapping the head tube).

 

[Midlife]

Thanks for the pics and the link, much appreciated.

 

[allenh]

That's a really interesting collection of components on a very nice bike. Thanks for sharing, I've got a few Raleigh's in my collection but all pretty run of the mill and haven't managed to add an SBDU yet.

 

[Jamiedyer]

A beautiful build for sure. I really like this colour scheme compared to most other Raleighs.
Thanks for the interesting write up regarding the downtube mounts, really interesting.

Jamie