jefnvk

Warehouse is all over the map on what they sell. Most of the stuff in the past, if it was used, was pretty good at describing issues, including flaws I would have never noticed had they not pointed it out.

They do accept no questions asked returns as with all their stuff, I had the misfortune of dealing with that once buying something that was supposed to be in original packaging with all accessories that wasn't.

jefnvk

Man, the 60cm has dropped to $598 from Amazon Warehouse.

Tourist in MSN

I got very lucky with my Gran Prix. I mentioned in post 72 above that I ordered the 58cm used one for a bit over $700 with sales tax from Amazon. I think I ordered it on Tuesday, was delivered this morning.

The one I got was listed as Used/Very Good, but it was new, the Raleigh box was never opened. But, the Raleigh box was smashed in and then placed in a much bigger box for shipping. I was sure that the bike was destroyed. I contacted Amazon, they assured me that if it was damaged I could return it for full refund and no shipping fee costs. So, at that point I opened up the Raleigh box. That was when I found how big the box was, there was plenty of room in it. To make the long story short I could not find any damage.

Assembled it today. Rides nice. Needs a new stem or stem riser, as the bars are way too low for me, and I would like a slightly shorter reach too. Other than that, I appear to have gotten the correct size. With a lowest gear of about 30.6 gear inches it is not a hill climber. Without rack mounts, I suspect that it would fare poorly for camping. But I could see using it for credit card touring with my Carradice Nelson Longflap or perhaps with a light duty seatpost mounted rear rack. When I was in Iceland in summer 2016, I met a couple that was bikepacking with Ritchey Breakaway frame road bikes. They were packed much lighter than I would like to pack for a camping trip, but I could see someone that travels with an extremely light load could use the Raleigh Gran Prix for bikepacking/touring on pavement.

I like to tour with a handlebar bag mounted on a second stem. There are 25mm of steerer tube spacers on the steerer below the stem, so I probably can fit a handlebar bag, but I could not use an average stem that way as most stems have more than 25mm of height on the steerer tube. I might need to order a Thorn Accessory T Bar to do that.

I think it could easily take 32mm tires, but not sure if it would take both fenders and 32s, that might be a bit tight.

The Raleigh bag is a bag with padding, not a stiff case. I would not trust it with airline handlers unless I beefed up the bag with stiffening inside. Later I might try to see if I can get the Gran Prix into my S&S Backpack Case, if it fits well there I might never use the Raleigh padded bag.

I think I answered any questions anyone might have for very light touring on the Gran Prix. But if you have any questions, ask. I attached a few photos.

A side note. I usually build up all my own bikes, I worked in a bike shop back in 1973 before I went to college. The only other time that I bought a complete new bike that was already built was when I worked at that bike shop, and the model bike I bought then was a 1972 (one year old at that time) Raleigh Gran Prix. I find it an amazing coincidence that I have only bought two new bikes and the two that I bought were the same model name, but there were 45 years in between the two model years.

Some photos of my new Gran Prix attached.

fietsbob

Bank Card breaking into a Sweat Yet?

jefnvk

Dang, never noticed there were no rack mounts. I'd still consider one, as I travel quite a bit for work, it'd be nice to have an airline suitable breakaway bike for general riding in the morning.

Looks slick tho, glad I decided to tag ya!

Tourist in MSN

Yeah, thanks for mentioning that there was a cheap 58cm available. Your note is what made me aware of it.

There are fender mounting points but I would not want to try to mount a rack on them as it might be too weak for the weight of a rack that has a load of camping gear on it.

It tips the scale at about 10.7 kg, so it is my lightest bike. But if I put a Brooks on it, that will increase the weight some.

Forecast for tomarrow looks nice, I need to get out on it some to try to figure out about how much I want to modify handlebar height and reach so I can calculate what angle and length of stem I need to get for it.

I commented above that I have seen a couple that were using bikepacking gear on some Ritchey Breakaway bikes, I attached a couple photos of their bikes, I never asked them for permission to put the photos on the internet so I cropped out their faces. Thus, if you wanted to pack as extremely light as they did, you could certainly tour on a Ritchey Breakaway frame, which would include the Raleigh. But I think it would perform much better as a credit card touring rig.

dr_lha

Glad the warehouse deal worked out for you, clearly I should have taken that gamble!

I worked on my (slightly more expensive but otherwise identical) Grand Prix this weekend. Tore it apart and put it back together again with added grease and correct torques. It was surprisingly well assembled in parts, awful in others. Last two bikes I bought I built from the frame up, so it was a fun and quick exercise.

One thing I noted, the Campy Cassette looks like a piece of junk, I thought it was an off-brand one for a while until I took it apart and saw the words "Campagnolo" stamped on the rings, oh well.

Still the bike looks nice and feels solid, and as the weather is good today, I'm planning on taking out for a test ride this afternoon. We'll see if the wheels hold up under weight (of me)! They did a lot of "plinking" when I road the bike around my cul-du-sac this weekend. Hopefully just the usual settling in typicaly with machine built wheels. Would have been more comfortable with a 32x rear though!

Tourist in MSN

The spokes clinked a bit for me, but I tweaked a few spokes to true up the wheels before I ever rode it so I assumed it was my fault that they clinked. I have maybe 20 miles on mine now. Of that 5 this morning, and decided today that I am putting on a different saddle. I am undecided if I should buy new Brooks or borrow one off of another bike. For now will probably just borrow one and order a new one later.

Yesterday when I got home from a ride, I re-adjusted the front derailleur and cable for it. Today it worked great. I have front derailleur chain rub in the two most cross chained gears on each chainring, which is fine with me as I want to avoid those gears anyway.

I will be buying a cassette puller for it, my cassette pullers are Shimano/Sram. I am unsure if I will ever pull the bottom bracket parts off the frame, so do not at this time plan to buy that tool. I have Campy older style (square taper) bottom bracket tool and Shimano tool, but not the newer tool for external Campy bottom bracket.

Ordered a 90mm 35 degree silver stem this morning. The existing 25 mm of spacers will allow me to play with height later, will probably set about 2 spacers below the new stem, 3 above it?

dr_lha

I just did a 32 mile ride.

Apart from a sore butt (yes, the saddle will have to go), everything went very smoothly. The bike rides nice, feels very solid, safe on downhills with no shimmy, and the gears are satisfyingly positive (never ridden Campy before I'll admit). The geometry of the bike fits me very well, surprisingly, I don't even need to change the stem (I usually favor shorter stems than manufacturers put on bikes, but then again they'd usually put a 110mm on a 58cm bike). Got a few more "clinks" from the wheels on some uphills under load, but the wheels themselves are very true and remain so after the ride, we'll see how they look after a few hundred miles.

I also had a little front der rub when cross chained, nothing terrible though.

BTW I looked up these cranksets online and to pull them requires a lot of tools I don't own. I did buy a cassette tool though, but they're less than 10 bucks.

Tourist in MSN

Yeah, if I pull the bottom bracket for any reason, I will probably pay a bike shop to do it. Then put on a square taper crankset. Cost of labor for a bike shop to remove it might be cheapest option, I have the tools to put in a new square taper crank.

dr_lha

Tourist in MSN

Update on my Raleigh Gran Prix.

Been quite happy with it. I now have close to 100 trouble free miles on it, that includes one 35 mile ride.

I borrowed a Brooks Pro from another bike in my fleet to put on the Raleigh, that was a huge improvement over the Raleigh seat. I had some Ritchey SPD pedals that were not in use, so that was one less thing to buy. I got a new stem (90mm, 35 degree) to shorten up the reach and raise the bars a bit, the stock posture on the bike was more aggressive than I prefer.

The bike is lightweight and handles well. I can not feel any flex in the take apart system.

While some would be opposed to a Campy drive train for one reason or another, I have a rear Campy brifter on my rando bike and I like the way that the rear Campy brifter shifts. But it is my first bike with a Campy brifter for the front derailleur, that took some time getting used to.

I set the front derailleur to give me an audible chain rub on the front derailleur cage when I am in one of the two most cross chained gears for each chainring. That alerts me to being cross chained so that I can avoid that gear, and that turns my 20 speed bike into a 16 speed which is just fine with me. Those 16 gears appear to be well spaced (see attached graphic).

It is fitted with a compact crank (50/34) and a 10 speed cassette (13/29). The lowest gear at 30.6 inches is higher than I would like. For now I do not anticipate any changes but time will tell if I will want to change the crankset to gear it down further. I usually use a gear of about 20 to 25 gear inches on the steepest hills that I frequently climb, so the lowest gear being quite a bit higher than that is something that I find less than convenient.

I commented before that it lacks rack mounts but has fender mounts. I should clarify that the fender mounts on the rear dropout could certainly be used for a light duty rack for credit card touring, but I would not trust those mounts to hold a rack with all my camping gear loaded on it. The chainstays lack rack mounts and would need a work-around for rack installation. I would probably use P clips if I install a rack. In the photo, I am using a seatpost mounted rack.

The wheels are 28 spoke front and rear, thus are not the strongest. I would not want to carry a load of camping gear on the bike for that reason but for general riding or credit card touring, I think the wheels are perfectly adequate.

I think there is room for 32mm tires in the frame, or fenders with the 28s. Not sure if both fenders and 32s could be used simultaneously. Because fenders complicate breaking a bike down to fit in a small case, I will probably not install any but I might use some temporarily mounted ones.

I think that Raleigh made a huge mistake when they made the padded bag without a side stiffener like the Ritchey case has. I would not trust airline handlers to handle my bike in the Raleigh padded bag as is. Adding the plastic stiffening frame like Ritchey uses to turn a padded bag into a real case during construction would have increased costs a small amount, but it would have made this a great travel bike package. Thus, the Raleigh bag without modification is almost worthless to me. Overall, the Raleigh padded bag is the one big disappointment for the whole package. I am unsure if I will try to retrofit their bag or if I instead need to buy the Ritchey case. I tried to put the Gran Prix in my S&S Backpack Case and I could not get it to fit. If I could have removed the crankset, it would have had a much bigger chance of fitting in the case, but I lack the tools to remove the crankset. My expedition bike fits in the S&S case but only after I remove the crank arms.

I plan to buy a cassette puller, but have not gotten around to it yet. Since I did not build the wheels, I do not have any spare spokes for it. I will probably just get a Fiberfix spoke kit instead of trying to figure out what length the spokes are.

In summary, overall I think it would be a great credit card touring bike, but the lowest gear of 30.6 gear inches could be a shortcoming in some locations and the padded bag would make one think twice before trusting airline luggage handlers with it.

Any questions on the Raleigh, let me know.







The gear chart assumes only using the least cross chained 8 (out of 10) gears for each chainring, thus only 16 gears are shown. Color coding is for chainring size. Values above each data point are in gear inches.




***

jefnvk

Any pics on the bag? Do you think it would be possible to stiffen the sides of the bag yourself, with some sheets of plastic sewn into the bag??

Tourist in MSN

No photos at this time. But this is from Raleigh marketing:
https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/12...g?v=1524140405

I am considering some form of side stiffening plastic sheeting. I measured the thickness of my S&S Backpack Case side pieces at about 0.078 (or about 5/64 inch). Not sure what that plastic is, I suspect it is HDPE. I am thinking about trying some 0.060 (1/16 inch) HDPE in the sides for the Raleigh bag, but trying to cut and re-sew about 80 inches of seam that also includes a zipper would be quite a chore. I might just try making a plastic frame and putting it loose inside the bag first, the S&S Backpack side pieces are loose, not sewn in. But the S&S side pieces have a small piece of velcro in each side to hold them in place. I ordered a piece of plastic (it was cheap), when it arrives I will have to decide if I am serious about putting some time into it or not. Ordered the 24 X 48 piece.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/HDPE-HIGH-D...E/282771493864

I found on the internet that someone had a photo of the side structure from a Ritchey case. The Raleigh case only had soft foam in the side, something that is easily crushed if you step on it but the Ritchey case is clearly designed to offer structural support.
https://www.bicycledoctorusa.com/rcase3.JPG
https://www.bicycledoctorusa.com/rcase5.JPG

In addition to the side support pieces in my S&S case, I also have a home made center support, two small sheets of thin plywood and a couple one inch diameter dowels that go in the center. I would do something like that as a center support in the Raleigh bag if I can get the sides stiffened up.

The photo shows my folding bike inside my S&S backpack case, you can see my plywood and wood dowel center support in the middle. The plastic stiffener pieces in the sides give it a pretty good structure.

dr_lha

Agreed, the bag is a bit flimsy, probably fine for packing in the car for drive-to-holidays, but I'm not convinced about airplane baggage handlers. What sort of stiffeners does the Ritchey bag use?

FYI I stuck a Charge Spoon saddle on mine, and my butt appreciates it. Got about 155 miles on the bike now, no problems to report other than the awful saddle.

Tourist in MSN

All I can say is what I saw in the photos. Near the bottom of this very long web page:
Coming Soon

You will find a section that states "We offer Ritchey BAB case modifications, a must for USPS shipments and to make them more airline friendly $49.90
They say a picture worth a thousand words, I will be brief and give you a 7 step guild for those that want to do it them self's or Our Tec will do it for you."

Below that section you can click on some photos to see more details on the case.

dr_lha

OK, I see what you mean. Gotta love Bicycle Doctor USA! Still they sold me a Ritchey frame for $400 below MSRP, so I have no complaints with them.

bmwt

Worth adding here. I just bought off ebay a 2018 model (60cm) of this bike. Same frame with all silver 105 (5800) components where the '17 was Campy. I'm a little over $700 with shipping the seller is Bicycle Bluebook. Here's the funny thing - I work for a Raleigh dealer and have never seen this 2018 model hit the B2B website. Raleigh is basically in a state of trying to pull out of a tailspin downward from their choice to go to direct sales last year. I've heard things were pretty bad when they made that decision. Anyway there's no travel case included. This seller has a 58cm listed as well. Judging from their site they list on (bicyclebluebook.com) there are more of the 60cm's available. So go direct or watch the listings on ebay. As of the time of this listing there is an Ebay Memorial Day coupon that saved me the $50 shipping. Seems worth the parts kit change if you have liked the write-ups here. The listings say 2017 but the only new road model listed as a 2018 is the Grand Sport. Compare the decals - the graphics have gone from a script font to a block face font - only on the 2018 bike. That's why I surmise this is a current but oddly not released model.

jefnvk

Link or listing number? Not seeing anything when I try to search that.

Tourist in MSN

I think this is it.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/2017-Raleig...9/273230795148

I was not finding it on Ebay but when I searched for Raleigh Prix and specified new, then I found a couple.

I mentioned above that mine was in a badly damaged box. This one also has a badly damaged box.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Raleigh-Bik...G/142797543075

***

A quick update on mine - I think I can make the padded bag stiff enough to trust an airline handler. I bought some 1/16 inch HDPE (I mentioned this in post 89 above) and am using that. Unfortunately HDPE does not glue well, but I am hoping that some caulking compound will work, I am trying to glue two thicknesses together. Will also tape the edges of the two pieces together.

I did manage to fit the bigger parts of the bike in the bag, but it would not fit the way the instructions said to do it. Mine is size 58 cm. I did have to pull the fork out of the frame to do it. The padded bag has an extra zipper that when you open that zipper the bag is a few inches thicker which I want to avoid. I did not have to use that expansion when I pulled the fork out of it. If the bag is thicker by a few inches I think that could alert airline staff that this is an oversize package.

In the first photo, I have some cardboard in the sides for extra stiffness, I also have a piece of white corroplast in the bottom of the bag. The wheels, frame parts (excluding fork) and handlebars are in the padded bag. The second photo is the other stuff that I would also have to add to the bag, but it would easily fit. I made no attempt at padding the parts for this dry run for packing, I wanted to see how to make the parts fit but I was not actually packing it for a trip. Thus, virtually no padding. I am not sure if I needed to pull the cassette, but I did and I probably would pull the cassette if I travel with it.

I also tried to fit it in my S&S case. But without pulling the crank, it would not work. I think I could fit it if I could pull the crank, but I do not have the tools to pull that Campy crank. I asked a bike shop what they thought it would cost to pull the crank and bottom bracket off, but they did not have the tools so they told me it would be shop time PLUS the cost of tools. I lost interest in that really fast.

jefnvk

Ugh. Good thing I already bought that 520 and have the upgrades on the way, or I'd have a $700 charge on my credit card and would be looking for a large Carradice

Crazy how that doesn't turn up in a search though. Makes me wonder what else I'm missing on ebay.

Tourist in MSN

I thought that was about the size you were interested in. And I think you were more interested in Shimano than Campy parts. But no travel bag.

Their description in text appears to be generic, example the brakes are cable but they said brakes may need bleeding. Thus, I think you have to rely on the photos for accuracy.

Mine is 28 spoke front and rear, that new one is 20 spoke (radial lacing) front and 24 rear. Not sure if that is the best idea.

That one in the damaged box, I wonder if it originated with Amazon at about the price I paid. If so, the buyer is trying to turn around and mark it up by almost 50 percent and re-sell it, but they lose on the shipping cost.

bmwt

Sorry jefnvk, for not responding quickly about the link question. The follow-up by Tourist in MSN has a link to the seller I used and I agree - the description is lacking. The generic language isn't very informative and is boiler plate to all their listings. The seller will respond and will come off the price some with an "offer". They also said the condition described was "conservative" (so likely better?). These bikes selling in the $600 to $700 range represent a great deal. Better than the wholesale price even if discounted. The bike I ordered will take a week to arrive. I had a higher spoke count wheelset in mind if I were to want to use it for travel. I firtly want a bike to keep at work for recreational riding. I landed on this discussion and ran across in my searching for general opinions about the Ritchey "Break-Away" design. My concern was that it doesn't detract from overall performance. Happily, I haven't found criticism of the ride stiffness or any other ways it might lack.

Tourist in MSN

I like the ride of the Raleigh, the Breakaway frame does not detract from the frame at all. That said, I have no racks on the bike, so I am not really doing much of a test on frame stiffness. I do not recall what I measured the downtube diameter at, but it was a bit fatter than my Velo Orange rando bike frame, so that should help stiffen it up too. I have only used a rack that clamps to the seatpost with a large rack top bag that I use as a gym bag when I go to the gym. I already posted a photo of that, above.

A side note: I noticed what might be a slight frame defect yesterday. Sent an e-mail to Raleigh, but with a holiday weekend, it will take some time to hear back from them I am sure. If they consider it a serious defect, I want to get it replaced while they still are licensed with Ritchey and have another frame they can use for a replacement.

jefnvk

Uhoh, what is it?