AZORCH

Hello, all - I've been absent for quite a while. BUT, I was gifted this Raleigh Lenton Sports yesterday and I'm not familiar with this rather crusty example. First off, I'm well aware it's not one of Peter Kohler's sought after 531 frames. This one is a five speed with a Huret Allvit rear derailleur and is gas pipe tubing. The lugs are basic and thick. 26 x 1 3/8 tires that are, in a word, original. The guy that gave it to me buys storage bins, found this in it and tells the story that it was mint when he got it last fall. Then he left it outside because his storage is full, and the B15 saddle is absolute toast now. He apparently tried to ride it and the rear tire blew. (Imagine that!) So, satisfy my curiosity, folks. Tell me where this bike fits in, and approximate date. I'm guessing early to mid-60's, and I've found a couple of photos that match - but nothing in the catalogs.








Thanks for your insights, all.

USAZorro

I've been told by people I consider more knowledgeable than I that mine is both a 1962 and a 1967 - so I'm little help for you here. I had persuaded Randyjawa to sell it to me despite the frame being a bit less than perfect due to impact.

I'm still debating between it becoming a 5-speed or a 10-speed.

thumpism 

Shocking to see that much rust develop over a winter. I got an old Raleigh back after years outside and it did not look worse than that.

AZORCH

Well, I only have the previous guy's concept of what constitutes "mint."

Road Fan

Yeah, I assume his idea of "mint" was kinda aspirational!

I've read a lot of Peter Kohler's stuff trying to understand where my 1952 Rudge Aero Special stands, and I have never seen a "Peter Kohler Pick-list." What I mainly found was a site ("On The Drops") belonging to Peter, containing a large number of blogs he wrote for Sheldon Brown's site and I think for Vintage Cycle Society in UK. Each one covered one model or a group of models. I don't know if all models were covered. All of the blogs contained magazine reviews for high end and lower end bikes. I have never seen a list of Peter's preferences. I know he has his own bike collection but I don't know what it contains.

I've just been looking through On The Drops and there were Sports models sold for many years. I can't tell for sure what yours is, but quite a few had frames made of Reynolds 531 tubing, but gauges and butting profiles are not discussed. The words used by Raleigh to describe the frames of most of the Sports models, my Rudge Aero Special from 1952, and it's fraternal twin the Raleigh Super Lenton, were "Reynolds 531 tubing, without the word "butted." So I assume none of these have double-butted tubing. A little higher model, made to order, was the Raleigh Record Ace, and it is claimed to use double butted tubing.

I would put your frame in the top class of Raleigh production bikes from that era. Perhaps an analog for the late 1960s is the Raleigh Competition from 1969, There's no reason not to refurbish the bike.

Would you tell us what the seatpost diameter is? I suspect these are pretty light tubing even if not butted, and not gaspipe.

nlerner

In Peter Kohler's article on the Raleigh Lenton's, he offers this line near the end: "It should also be noted the name "Lenton Sports" was revived briefly c. 1962-3 for a 2030 tubed budget machine sold in the United States under the Robin Hood brand." I had one of those Robin Hood frames some time back, and the markings were very similar to your Lenton Sports:

USAZorro

I've had the pleasure to meet Peter and go on a few group rides that he was also on. I don't think his intent was to cover every model of Raleigh, but rather to share what he came across while pursuing his interests.

I am guessing that I have the same model as the author - though in my own (quite civilized) size. The diameter of the seatpin in mine is 25.4 - which makes it well-decorated gaspipe.

Road Fan

I'm pretty sure you have a preliminary issue which is more challenging than choice of gearing. On my 1952 frame the BB threading is the old Raleigh standard, not compatible with the modern BB threading formats. There are a few cures available. First, it can be forced, but I don't call this a cure. The most versatile one is to have a good shop re-tap the shell to fit common modern BBs and then you can use any chainset style on it, except the original cotter-pin designs. But that's not what I did. When I overhauled the BB I noticed the existing cups are in very good condition. Using the Sutherland's 5th edition I found that a TA 314 BB spindle is a fit-replacement for the original Raleigh Industries spindle. I happened to have that spindle and I happened to have a TA 5-pin chainset which fits the spindle. So I "weight-weenied" the Rudge by installing an alloy chainset! There are a lot of old spindles which will also serve as a good replacement, so I'm not worried about longevity of the solution.

So if you are going to solve the problem with a Sturmey 3 to 5 speed, or a modern 8-speed, you can use a front single chainset like one made for track, or with a wider spindle put on a double or a triple on the crank and set up for a 5 or 7-speed rear cassette or freewheel, with an appropriate choice of rear hub, IGH or cassette. Another reason I hesitated about this approach is that I did not see what available rear derailleur I had to solve the problem. Certainly not much from the English world, and no Gran Turismo or extra DuoPar on hand - my concept was this build is supposed to be cheap!

USAZorro

Having dealt with Raleighs for some time, I have made it a habit to save headset and bottom bracket parts. The cups and threading are no issue whatsoever. I did manage to select a spindle that the crank arms won't fit over, but I have replacements on hand, and I'll be circling back to wrap this up soon - after I get the Motobecane Grand Touring in proper shape (have to sort out a FD issue on that). I've selected a Huret FD and an almost NOS Simplex RD. I'm anticipating this will proceed quickly once it regains a spot on the workstand.

Road Fan

Sounds good to me!

AZORCH

That could be the ticket in my case. I think I see the remains of a 2030 waterslide decal on the top tube near the seat cluster.

Incidentally, the tires are the old obsolete 597 ISO.

DeathForks

I'll have to post a few pictures of mine, which has the weird 2 sprockets on the 3 speed hub thingy going on.

PhilFo 

The 1948-51 Clubman from Raleigh, Rudge and Humber all have 1" seatposts and they are definitely not gas pipe.

SirMike1983 

Neal is correct. The gold bike in the original post is a later use of the Lenton model name, different from the earlier 531 Lenton or the Clubman series.

That is not to say it is a bad bike - it should clean up nicely and last a long time if reasonably maintained. If weight is an issue, a set of wheels with aluminum rims will help in that regard.