rudypyatt

I guess the other possibility would be to get an S3X hub and run it with a freewheel. I think that hub goes low to high from 62 percent underdrive to 78 percent to 100 percent/direct top gear.

tcs

And another possibility is Sturmey's newish XRF4: an even 28% between gears, 210% total range. Dual paddle, thumb and twist shifters offered.

clubman 

If you're lucky and the town centre is 1 km from your home, a two speed Duomatic fills the gap. I 'had' drop bars, honest. (yes fender line sux)

52telecaster

very cool.

Oldairhead 

I love it when a 10 year old thread comes back to life as if it was just last week!

Imazagi

Love those builds.
I recently found a Dusika, converted to 26" wheels with a coaster brake 3-speed Sachs Torpedo. I'll have to clean and regrease the hub but it will become a light barebones city commuter.

Road Fan

I952 rudge club-style bike, 27” wheels, Al rims, AW or FM hub, 531 straight tubing, AL seatpost, stem, GB bar, TA 5-vis chainset, GB caliper brakes / levers.

Pic when I first got it:



Rudge Aero Special more or less as received.

tiger1964 

Yeah, I don't see where you're going to fit a freewheel on that, unless as an ornament.

After New Years, planning on spending much more time & $$$ on the bike collection and get a few more on-the-road; at/near top of list is the Falcon and I want what this thread describes except an IGH of more gears especially to give more ratios in mid-range. Alas, going from website to website and most IGH's are "out of stock" and have been for all of 2022.

capnjonny 

Raleigh Sport "Scorcher" w/ inverted bars and 24 tooth rear cog 31 lbs as shown

Road Fan

Bob, I don’t know what your ultimate build plan is, but my Rudge (the frame is from 1952) has some odd OLDs The rear is 114 mm across the rear dropout faces, and the front fork is about 85 or 88 mm across between the inner faces of my fork blades. Both the original Raleigh front hub and the original SA 1952 AW match their respective mounting points very well, and both appear to be the OEM parts. If one big bike company decided to make a bike like this with such small cpacings why not others?. If you have such narrow spacings, it might be best to get . It might be difficult to implement a more standard set of spacings, including any with a freewheel using more than 5 sprockets, unless the chain is very carefully draped into place, or if I take it out to be aligned front and rear.

I had originally planned my build with the original 3 speed AW hub or an FM, and a triple freewheel with a derailleur. Finally I’ve decided to go for just an IGH.

tcs

Alpha & Omega drop bar 3-speed: the Raleigh Record Ace

https://on-the-drops.blogspot.com/20...1933-1942.html

These bikes were long-distance record setters, time trial champions and ridden to wins in the rare British mass start races.

pastorbobnlnh 

52telecaster tiger1964 and Road Fan, I'm not including a freewheel in this build. My alignment is great despite the 122mm distance between the dropouts.

I'm going to give it a try with the current SA-AM medium spaced gear range and the 47T X 19T chainring and sprocket.

And BFisher thank you for noticing the crankset. It is from an early 1950s ladies Schwinn Superior. I've hung onto this crankset and its BB for 10-15 years, always not certain how I'd use it. It is a bit natty, but it will work on this build just fine!

bikamper

Seventies something Mercier with an FW modified to 3 speed fixed gear. Clobbered by a car.


1973 Super Course. What parts survived from the Mercier were hung on this.


Sixties Dunelt Fluer des Lys(spelling) AW with two rear cogs. Built it up for my SIL who decided he didn't like riding bikes.


1970 Robin Hood Lenton Sports. Owned since new but has gone through several changes. Currently has an AM with a triple Cyclo cluster.


And just to stir things up a bit. The red one is a 1954-ish Robin Hood with a manually shift Bendix 2 speed converted to 2 speed fixed gear. The bluish one is a 2007 Rivendell Bleriot with a Sram S7.

rudypyatt

So much this.

Road Fan

Hello Bob, sorry for any misunderstanding. In your post about this bike, you finished with this statement: “I had originally planned my build with the original 3 speed AW hub or an FM, and a triple freewheel with a derailleur. Finally I’ve decided to go for just an IGH.” That is what I was responding to. Yes, it does not say you plan to build with a 3 sp freewheel or any other type.

grant40

adventurepdx

Glad this thread got revived. Since this thread has started, I've had two drop-bar three speeds:
The first was a 50's Rudge that was given to me and I had fixed up. I had this for two years, from 2012 to 2014. The 21 inch frame was on the small size, if it wasn't, I would have kept this bike longer:


Then someone gave me a 23" Robin Hood frame around 2017 or so. Since I had (and still have) an upright Raleigh Superbe, I decided to build it up as a drop-bar path-racer. With the Rudge I simply flipped some North Roads, but with the Robin Hood I splurged and got a pair of Soma Lauterwassers. I rode this bike from 2018 until last year, until issues with the frame
made me scrap the bike.



Perhaps I'll build another drop bar three speed at some point, maybe with a nicer frame as the base.

Imazagi

Not a drop bar, but a converted drop bar bike. I recently barn-found this Dusika, already converted by someone to 26" wheels with a Sachs 3-speed coaster hub. I added the porteur rack and bars and some graphics and it's now a fun and aggressive city bike.

BFisher 

Well, those bars do look to have a slight bit of drop, so I say it counts. Lovely crankset, by the way.

Ged117 

This is one of those threads that I saved and come back to regularly for inspiration. Nice to see it up and about!

Here's my '51 Sun Wasp, with DB 531 tubing which originally was set up to race in continental style "massed start" events, so it came with derailleur gearing and has the braze-ons for cable routing. I got it as a frame from a BFer, and decided to run it like an early '50s club machine, with an alloy '53 SA FW hub gear. GB alloy stem, VO seat post. These Velocity rims I got essentially for free so I used them at the time, but I don't care for the look so I've managed to find a 40h 700c rim (Sun CR-16 from eBay, NOS) that I will be lacing the hub to, with a matching front rim laced to a high-flange Normandy hub from the '60s. I've since replaced the late '50s era B17 narrow saddle which was quite uncomfortable with a contemporary B17. I plan on dark blue handlebar tape for next year, the orange isn't doing it for me. Alloy crank, and chainring is a Surly steel one at 48T, and the hub has a 20T sprocket, which makes this guy perfect for our rolling hills and flattish pathways. I saved the original Bayliss-Wiley BB I had to go with a Williams crank in a drawer for "later", so I run a nice quality Tange cartridge BB. It has a fork lamp mount, so I'm going to re-wire an SA lamp set off of a 1948 Clubman and get it on the bike and use a bottle dynamo to run it with LED bulbs. I also have a set of 700c 1970s French alloy mudguards that I plan to install to spruce things up. The paint has certainly failed, but I keep the exposed steel parts nice and oiled / preserved with wax until I decide what I want to do with it.

tcs

And in 2022, driving LED lamp:

Ged117 

Heh! I have '46 and '47 dated dynohubs with the bakelite cover, along with a '62 dyno, in my stores. I run a '75 GH6 on my Triumph Sports, which works great in its role. For the Wasp, lightweight running is my target, so using the high-flange Normandy hub up front and a bottle dynamo to run the lamps saves a few pounds over a chrome steel dynohub. They are very cool and functional C&V technology, especially paired with LEDs, but they are heavy and in my experience make the front handling of a lightweight road bike feel kind of leaden.

Ged117 

How do you like the bar end SA shifter? I wish they'd made one for the four-speed hubs, though my period trigger shifter is working OK, eventually it'll wear out.

My FW is due for a service, so at some point this winter I'll give it a going-through. My original idea was to find an FM hub, but folks on here reported their being a bit more sensitive than the FW, so I found one of those instead. Is the AM as fuss-free as the AW?

tcs

BTW, those Dynohub terminals are British standard B2A 'sparkplug' threads, if anybody wants to get some brass thumb nuts for quick disconnect.



PS: Why is there so much axle showing? This was a NIB (!) 1978 Dynohub with 36 spoke holes (American, not Raleigh) and a 90mm OLD (roadster spacing). Well, no wonder it was still NIB! So I replaced the GL621A axle with a generic 3/8 x 26 one, substituting Locktite for the shoulder stop on the Sturmey part.

tcs

It's great, with a nice 'click' action and no falsies, although if anyone is going for period aesthetics they should stick with the trigger.