# 1938 Raleigh Gazelle boy racer



## Andrew Gorman (Jan 30, 2012)

A few weeks ago I went to look at a Raleigh roadster I saw on craigslist- it was only about 5 blocks from the house.  It was cheap and it followed me home.  Turned out to be a Raleigh Gazelle Safety Roadster from 1938 with a Sturmey Archer AW 3 speed.  The cranks were stripped at the pedal ends, and after an extortionate quote from the local bike shop to rethread them, I went ahead and did it myself with the Unior pedal bushing set.  It's a great tool and easy to use.  If you have stripped 9/16 threads I recommend it highly!  The handlebars were really rough on this bike, and removing the silver barn paint revealed mostly rust and peeling chrome.  I've been wanting a slack angle road bike and decided to use up what I had on hand.  This was a perfect excuse to get a pair of SOMA Lauterwasser bars! Other than a general tune up and clean up all I had to do was make the existing rod brakes work with cables from the drop bars.  That was lot easier than I expected.  The previous owner kept the dried out and un-useable Brooks saddle (Them things is worth MONEY he sez...) so I put on a B-66 I've been curating for at least 24 years.  Took it for a spin yesterday and it works pretty well,  I still need to do some  adjustments on the brakes but I can see why sportier bikes in the 1930's used calipers.  I've been having fun with this one.


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## Zephyr (Jan 30, 2012)

Looks very nice! Looks new.


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## hatfulofhollow (Jan 30, 2012)

Wow, nice build!


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## Andrew Gorman (Jan 30, 2012)

The paint Raleigh used at this time was pretty amazing- I think it was asphalt based and baked on.  It was very dull and the pinstripes were only ghosts.  A good rubdown with brasso brought it back to a high shine.    I re-did the pinstripes with the trusty Beugler striper.  I haven't even waxed it yet.


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## Wcben (Jan 30, 2012)

Beautiful bike, I've always liked Raleighs.


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