My 1966 DL-1 Tourist

[Doohickie]

I think I asked for a Classic Bikes subforum and now I have it, so here goes.

I bought the bike I call The Old Gentleman in September 2008. It was a garage sale situation, and neither of us knew anything about the bike. She was willing to take $25 but I actually gave her $30, since the money was going to our church for its annual garage sale. It had two flat tires, rusty chrome everywhere, an old, cracked, leather saddle, some wires hanging limply that went from a generator to a headlight, a 3-speed hub and some weird looking, funky brakes.

I took some pictures that first night. Not much to look at- an old, worn-out saddle, a saddle bag with broken straps, the wires hanging around...



Note the old headlight...



...and original frame pump.



Wait a minute... what's going on with those brakes?



I came to learn that this bike as "roller lever" or "rod" brakes. Instead of a cable, they have a hard linkage all the way back. Instead of squeezing the rim like caliper brakes do, they are pulled up into the inside of the rim. This was done to make the brakes more rugged for bikes intended for the English countryside.

Still, even that night, The Old Gentleman had a stately profile



There is a City of Houston registration sticker on the bike from 1975, so I knew it wa's at least that old. I learned that the Sturmey Archer 3-speed hub has a date code on it, and the one on this bike is 65 12, which means it was made in December, 1965. Based on that, I'm calling this a 1966 model.

I cleaned The Old Gentleman up a bit- shined up the chrome, waxed the frame and lubed the working bits. I also did some basic maintenance- reconditioned the Brooks saddle, replaced the shifter cable which was kinked, and replaced the saddle bag with a NOS bag of the same style. Then I added some Wald baskets front and back, and now The Old Gentleman is ready for duty as a grocery getter and back-up commuting bike.













Just this past Friday, I rode the bike to work and took a few pictures. The first one is me on the bike. It came from two pictures crudely pasted together.







Note the new Schwalbe Delta Cruiser tires.

I took it over to a tavern I like for lunch.



It was after the lunch rush, so they let me bring it in and put it in the corner.



Cheers!

[brian_fick]

hi my name is brian fick and i live in madison wisconsin. i am buying a Raleigh Classic DL Tourist from a used bicycle shop today. the serial # is NH 9002247. Do you know what years the Classic Tourist was made? Just in the 60's? where specifially did you find the "12,65".. numbers... was it on the rim of the wheel.

thanks
B

[hartleymartin]

According to some research I have been doing the DL-1's design originates from a 1913 military order for bicycles. Pre-WW2 most bicycles shared features of the DL-1, such as the rod-operated brakes. The earliest Raleigh catalogue I have seen dates from 1939 and it was named the Raleigh Tourist then and had a full chaincase. It was last in commercial production for the catalogue year 1985, and the basic design hadn't changed over that time. Perhaps the biggest single change was the move away from the full chain-case to a hockey-stick style chain-guard. Apparently this was introduced to bring the total weight of the bicycle under 40 lbs so that they wouldn't be charged extra tariffs to export them to America.

So, they were in production as late as 1985. They are still being made now in India using what I believe is the original tooling, but under another company name - I think Eastwood or something like that.

This is the dream bicycle I want to add to my small collection.

[chris667]

Very, very nice.
It's quite late for a bike to have proper 30/42 spoking on the wheels, which is good. Later ones had "continental" 36/36 spoking on front and rear wheels, so although it was cheaper to make, the back wheel wasn't strong enough and the front was heavier than necessary.
I have a 1948 ladies Superbe, and a 1949 Clubman. It's good to see another Raleigh in such good health, trundling out the decades.
They're great, aren't they? Such attention to detail. Even the most expensive modern utility bikes are at best rather inferior copies of these.

[Doohickie]

hi my name is brian fick and i live in madison wisconsin. i am buying a Raleigh Classic DL Tourist from a used bicycle shop today. the serial # is NH 9002247. Do you know what years the Classic Tourist was made? Just in the 60's? where specifially did you find the "12,65".. numbers... was it on the rim of the wheel.

thanks
B

The date code numbers are on the center hub of the rear wheel, in between the two rows of spokes. Here is some information about the Sturmey Archer AW 3-speed hub:

http://www.sheldonbrown.com/english-3.html#sturmey

Here is a link to how to decode your serial number on the frame:

http://www.sheldonbrown.com/retroraleighs/dating.html

NH9002247 doesn't seem to fit in though. It could be a serial number scheme from a non-English factory; I recently learned that Raleighs were made in Canada for the Latin American market or something like that.

[Doohickie]

Apparently this was introduced to bring the total weight of the bicycle under 40 lbs so that they wouldn't be charged extra tariffs to export them to America.

I've heard the same thing except for one point: The weight they were trying to beat was 50 pounds. My Raleigh Tourist above, equipped with baskets, weighs 51 pounds. Remove the baskets and it's more like high 40s.

[Doohickie]

This is the dream bicycle I want to add to my small collection.

I was lucky; I found out someone from my church was going to donate it to the church yard sale. I took a look at it before the sale and bought it for something like 1/10 of what it can bring on ebay. I had no idea what I was buying at the time. It was only later when I starting asking on the internet about the strange brakes that I found out this was a rather unique bike.

[Doohickie]

Very, very nice.
It's quite late for a bike to have proper 30/42 spoking on the wheels, which is good. Later ones had "continental" 36/36 spoking on front and rear wheels, so although it was cheaper to make, the back wheel wasn't strong enough and the front was heavier than necessary.

It's actually a 32/40 pattern. The normal 36+4 in the back (= 40) and 36-4 in the front (= 32).

[chris667]

Very, very nice.
It's quite late for a bike to have proper 30/42 spoking on the wheels, which is good. Later ones had "continental" 36/36 spoking on front and rear wheels, so although it was cheaper to make, the back wheel wasn't strong enough and the front was heavier than necessary.

It's actually a 32/40 pattern. The normal 36+4 in the back (= 40) and 36-4 in the front (= 32).

Late night typing . Still, a much better solution than continental spoking. I particularly love the way the spokes are usually the same length!

[Doohickie]

I thought that's what you meant.