Ye Olde Favorite the Raleigh Twenty

Now that I have one I'm cosidering doing a little hopping up. Although I'd
love to do something radical al' la Sheldon Brown. I'm thinking something
along a "product improved" Raliegh Twenty and keep it a workhorse bike as
the Raleigh engineers had intended her to be.

Specifically I was thinking lighter rims, Shimano Nexus seven speed hub, and
dispensing with the front Dynohub entirely. As well as racks front and rear
for hauling groceries or other cargo; however, after looking at some of the
other Twenty's on E-bay and studing the racks available from the large mail
order houses I'm wondering how would I go about putting racks on it. The
racks I've seen attached to other twenties on E-bay look like they were
specially designed for the twenty (and lets face it if they were it means
they have been out of production at least 25 years.).

Starting with the racks are there any suggestions as to where to find racks
that would work? Anyone still making racks that would mount to the Raliegh
20 frame and front fork?



As for the later phases of the project the improvement of the powertrain
who sells Nexus Hubs and how much would a package of the the Nexus hub, a
fron't hub, a set of good alloy 20 X 1.75 rims be with enough spokes to
build up the new wheels? A partial reason for swapping out the hubs is that
the Sturmey Archer 3 speed hub has something wrong with one of it's speeds
(doesn't engauge) and although I'd love to get the dynohub working my twenty
came without the front light and based on past discussions on here the
dynohub light isn't much of a light to begin with so I rather save a pound
or two and run a conventional front hub and do lights another way.

Sheldon Brown wrote:

Getting Dynohubs to work well with small wheels is just about
impossible, nobody makes a suitable bulb for that application. I used
to
have a Moulton with a Dynohub, and every bulb I tried either gave a
dim
yellow glow, or burned out on the first downhill.


A potential option for this setup (expensive, but may be worth it) is a
Schmidts hub, built specifically for 20" wheels:
http://www.peterwhitecycles.com/Schmidt-Lumotec.asp

I'd love to build one into a hot rodded Raleigh Twenty- once I win the
lottery, that is.

Jeff

John L. Lucci wrote:
Now that I have one I'm cosidering doing a little hopping up. Although I'd
love to do something radical al' la Sheldon Brown. I'm thinking something
along a "product improved" Raliegh Twenty and keep it a workhorse bike as
the Raleigh engineers had intended her to be.

Specifically I was thinking lighter rims, Shimano Nexus seven speed hub, and
dispensing with the front Dynohub entirely. As well as racks front and rear
for hauling groceries or other cargo; however, after looking at some of the
other Twenty's on E-bay and studing the racks available from the large mail
order houses I'm wondering how would I go about putting racks on it. The
racks I've seen attached to other twenties on E-bay look like they were
specially designed for the twenty (and lets face it if they were it means
they have been out of production at least 25 years.).

Starting with the racks are there any suggestions as to where to find racks
that would work? Anyone still making racks that would mount to the Raliegh
20 frame and front fork?

As for the later phases of the project the improvement of the powertrain
who sells Nexus Hubs and how much would a package of the the Nexus hub, a
fron't hub, a set of good alloy 20 X 1.75 rims be with enough spokes to
build up the new wheels? A partial reason for swapping out the hubs is that
the Sturmey Archer 3 speed hub has something wrong with one of it's speeds
(doesn't engauge) and although I'd love to get the dynohub working my twenty
came without the front light and based on past discussions on here the
dynohub light isn't much of a light to begin with so I rather save a pound
or two and run a conventional front hub and do lights another way.


While you consider all those options, what's the symptom
exactly on your AW (AWC?) hub? Perhaps we can advise you
such that you can ride it while arranging the modifications.

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

Sheldon Brown wrote:


Probably the best option is a seatpost mount rack. There are lots of
those out there.

See:
http://harriscyclery.net/site/page.cfm?PageID=49&Category=86&Brands=All&type=T



Hi Sheldon,

Your link to the seat post racks sounded like just the think for
my little SpeedPro from Dahon. I was very interested in this rack
from Delta:

http://harriscyclery.net/site/page.c...=49&SKU=RK7506

It's carrying capacity is amazing. I can hardly wait to haul all
that stuff on the little dahon folder. Does it also have a class
III receiver hitch so I can tow my airstream trailer? That would
save me a fortune in gas bills, insurance and payments on a Yukon
or big 3500 van.

thanks man,

Randy "towing capacity" Gore

:-)