Is my Raleigh Grifter Mk2 in Blue worth more than £30?

[ffoxy99]

In my quest for some Raleigh Bomber parts I ended up getting a job lot of bikes for £50.

One of them is a Mk2 Prismatic.

It was quite dirty with flat tyres and some broken front spokes and, as I want rid of all the bikes except the Bomber(s), I agreed to sell it to a close friend for £30.

I promised not to clean it up for him as he wants a 'project' so I just pumped up the tyres and checked the brakes etc.

Am thinking now it's a lot better than at first glance. Most obvious issues are the missing rear guard, damaged chainwheel cover and damaged seat but there is a spare (Silver/grey painted!?) Mk1 mudguard in with the stuff I bought































looks like an '81 model



longer mudguard looks like Mk1 rear



dubious welded repairs to short one

[hazchoppers]

That would clean up so well.. Then it'd be worth more! But not that much more

[gingerrich76]

Worth it. Not sure bout the mudguards tho...

[hazchoppers]

Yes those guards don't look right, the front one looks extended at the front and the other just looks like nothing lol

[4737carling]

£30 is about right for a bike in that condition. The first thing you notice about the guards is there's no holes for the flares to fit into. One of them has been cut down and some horrible welding done! That will make a nice project with excellent before and after pics.

[ffoxy99]

Interesting stuff guys.

I'd have never considered them being Bomber guards but it kinda makes sense as I got the parts with two Bombers.

The short guard (with the bad repairs) looked nothing like the Grifter ones on Ebay so I was a bit confused.

Also, about the holes for the flaps. I did notice that and considered that a good welder had filled them with weld and painted over his work but, looking at the other repairs, this was pretty unlikey

I actually had one the same as this when I was 12 and kept it immaculate. I took it down the dump when I was about 22 (in 2002)as I thought no-one would ever want it as BMX's were the way forward.

Here I am another 20 years later back to where I started

The only thing I noticed different on this one is the twistgrip doesn't have the red/yellow/blue indicator on it that mine did. I used to like seeing the yellow square appear which it seldom did as my gears were never adjusted properly, despite my big bro's best efforts. The set-up seems pretty simple now but back in the day was beyond me.

I read a bit about the different twistgrips online and it seems the type with no indicator was a later improvement as something in the old ones used to move around. I vaguely remember this

Strange thing is this bike is older than my original '82 one was iirc

[gingerrich76]

Familiar story :-) mine went down to the tip too... my dad cut them in half as well :-D

[4737carling]

Did you say your twistgrip hasn't got the colour indicator? A lot of the time the colours simply wore off! Airfix paint is perfect for replacing the colours. The later ones with the very small window were off the supers, Is yours the long window or short? they only move if you don't do them up properly!

[ffoxy99]

I'll need to have a better look carling.

It would be strange if it had no window at all right enough. How would the kids now what gear they were in.....

I'm itching to get in about it mechanically altho I've promised my friend who bought it that I won't clean it up before he sees it. He won't know I've had the twistgrip apart

[gingerrich76]

Wouldn't take the twist grip apart... its a bugger to put back together. . Undo a little and twist :-)

[4737carling]

They are tricky to put back together but you don't have a choice when you need to re-grease the ball bearing! Sometimes the metal sleeve slips round and you can't see the window anymore. I would be itching to clean the bike up!!

[raleighdaz]

I would clean half of it lol

[ffoxy99]

Well. I took it apart tonight and unsurprisingly it does have a window and the red/yellow/blue indicators. I'll try to find a link to the thing I saw online saying later Grifters didn't have this. I'm guessing the author just saw several that had turned inside and assumed it was a new feature.

The only colour left was the yellow. For some reason the blue & red painted bits have vanished but it wouldn't be hard to replicate them with some Humbrol.

It went back together fine and I kept the cleaning down to the minimum. Just wire brushed the casings inside and out to get rid of the oxidation and greased it all with some white lithium grease.



what gear am I in!?









iirc the window should sit around here

[4737carling]

Told you in just spun round!!! All grifter's had some sort of indication to what gear you were in! The screws and grip will clean up a treat, the before and after pics will be good with this bike.

[ffoxy99]

Well. I ended up tinkering more with the Grifter tonight.

I was working on my Bomber which suffered a snapped toggle chain and I thought it might be to do with an apparently non-standard RHS window-nut so I borrowed the pukka Sturmey Archer one from the Grifter.

Whilst doing so I tried to take the LHS 'R' nut off too and it wouldn't budge. I fact when I put a bit more pressure on the spanner the slotted washers on both ends of the axle actually cracked!

Next thing I knew the wheel was out for inspection and even removing the R decal to put Plus Gas down the thread then holding the RHS in a vice and getting a spanner on the LHS nut wouldn't budge it.

I've removed countless rusted fastners over the years but this had me puzzled as there's no heavy rust visible like on somethings - underneath a car for example.












Since access was good I decided rather than use any more force it would be better to just file one side of the bolt off. It's quite handy the the axle has flats on it as you can file a lot of the nut off without damaging the axle.



There was also a cracked thin nut on the RHS, outside of a 1/8" spacing washer. I'm pretty sure you don't meed a locknut on the RHS as it has the lock washer on top of the cone so God knows what it was doing there.


not sure how this nut got split or why it was ever there

One the nut was filed it came off quite easily and there were no stripped threads on the axle.

I really should leave this alone or my pal will learn nothing but 'watch this space' as they say.