I'll be honest, this post is finally coming about because not only have I done up the Raleigh Misty, but I'm selling her on eBay. Read on for a full drawn out year of messinaboutin', and then bid like it's Monopoly money.
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| All this could be yours! |
The years have taken their toll on Misty. The years and the rust. I don't know what leaky garage this bike came from, but it sure hadn't aged well. Originally it seems it started out life a 5-speed town bike with a stem mounted shifter. Cottered cranks with a freewheel at the back, a notable feature was the old-style rear derailleur, which instead of mounting to a derailleur hanger as we see today, it mounted inside the horizontal dropout, behind the nutted axle of the rear wheel (Shimano still make the Tourney, a version which still uses it's own hanger to mount to standard horizontal dropouts).
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| The Raleigh Misty - Where even the rust is rusty |
The bike came with all the usual old-style town bike accessories (dynamo lights; mudguards; pannier rack) but most of it was rusted or cracked to the point it wasn't worth saving (I'm still in two minds as to whether I should mod the bullet lights to take an LED lamp, although there's not a spot of chrome left on either... the rust would have to be a feature!).
The wheels too were in a bad way; the steel rims were more rustpit than chrome, and the tyres felt like cardboard. The alloy components were dirty, but nothing a lot of steel wool, WD40, beer and patience wouldn't fix.
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| This is the same mudguard I had shotblasted along with Joonya; although I considered waxing it up and leaving it on the Misty, it looked dull and out of place against the chrome cranks and handlebars |
So all in all, the bike was a rusty heap of shit. Harry, the mate who had made light work of stripping down the Commodore, seemed dismayed that I wanted to carry on with the task of doing it up; especially when I turned down his suggested alternative of throwing the bike around the garden for fun.
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| Surface rust galore |
So, to work I went stripping the bike down. To be fair, I was surprised at how not-grimy this bike was. Don't get me wrong it was filthy, but this was clearly a bike that was put away clean, before being waterboarded for decades.
The corrosion made up for the grime though, as did the billion dead spider eggs waiting for me in the handlebars. As I worked my way through every sheared bolt head and rounded nut (it seems age makes for a great threadlock), I finally ended up with three piles; "Shit to clean and keep on the bike", "Shit to clean and keep in the spares box", and "Shit to bin".
Shit to clean and keep on the bike:
- Frame with cottered crankset and bottom bracket still attached (oh, we'll get to that in a later post)
- Raleigh-Weinmann 610 and 750 centre pull brakes
- Weinmann brake levers
- Sturmey Archer front hub
- Sturmey Archer rear freewheel hub
- Headset
- Chaincover
- Pedals
- Bullet lights
- Raleigh 60mm quill stem
- Black plastic Brooks saddle
- Seat post
- Handlebars
- Shimano 5-speed freewheel
- Pannier rack
- Kickstand
- Tyres (dry as balls)
- Inner Tubes (dry as balls)
- Rims (rusty as balls)
- Spokes (corroded as balls)
- Suntour rear derraileur (stiff and corroded as balls)
- All the cables (rotten as balls)
- Chain (stiff and rusty as balls)
- Mudgaurds (cracked as balls)
- Plastic stem mounted gear shifter (snapped as balls)
- Grips (rubbish as balls)
- Dynamo (not working as balls)
The crankset and bottom bracket were eventually removed (like I said; later post), so I sent the frame off to be powdercoated at Armourtex Cycles in Hackney. I wanted this to be a really muted bike - completely the opposite of the workhorse death machine that is Mighty Martha II - so I decided on RAL 6019 Pastel Green. Completed with some cream Schwalbe tyres and a brown saddle, I think Misty carries it off perfectly, like a bike made of ice cream.
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| Like a mint neapolitan |
I wasn't fond of the original handlebars (they looked and felt uncomfortable, in some odd limbo between flat bars and what they are now), so changed up to a pair of Humpert Stuttgarters, which sweep back more with a little bit of rise.
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| Humpert Stuttgarters, bought from Practical Cycles via eBay |
I wanted to keep the quill stem angle the same for a 'gull wing effect', but it needed to be longer (80mm); not only does it look better but it makes for less twitchy steering.
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| System EX 80mm stem |
The brake levers cleaned up beautifully, and were laced up with Jagwire brake cables, with a 'braided silver' coloured outer sleeve.
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| Original Weinmann levers |
I really wanted some yellow grips that didn't look overly modern, so 'made' some short grips out of a roll of handlebar tape.
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| The chrome on the headset's a little pitted, but the alloy brakes cleaned up grand |
As usual, the Weinmann brakes also cleaned up great. I bought new yokes and straddles as the originals were looking pretty tired. The original brake blocks were thrown out; I used the ones that came with Mighty Martha II's Avid V-Brakes.
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| Should've just mounted two sets of rear brake |
Because of the mixte frame's shape, there are two places to mount the rear brake. Originally the highest mount would have conflicted with the pannier rack, and without the rack the pannier mounts are left on show and are a little ugly. The lower mount however, comes with a more natural feeling way to route the rear brake cable. Plus, it seems more novel to have the brake yoke straddle the seat tube.
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| Brown vinyl saddle, again from eBay |
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| Make sure the freewheel is this way around, or there'll be tears! |
The 17t single speed freewheel came from good old eBay (buyer beware: I almost learnt the hard way that the manufacturer's stamp is on the opposite side to the removal splines; if the freewheel was screwed on with the manufacturer's stamp facing outward (as is usual), the splines would be on the inside, and thus pointless. I didn't fall for this as I do well smart).
The chain is originally the 7 speed chain from Mighty Martha II, back before she was mighty. I know it's not 'proper' to have a 7 speed chain on a single speed, but Misty's original chain wasn't up to much in the way of moving, and I didn't want to spend even more on this build when there was a perfectly good chain in the spares box.
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| Misty's crankset |
The original cottered crankset was cleaned up, with only a couple of pitting marks on the crank arm. Even if they weren't rusty as hell, the chunky rubber pedals didn't go with this Misty reborn, so some alloy quill pedals were sourced from eBay.
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| Sturmey Archer freewheel hub |
As for the wheelset, I kept the Sturmey Archer hubs, and laced them into some 30mm deep 700c rims. The rest of the bike was a traditonal, vintage bike rebuild; the 43mm deep Swift Arriv rims
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| As much rim as there is tyre |
The rims are wrapped in cream 700c x 32mm Schwalbe Delta Cruisers. I'll be honest, if this was to a budget, I couldn't have used these tyres, but then they look lovely and I'm a pushover...
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| The wheels were laced with stainless steel spokes from SpokeSave |
Half of the front bearings had to be replaced; the balls were rusted on one side, presumably because it wasn't tightened up properly. This is understandable as the cone/axle situation on both hubs is a weird one; the fixed cone side of the axle doesn't have spanner markings, and therefore can't be tightened unless you use mole-grips or a vice. Pretty annoying to come across, and has never rolled right compared to standard hubs it has to be said. It's not that it's not a smooth roll once it's going, it's that it seems to stop rolling too early.
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| Deeeeep V's |
Saying that, once on the bike, it's a pretty smooth ride. I've only taken it out for a spin once up and down the street, but it was lovely. The gearing seems to be be perfect for the flat streets around my house, and if I had more space and less Martha, I'd keep it.
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| The loveliest town bike |
So there you have it; from rusty champagne to mint ice-cream. Like I mentioned at the start, I'm selling Misty on eBay, so you can go mad and bid on it if you like.
*Note: I had it in my head they were 30mm deep Velocity rims, but they are in fact 43mm deep "Swift Arriv" rims with the stickers removed. I bought them here.
