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Let's see some memories....! Am sure we'll have a few Choppers and Bombers (in fact, am sure that most will be Raleighs!) but my childhood favourite?
A lime green Raleigh Strika, just like this;
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See? I was rocking that triple clamp thing way before it became cool!
I ragged this thing senseless, planks and bricks as jumps, whatever I could find. I reckon this is what got me really in to riding bikes and what led me on to BMX, which in turn got me on to mountain bikes. It was all good!
apart from the grips. They were shocking!
My first! not mine, but it looked like this...
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have a video of my first ever ride without stabilizers somewhere
I had the strika's little brother, the boxer. This bad boy
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Great little bike until i snapped the forks popping wheelies and jumping it over brick and wood plank jumps in the back lane.
great thread,
I had that same colour strika, a tomahawk mk11, then later BMX's but my favourite was the commando, mine was better than this one though as it actually had a camo colour scheme
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Apparently, my mum says I was overjoyed to receive a little tricycle, when I was very small. something like this. I couldn't ride it at first, but just sat on it, beaming, saying 'bike!'.
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Ah, the memories of childhood...
Had a Grifter, later. Think the little trike was probbly my 'favourite', though.
Was just about to post the commando!
Gripshift yello/blue/red.
Stop in red and you'd have to push until you found a hill to coast down and change gear again lol
Oh and the seat was the most uncomfortable thing ever!
A blue Tomahawk - (not mine and not me I'm afraid)
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and later on, a Mongoose California:
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I had a Raliegh Jeep. Sort of an early mountain bike really. wide cow-horns, 3 speed SA, rack. It was lush. Grifters were shite, a mate had one, it must have been made of solid pig iron it weigh so much
Grifters were shite
What punishment for this blasphemer, d'you reckon? Hanging? Burning alive? Public disembowelment?
They were proper [i]bastard[/i] heavy, mind...
this is the first one i had bought new for me:
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class!
why did old school bmx's have those massively laid back seatposts?
(I had a 5spd pug racer until I was old enough to buy my own mtb - how I coveted my best mates Grifter)
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The Raleigh Boxer.
If anyone knows where I could get some decals, I have a hankering to spray my 456 and sticker it up as a Boxer 🙂
and then they made them heavier by adding metal mudguards:
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Another vote for the Budgie. I was properly gutted when I broke it - aged about 17 (OK, I should haven't been riding it, but I could resist after finding it "hiding" at the back of the shed)
Curtis freestyler... pk ripper.. that mongoose looks cool too )
grifters were shite bikes echnically, one of the worst hanlding bikes ever mad, but we loved them anyway!
Raleigh Tuff Burner
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"grifters were shite bikes echnically, one of the worst hanlding bikes ever mad, but we loved them anyway! "
Have you ridden a chopper recently? I rode one auite recently and frankly I'm amazed that we survived on the roads for as long as we did.
In my case I had both the Budgie and Tomahawk then it was onto racers.
SE Racing PK Ripper
My Grifter was blue but could only find pics of a red one, did anyone else tuck the front mudgaurd under to make the tyre rubbing sound like a motorbike?!!
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Meteor-Lite freestyle frame (mine was polar white)
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Raleigh Tuff Burner
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Cant find any pics of the Ammaco Mongoose race frame I had though but God it was nice!
I had a black striker, and my dad fitted a box to the handlebar that made a motorbike noise 8)
Grifter, the original one.
Looks so small now, but class memories.
That mudflap used to bend into the tyre and sound like a motorbike, well it did when I was young!
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Image courtesy of www.bmxmuseum.com
Whatever bike I was riding was my favourite!
Grifter, loved it more than the racer (a Raleigh thing, white with red bar tape, can't remember the name) but I had to concede it was heavy. Landed wheelies/jumps so badly and frequently that the forks bent until the tyre buzzed the bottom of the headset. Still, saved folding the mudguard under to get that engine noise 😀
Happy days, oh, and Sturmy Archer 3 speed with a twist grip was awesome, much better than the downtube nonsense on the racer.
I also had a lime green Raleigh Strika. Anyone from Huddersfield here? I used to ride it repeatdly down Woodhouse Hill in Fartown (before they had the traffic calming measures in place of course). Forgot all about it then recently I drove up, its a second gear climb and about 3/4m long. ****. I must have been 6yrs old doing that. ****!!!!
was the 'boxer' not the mini grifter?
grifter would be my choice, although mine had foamworm in the saddle!
Hora, my lime green Strika was oop North as well, as I was in Yorkshire at the time!
Got to be my first bike which was a chippy:
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Had one in yellow...
****, I had a yellow Chippy too!!!! never knew it was a Raleigh, then I had a red BoBo whatever that was?
the Grifter is Marmite's pic looks tops, i'd ride one now.
Funny, I bet the bikes are tiny compared to us now. I remember mine being slightly too big at the time.
A year or so back I came across my old Cub uniform. I couldnt even get my arm through one of the shorts legs let alone a leg now!
I remember the Grifter having a gripshift? Plus compared to my strika it was smoother and alot heavier!
Another vote for the Strika here, my favourite because I could be a more effective tomboy with it than my old Raleigh girls bike. I made cardboard thingies that dragged on the spokes as the wheels turned and made a cool noise...
Must dig out an old photo.. I [i]wished[/i] for a branded bike like a Raleigh! I only ever had cheapos and my dad went to great lengths to make them as Grifter or Chopper like as possible.
Cowhorn bars and a banana seat I recall being added to one of my bikes.
My fondestly remembered bike was a chrome framed road bike that I used to ride to my girlfriend's house on every day. I think I was 14/15. Wore through the crotch on my jeans on the saddle.
Strika for me too
Me dabbing on a gnarly bit of tarmac singletrack near home some time in the early 80s
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lead to this beautiful chrome burner and the only full face I'll ever own.
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Think my first bike might have been a fixie though. Rod brakes too.
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Thought I'd post a pic of my fist real road bike, a Raleigh Team Cadet, from about 1986, I rode this everywhere one summer.
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Cannot find any pics, probably due to it being cheap, but boy did I have fun on mine 😉
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Before this, I had a Raleigh Bomber, showing my age now 😉
I have no idea how I survived riding that with monkey bars fitted, on the road 😉
I've found Boxer stickers on eBay 🙂
My first was a 2nd hand thing called a Pavemaster. Cr@p, but fine for buzzing about on Somerset lanes. First proper bike was a Grifter XL, just like the black one a few posts back.
Yes, it did have grip shift, but only two of the three gears were ever available at any one time. I also bent my forks doing 'Phantom Riders' (pedal along as fast as possible, jump off, and watch your steed being ridden by a phantom - you could get it to go a good hundred yards by itself downhill!).
I had a beautiful Kilp(scottish handbuilt frame) roadbike with full campag groupset when I was about 15. Sadly stolen. The nicest bike I have ever owned.
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Red Tomahawk, just like this one!
Still remember blasting down our hill with my mate in chuckie mode, both no handed,
all going well till we hit the bump in the road and both went flying, how we laughed/Cried!!
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Raleigh Chopper, purple 5 speed, had two gear levers... I was da man when i was 9!
loved my tomahawk, mine had mag wheels like this one but mine was gold
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had a skyway tuff 2 burner aswell but when things started getting serious i got one of these, a DP Firebird Delta but my kit was red. If only my dad hadn't tipped it when i went to uni, worth a mint today
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Well it had to come didn't it?
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At the time, you felt this bike was capable of marvellous stunts, cos it kinda just looked like it should be. Ermmmm, it wasn't. It was impractical, slow, drove off road like a pig, flew like a brick and was dangerous. Good for ramming things and ferrying multiple mates around on though.
I loved my chopper mk 2 to bits
The first bike I had was a really old solid tyred effort but I did do jumps on it as some of the older kids built jumps. Next I had a 'Stambecco?' or something like that, again with solid tyres and a rack at the back which formed part of the frame. I cut the tyres off that and rode the rims which was like riding on ice.
The bike I learnt to 'trick' on was a Raleigh Striker, the silver one (most green ones had pedal back brakes IIRC). Followed by a Grifter which I mastered wheelies on. The next was Puch BMX and then a Mongoose 'wire wheel' BMX. Fond memories of all those bikes.
I was in my mid twenties before I got my first Raleigh Chopper. For a time I had a mk1 and mkII - great bikes for riding around town p*ssed up after a few beers.