I Feel Seen

For males in the 45-60 age demographic in the UK, at least 15% of those with 'bad knees' can attribute their ailment solely to the faulty gears fitted on Raleigh Grifter bikes of the late 20th century.

— Anon Opin? (@anon_opin) May 10, 2024

I didn’t have a grifter. My knees are fine(ish) ergo.

Meh…

Hate to think what problems Raleigh Chopper riders are suffering with.

With that plum bruiser shifter 🙂

Always wanted a Grifter, had the Burner which if I’m remembering correctly was the cheap man’s version.
Had one knee OP already, the other is on the road out.

Burner was post grifter. It was Raleigh’s bmx. Grifter was a motorbike wannabe with twist grip shifting with dodgy slip gear. I was a chopper man before the burner phase. Tomahawk prior to the chopper which was a mini chopper with no gears. Chopper was like an suv for kids. Could carry 4 kids comfortably!

I had an ancient Coventry Eagle with Sturmey Archer 3 speed, large adult size, when I was nine. It was huge! I don’t have any knee problems so the OP may be correct.

My main memory of my Grifter looking back is that im sure it was made from a neutron star.

‘Neutron star’
Amazing, considering the forks were made of cheese.

Never had a Grifter but my memory of shonky Sturmey Archer hub gears has nothing to do with knees.  Heaving on the bars to get up a steep hill and having the gears slip causing a hefty blow to the bollocks on the top tube, a pedal being raked up at least one calf and maybe a bit of face into the stem action too if you were trying hard enough, yes.  Knees not so much

Many miles on a Chopper. Knees fine, but nuts not (but that was something else).

My grifter went through phases of having three, one, or no gears at all. No gears usually happened during the summer traffic light races after school, when the damn thing would give under maximum effort and dump me unceremoniously on the top tube, to be followed by about 10 minutes of writhing around on the ground. I would sometimes then have it jammed on 2nd by tying the gear selector thing at the hub back to the frame, or just ride it everywhere in third all the time.

I think this is why I have a predeliction for ss ht these days. Knees seem fine so far.

Did anyone use any gears apart from green (easy) on the grifter? I could just about use yellow on the flat. We would ram a spoke in the hub and somehow lock the grifter in green.

Someone posted a table of the Raleigh bikes weights a few years back. I think the grifter was over 30lbs and the bomber wasn’t far behind! 🤣

I had a Raleigh Strika. Single speed 😎

Neutron star’
Amazing, considering the forks were made of cheese.

I did some pretty stupid stuff on my grifter but never had a problem with the forks.

I had a Raleigh Commando with hub gears. My knees are fine but it damaged any sucess with the ladies

I wanted a Grifter but also ended up with a Commando. God know how many miles i did on the thing over the years I had it. Didn’t give a **** about frame geometry, tyre pressures or shit like that I just rode it with a pin in the silly hub gear chain so it was constantly stuck in second.

I had a grifter, not a light bike.
Mine was ok, the gears worked fine when they were correctly set up.
But the forks bent back on mine, under normal riding, I never did jumps or stuff like that.
A neighbour had a chopper with a grifter front end, forks wheel bars.
It did actually look good tbf.

Be safe, be seen

that saddle! like sitting on a razor blade….