Restoring This Abandoned Vintage Raleigh! 1981 Rebuild! Service, Hub & Bearing transformation ASMR! 

I am the proud owner of this beauty. The workmanship is top quality. The ride is sublime and I am looking forward to clocking up some miles on it. Thank you bikespeeds 👌

I really like it when you do old bikes like this one. So much more fun to watch than modern bikes and gear. I really think this is my favorite one you've done. Absolute beauty!

I had a winner in the late 1980s, so happy to see one being restored. Good little bikes, never going to win a tour stage, but fun to ride. Brilliant to watch how detailed you get, replacing caged bearings with loose, then greasing with different lubes before reassembly, great work

In my opinion, this is one of the best projects you have done. The reason is that you restored all parts and reused them.

Now at the age of 63, I look back at this era and use to love tinkering with my chopper bike at which I got for my 10th birthday and even now, when I see one riding around, I just stop and grin for a very long long time, because it's the memories of our childhood as well when we were allowed to go out in the morning just riding absolutely anywhere and not carefully laying my bike down worrying about scratching it or damaging the Sturmey Archer hub chain and adjuster, but just throwing it on the floor as we scrambled up a tree. Now of course, times have changed and my £5,500 carbon Revolt only gets lowered if there's a carpet near by lol. Even so back then, me and my mates would sit with our bikes cleaning and polishing them, such fond priceless memories and watching these videos takes me years back... thank you millions for those great memories

The consistency of this excellent content is unmatched by other bike restoration channels

These older bike restorations are superb to watch, almost like therapy. Your care and enthusiasm applied to making something look like new is infectious and inspiring. I love the old technology as well, not a hydraulic disk brake or indexed gear in sight. In our modern throw away age, this is great for the planet as well. This old Raleigh is probably one of your best projects, great stuff.

This is art at its finest

Great love for an old bike! Good for at least another 40 years

I love when you restore these vintage bikes! They are a treasure after your job!

The transformation is amazing and what a treat to see an old bike like that get a completely new lease of life. I grew up with this type/era of bikes myself but have embraced the development and I have carbon frame, hydraulic disc brakes, and Di2 shifting today, and I love it, but I would still love to have a go on an old bike like this just for the sake of that trip down memory lane. Beautiful work.

Incredible restoration by Bikespeeds. The sound of the rear wheel is magic, and the motion on the bottom bracket is stunning. The older bikes really do clean up better than any modern bike on the road. This bikes needs to be ridden for many, many years. Raleigh makes a wonderful bike. Thanks Lee, and thumbs up to Simon for another beautiful edit. This video is terrific.

Another amazing job, love the older bike restoration videos

I’ve commented on the old bikes before, the reason they come out really nice is because the components were built up to a standard not down to a price

Please do a 90s mountain bike next

I thoroughly enjoyed this restoration and will no doubt watch it again with as much pleasure. I remember growing up and riding bikes like this when the world was a much more simple and nice place. My friends and I would jump on our bikes and ride to freedom wherever the road took us. Love the technology of the day but there were no batteries to charge, firmware to update, Bluetooth & Ant+ devices to sync or iPhone to remember. You just got on your bike and took off. Superb job Lee on the mechanics and hat's off to Simon for a wonderfully edited video.

Nice bike not like the overpriced junk today. Great resto.

30 minute bike speeds Restoration? Yes please

Great job! Hoping to see some (slighter) more higher end vintage bikes getting the Bikespeeds treatment

I got a brand new Raleigh racer, red and white, 1986ish for Christmas. Loved that bike took me to school and back every day. Best bike I ever had.

Fantastic to see this project. I remember Winners of this period being black and silver, maybe this was made for the European or American market.

I've watched hundreds of bike restoration videos on youtube but can honestly say this is my favourite. I had a Raleigh road bike in my early teens in the mid 80's, unfortunately i dont have any photos of it and cant even remember clearlywhat it looked like. I too wish modern bikes were made this way as i couldn't tackle half of what you have done on this one on my bike but would be pretty confident i could tackle most of what was done here (apart from the cleaning !)

Lovely sympathic restoration, you are totally correct, these bikes are bulletproof and could be ridden for years 🇫🇮😎

Love your videos.. AND your seemingly endless collection of wrist watches!

First ever proper bike Raleigh Arena. £64 in 1977. Rode it for years just used to occasionally squirt oil on chain.

Thank you for this very important rebuild. The old stuff is good enough for who it's for. My favourite bike cost me less than $600.00.

I love these auxiliary brake levers, very useful and confortable!

Great renovation. The parts and frame were made to last an entire life. The chrome plated parts were durable and easy to polish if they are not corroded. I use sometimes a varnish for the aluminium parts after polishing. The rear huret derailleur on this bike has two possible positions for the spring tension. Great choice to put new ball bearings on the headset.

Just went to Chinese and saw this bike in your shop window. Was so impressed that I went home and watched this video. I will be visiting your shop to discuss if you’re interested in renovating or servicing my Raleigh elan .

What a beautiful bike, even with it's grime. The crusted-on dirt tells a story about this bike and how many miles it's been ridden. An excellent restoration, as always!

Great video . . . . . I'm currently working on my old French '75 Motobacane Grand Jubilee Steel road bike. It's got to be the most beautiful riding bike I've ever had (next to my new '24 All City Zig Zag of course)! Anyway, the bike is definitely not stock except for the steel frame which I had powder-coated the same stock color. This has been a 30 year on and off project where I have replaced the old parts with vintage era parts: campy, shimano, suntour. I utilize the local bike Coop now where I can to do some work myself. I had the bike frame powder coated the same color. The vintage paint had worn off except a little section. My goal has been to change it from a racer to more of a rando/touring bike. It has a 6-speed free wheel. I set it up with sugino triple crank 28-38-48. The old NUOVO record small cage derailler/suntour triple front derailler works pretty well with it. I've moved the campy down tube shifters to the bar ends with a retrofit kit. I'm still using the vintage campy/omega hardox rims i bought with it; and, they're sooo smooth on the road. The bike makes no clicking noises when your not pedeling . . . .it's very quiet . . . . I like that! One of my local BS mechanics put up a fuss with me because he didn't want to work on an old French bike with the weird bottom bracket threading it had. He said I should buy a new bike (from him of course!). Forget it!! I took it across town to a another shop. They fixed it up and also earned my buisness on a new bike (all city steel zig zag). I'm happy now . . . .still got some more parts to get off ebay . . . . everything is good! Thanks for a great resto video on this vintage bike . . . . . .beautiful! OLD MOTO Dan

brought back some lovely memories of looking at the Raleigh catalogue back in the day - mainly drooling over the top of the line stuff but also having a glance at some of the more mundane bikes. you got this one looking lovely 🙂

Love these older bike restorations too. Real testament to your skills and abilities. Looks like it's just come out of the factory. Excellent job on the video too Simon 🎉

These are the bikes I remember seeing jn the bike shop as a kid and out on the road being ridden to work etc. always listed after the criterium, equipe, record ace etc. when I was a bit older I had a Raleigh banana and then my first proper road bike the Raleigh elix.

Absolutely lovely restoration. 👍 I had a Raleigh Carlton when I was at school in the 70's. When my mother died and I cleared her house in 2006 I'm sorry to say I put it in a skip. 😭

I had a 1981 Raleigh. Not sure of the model but it was the best fitting 10 speed I have ever rode. At the time they came in a frame size 1 inch in-between other makes.

Raleigh bikes used to be so great. Over here in Canada that is not the case anymore. They are exclusively sold at Canadian Tire so they are "big box store" bikes and made of cheap components.

WOW! Those old bikes are so beautiful and you did a bang up job with this one! My father had an old Bianchi. I wanted to restore it when I got back into cycling, but come to find out it was one of those old green cheap models from the 1970s or 1980s (forgot how old it was exactly) and it sat too long in an outdoor closet in a car port. It was too damaged to be restored.

24:54 and 25:13 😱😱😱 I was told NEVER to grease these parts!

beautiful work guys! Thanks! These full restorations of older bikes are my favorite videos too!

Oh! That's a tall boy!

Beautiful, I love the old Raleigh’s. I one had a Record Sprint and Road Ace and I wish I had kept them .

This may spur me on to refurbish my late 70s Raleigh Record Ace.

i really like the one who works whitout gloves

That's a huge frame, hope you find a giant to ride it!

Downtube shifta crew in da house. 💪

Your videos are so satisfying to watch

Awesome job! Best restoration to date! Thanks for putting in the time and effort to share with the world

watched every single video on this channel, can't remember a more thorough restoration work than this one, or maybe i'm wrong.

An excellent restoration as usual looked like a nearly new bike. The bike was fitted with what I knew as suicide brake levers. I seem to recall in the dim and distant past and the deep recesses of my brain these parts were removed from sale on bicycles as there were several serious accidents where the levers which you could reach from the tops of the handlebars could not apply enough pressure for the brakes to stop. I am talking early 1970’s. I may be wrong of course. That aside a brilliant bike which will make someone very happy

The most noticeable thing that is different about the pre 2000 bikes is all of the spokes needed to keep a wheel straight. The aero rims are so much stiffer than the older ones with no tubular cross section.

Amazing result ❤

What a fantastic looking bike. It's great to see the amount of time and effort put into it through this video. I really like these 80's bikes. I myself have a Raleigh Weekender from 1984. Looking forward to seeing your next restoration.

Lovely job as always. It's cool seeing these old Raleigh bikes brought back to life, always reminds me of my dad's bikes that I always wished I was big enough to ride when I was younger. He used to cycle to and from work every day into his late 60s until his workplace moved to near a motorway junction. I'm not stuck in the past - love my modern components - but silver groupsets just have that classy look you don't get any more. The newest Campagnolo look like garbage compared to the classic chromed style in my opinion.

One of the best videos you've made ever Lee. What a fantastic turnaround for a lovely old bike. It brings back memories from what I used to work on when I was a shop mechanic back in the day. So durable and simple to work on compared to some of todays bikes, thanks to you and your son for taking the time to produce this video, its an effort well rewarded.😊

What a great restoration and stunning result! Thank you for all the effort put into this video too!

Wow....!! Might just be your best one to date 😍

A masterclass! I love that visual with the spoke tensioning. Very cool

I've got this exact bike in my garage. After watching this you've inspired me to to give it some TLC...... thank you 👍🏻

Amazing work with a beautiful result! Thank you for another great bike on the road!

Looks like my old bike, love what you have done to it, looks fantastic

Such a joy bring them back …just have to have patience not to rush it Beauty 😎

Lovely result and jees thats a big frame...

Beautiful job well done

Thats a peach!

Wow that was amazing.... proper old school engineering how good was that bottom bracket ! Keep up the good work

I had one of these and this really brought a smile to my face!

What a pleasure to watch the restoration, loved it, thanks

Absolute class. I think that could be your best project so far. Congrats 👏

🥖🥖🥖very nice! My brother had a very similar bike when I was younger, I used it a lot, great bikes!

How you remember to put all these intricate parts back together never fails to amaze me, your attention to detail is on another planet. Finest restoration to date and the best restoration channel on You Tube by a country mile Lee.

thank you.

Oh way to go guys magnificent job as always. I have such a soft spot for these old Raleigh’s as that is what I rode as a kid. This bike just gleams. Thank you. Cheers 🍻

I wish you could do such a restoration for me. 👋 from 🇨🇭

Well worth doing this video. Really highlights your knowledge and skills. Thanks Simon for all your efforts in putting the video together it is very entertaining.

And another brilliant video, the attention to detail is absolutely amazing!!.... Well done!!

Probably better than new.great watch collection

I had one of these in 1983.

Quite possibly your finest work yet gents, absolute class act.

what a restoration Beautiful

Absolutely fantastic - thanks for sharing the restoration 😊

Superb job on this one got to love a Raleigh

That was a joy to watch!

Absolutely enjoyed this video. Great job,Simon!

Even by your own very high standards, this was a level up. Loved it. Really well done to you both. 👊

A true masterpiece of a video!

Turned out so nice

Without a doubt, one of the best refreshes / restorations you have done. Excellent work, as always.

Just immense satisfaction and enjoyment you bring with your restorations. The before and after shots are night and day. I bet the riding experience is also world's apart once restored. The attention to detail is second to none. Your videos make me want to find one of the old kids bikes in the garage that's a bit neglected and take it apart and restore it again. Keep up your amazing content.

Such a clean restoration. Great job.

Lovely restoration

As always cracking job gents...

Unbelievable result! I so regret disposing of my 20 year old Claud Butler bike last year, you would have returned it to as new! This Raleigh looks fit for another 40 years!

Great job just like my first bike.

One of the best videos so far

That was more than a rebuild, it was a detailing into perfection. Well done!!!

Once again you made an incredible video and did an amazing job with this bike. Videos like this always make me want to pick a bike from my collection and go through it from top to bottom and bring it back to its wonderful glory. Salud! 🍻

Best video so far. My brother and I had two Raleigh bikes which we bought in the USA back in 1978. Both were TI Raleigh bikes one blue/yellow and one red/yellow. Brakes looked almost identical to the ones on the Winner. We took them back to the NL and rode them years thereafter. Brings back great memories. Thanks again for the lovely videos. Learning new things every time. Gave me enough confidence to regularly clean and properly maintain my current bike (Ridley).

You've outdone yourselves! I noticed improved camera angles during the disassembling, as well as before and after shots. A great restoration for a classic bike. Thanks for these videos 🥳🚲

Totally amazing! Love to see old bikes getting a new lease on life. Back in the day I used to have a Raleigh Super Grand Prix, unfortunately it got stolen from my house.