Hi all the Raleigh experts!!!
I'm about to restore a Ti Raleigh 753 bike.
I bought this bike (mis)used and very roughly repainted with auto wheel spray paint.
The new coat of paint has been sprayed over without any surface preparation and this is a good thing because the old paint has not been striped and the original transfers have not been removed, so by carefully rubbing away the paint I make reappear the original colour and traces of the transfers.
This is what I managed to "dig out":
a.. Colour is red with yellow-black-yellow on seat tube and black area around the head budge. No chroming at all. b.. Ti Raleigh transfers on the down tube plus unreadable gold decal on top of the shifters c.. Raleigh transfers on the seat tube and round Ti near the bb. d.. Typical Raleigh seat stay tops, plus unreadable oval shaped gold transfer on right chain stay. e.. Pierced Campagnolo dropouts f.. Ti round transfers on fork. The fork crown is not very sloppy and has nice round cuts of decreasing size on inner sides. Round section at the place where the front brake is mounted. g.. Serial no is SB2833 h.. The bb lag is 68 mm (1.370"X24TPI). On top is marked RGF (oval shape) and has two cuts that serve as cable guides. (It is not a cinelli like others with a bigger serial no that I've spotted on the net) i.. The lags are plain (no heart shaped holes) j.. It has braze ons for shifters and one water bottle. Also for the rear brake and derailleur (those are round shaped). k.. The bike is campagnolo equipped except for the Sugino Mighty cranks (campagnolo 42-54 chain rings) and pedals and the cheap calloy saddle pin (26.8mm) l.. Cinelli stem and giro d' Italia bars m.. Frame weight (58 cm size) is about 1730 gr. n.. Fork weight is about 640 gr. Photos can be provided if they can be of any use.
I know very little about this beauty (I've been a Colnago guy) so any help (model, year, history, tips, photos, brochures, specifications etc) will be very very appreciated.
By the way I'm also looking for all the transfers and decals and I don't feel guilty at all about that (I don't want to restart the owners rights discussion once more)
Many thanks
Yannis Papaioannidis
From a cold (by our standards at least) Athens, Greece