1969 Raleigh Chopper 3 Speed

When it rains it pours I guess. I had been looking for a raleigh Chopper for years, and now within a month I have uncovered 2 nice ones for the collection. I found this 3 speed on the Long Island NY Craigslist. The bike was about an hour away without traffic but unfortunately there is always traffic when you are trying to cross Manhattan into Long Island so I made a call to friend on the island and he agreed to pick the bike up for me.

The bike itself is in pretty nice shape for an unmolested 42 year old bicycle. Everything is original on this one and all I did was clean it up, get some rust off of her and put her in the lineup, however it did take over an hour of banging and lubing ( dirty mind moment ) to get the sissybar out of the frame :)

Ross Polo Bike

Craigslist find from a few years back. Drove out to Bridgewater NJ to meet a kid in a parking lot to make the deal . I barely had to clean this one when I got it. The kid told me it was his uncles and that it had been sitting in a room at a family members house for as long as he could remember. I wonder how many people have these old bikes just sitting forgotten somewhere in their homes ?

1970 Ross Apollo

A friend had been trying to get me to take this bike off his hands for months but without the Gran Tour tires. Well after much back and forth I finally convinced him to give me the bike with the Gran Tour tires as part of a deal we had going on for one of his other bikes as well. Bike is all original except I fabricated the side frame reflectors as the original ones were long gone. These bikes almost always turn up missing the side reflectors as the originals were pretty flimsy and easy to pop out.

1969 Huffy Slingshot

Not much to tell about this bike honestly. I saw a friend list some bikes for sale on a bicycle forum so I emailed him to see what else he might be willing to part with and in the end this bike ended up on my door step.

1970 Raleigh Chopper 10 Speed

My quest for a Raleigh Chopper came to end last night thanks to my friend Steve. I have been looking for a Chopper for quite some time now and only in my wildest dreams could I have imagined getting a 10 speed but miracles do happen I guess lol. My friend picked this bike up Thursday afternoon from a friend of his, and then sold it to me last night in what had to be one of the fastest flips of a bike ever. I had some money put aside from selling a few bikes so when my friend called me at 8pm last night and said if you want the bike come and get it before I change my mind...I ran to my car and headed out to Long Island, and even the falling snow couldn't stop me.

Swingbike

This Swingbike is a CT Craigslist find. I spoke to the seller and we agreed on a price so I jumped in the car and headed up to CT. When I got there it turned out the seller was the original owner of the bike so we spent some time chatting and he told me some stories about the bike and how he got it as a kid etc. Cool bike, and a cool day spent chatting with the bikes original owner.

10 Speed Sears Spyder 24"

I bought a tire off ebay for one of my bikes and drove out to the guys house to pick it up since he was fairly local. He took me into his garage and I saw this bike hanging from the ceiling and instantly new I had to have it, so after some heated negotiating I loaded it in my car along with the tire and headed home. All I did was clean it up with some elbow grease and here it is...100% original.