It's a Moulton, Jim, but not as we know it

Riding home from work this afternoon I saw this delightful little Raleigh RSW16.  In the 1960s everyone who was hip and happening rode a Moulton, generally what we know as the mk1.  Famed engineer Alex Moulton, who designed the suspension for the original Mini, popularised the egalitarian small wheeled bike with a compact, step through frame and suspension for both wheels.  Raleigh rejected Moulton's early approaches for mass production, but when the bike became fashionable and desirable – heck, even The Avengers rode them – Raleigh was caught on its back foot so to speak, and created their own version. In place of the hi-tech parented suspension they used big, fat tyres, and good old weighs-a-ton steel for the frame.  The bike handled ok but the tyres for one thing allegedly had terribly high rolling resistance, though that might be an old wives' Moultoneers' tale.  At any rate, Raleigh sold shedloads of the bikes which nearly put Moulton out of business, and Raleigh soon enough bought the company.  50 years later though, modern fat tyres are supple, grippy, fast rolling and generally excellent, and these aren't the originals.  But you can't mess with a classic – at least, not too much.

I learned to ride on a Raleigh RSW14, which rather incredibly was even smaller than this one.  It broke after one too many stunts, as I recall.

It was a day of meetings, and lunch with Random Colleague who was then nearly late for their own next meeting.  I finished while the sun was still out and got home, got changed and went back out to the shops for milk and bread. There I bumped into my neighbour so we had a lovely walk back home and a long chat.

I was for flopping after that but after tea I went back into the garage to deal with the next, and I think last, mess of wiring that I have now simplified and tidied up.  That means, subject to test riding, that I can put Fidra's clothes back on.