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Warning: Hipsters on Raleigh Choppers

Had one. Just before my birthday I realised that a proper bike (racing style) would be much better. Too late, they’d already bought it. I did quite enjoy it to be honest, and it probably helped keep me fitter.
 
If they were really cool they'd have Schwinn Sting-Rays:

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It was just a regular child's 20" frame with added "butterfly" handlebars and "banana" seat. Prior to the Sting-Ray as a commercial product, I suppose there must have been some culture of modifying bikes with aftermarket parts in California. I was very surprised when my dad woke me up one Saturday morning, at age seven, and took me down to the local Western Auto store and bought a set of Sting-Ray look-alike seat and handlebars. For once I was the first kid on the block with the new fad, little did I know that it was a cheap way out for my dad, to avoid having to replace a bike I was rapidly outgrowing.
 
It's a shame it's not a proper update, keeping it at least close to the performance of modern stuff. They really were terrible bikes.
 
Had one. Before that I had the Tomahawk if anyone remembers those, they were the smaller version. Both second hand of course. At about 11, I really, really wanted an Ultra Burner. It was £145, which was a hell of a lot of money. I went around the neighbours, washing cars, windows, anything to earn some money. Used to go into the bike shop and give the owner what money I’d earned every week until finally, the great day arrived when I had the final amount for him to hand it over to me. One of my proudest moments! Nowadays of course, it would just be slapped on a credit card and the sense of achievement completely lost.
 
Mine was purple. We used to see how many of us could fit on it, in between kick the can & treasure hunt of course, or was this a local Quarry Bonk thing :)

Later changed the handle bars to cow horns, oh boy, brings back fond memories of simpler times.
 
Ragaman said:
It was awful but as kids we used to visit our local Cradley Heath speedway on a Saturday & it became the thing to get cow horns for all our bikes.
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cow horns are far preferable to drops on a chopper. Easier to wheelie as well

My extreme sports buddy and I used to ride a pimped Grifter that we learned to counter-steer on. Great feeling when it comes together. That bike only lasted a couple of months, but memories are strong.
 
Big Tabs said:
cow horns are far preferable to drops on a chopper.

My extreme sports buddy and I used to ride a pimped Grifter that we learned to counter-steer on. Great feeling when it comes together. That bike only lasted a couple of months, but memories are strong.
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I used to build my own bikes from stuff from the scrapyard, lots of fun.
 
paulfromcamden said:
I had a Chopper as a nipper - great for cruising round to your mates house but not so great for off-road! I was rather jealous of other kids BMXs : )

P.S. A grand?!
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I had one as a teenager and rode it daily. Was cool but a death trap.

My friend had a Grifter (nothing to do with Donald Trump) and it, in my eyes, was a BMX.

It rode massively better, and everytime we met up, I'd always want to swap with him.

Chopper. Iconic in many eyes but a terrible bike.
 
Never had a chopper, wanted one until I rode a mates - was wobbly as hell! I had a Raleigh Banana racer - used to do miles on that!
 
I wasn’t allowed a chopper, instead my dad bought me a small racing bike with a 4(!) speed derailleur gear setup. I used to take it to the woods and do off road riding and we would also make ramps and do jumps with it.

Probably the very first gravel bike.
 
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