The last of the bikes moved from Virginia to Connecticut was the Raleigh roadster export model, which made the trip at the end of January. I loaded my Jeep to the ceiling with the stuff left to be moved, threw the bike rack onto the back, and loaded up the Raleigh.
Unfortunately, the day proved to be bitterly cold, windy, and snowy. The Raleigh was subjected to corrosive road salt and brine most of the 300+ mile journey. When I arrived in Connecticut, I basically hosed-down the bike with WD-40 to prevent moisture from mixing with the salt.
While this helped to some degree, the bike still had a fair bit of corrosion on it. Over the course of two weekends, I totally took the bike apart. I cleaned all the parts, and put any rusty parts into Evaporust formula. Evaporust is expensive, but it can be re-used and it does a good job removing rust from small parts.
After re-assembling the bike, I decided to put it through it a test by riding over several dirt farm roads in the area. The black flies and deer flies were brutal along these roads, but the bike made it through just fine. It's a little dusty from riding, but the corrosion from the road salt is long gone and it's back on the road.
The pictures in this post are from the dirt road ride. The DL-1 style roadsters excel on this kind of road, though you still have to take it a bit slow because of all the loose stones and the rather marginal rod brakes. But you can still ride these roads, and the rod brake roadster is far preferable on dirt and gravel compared to the Sports-style light roadster or the clubman-style racing bike.
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