Check out the height of the head tube and the seat tube. No wonder they have the seat so low.
Old Schwinn with large frame
- Thread starter Number_35
- Start date
Check out the height of the head tube and the seat tube. No wonder they have the seat so low.
Dude not 5’8”
MrQuackers
Site Donor 2024
World converted to fixie. Better not be any hills.
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More like 8'5"!
That was the style of 10 speeds back in the 70's. That bike looks exactly like the 10 speed of my youth which is currently hanging in my garage. Nothing unusual.
The massive size of the frame is what is unusual. My vintage bike is similar size to the frame below:
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That bike is from the late 80s. I could be wrong but it looks like one of the last US made Schwinns built in South Carolina. Giant started building for Schwinn in the 70s and by the time the above bike was built was making most of the bikes Schwinn sold and virtually all Specialized.
I’m worried that the stem is too high on the bike. If the expander plug is engaging where the steerer tube is threaded, the fork will eventually break.
I’m worried that the stem is too high on the bike. If the expander plug is engaging where the steerer tube is threaded, the fork will eventually break.
This is a nice frame. A Japanese built S-10S, it put Fuji on the map in the US in the early 70s, thanks in large part to a stellar review in Consumer Reports. IIRC the bike sold for about $220 at a time when a Peugeot UO8 was about $150 and a Cinelli Super Corsa under a thousand. Back then we had a very favorable exchange rate with the yen.
Hilly area overall, but I suspect this is purely a campus cruiser. (Bike was seen on the CSU (Colorado State University) campus in Fort Collins.)
Presuming the cranks are 8" long the seat tube is at least 25" tall. That's a rather large frame. Size 63 or larger. That's suitable for a 6'5" tall rider.
That’s a 27” frame, the largest they made and quite rare. Inexpensive bikes like this in the US commonly came in 19, 21, 23, and 25 inch sizes. High end bikes were sized from around 47 to 64 cm sizes in 1 cm increments. Remember the steerer tube was unique to each size frame. Thus, it’s easy to see that threadless steerers and t-shirt sized compact frames were primarily driven by a massive reduction in SKUs.
I have a Fuji Del Ray with a frame like that.
We walked through the campus again last evening, and saw the big boy again.
MrQuackers
Site Donor 2024
That's Bill Walton size. Back in the day, my neighbor found his stolen bicycle and I gave my neighbor a Blazers shirt and a fan letter for him to read, hoping to get a signature. He signed it.
Almost 7 feet tall! Who'd steal his bike? Another giant?
My wife and I have a couple of Schwinn Suburbans bought new in 1975 and 1976. They were both Chicago built. I didn't know that South Carolina was an interim spot before overseas.
Yes the SC bikes were lugged, unlike the Chicago bikes (save the Paramount, which was later moved to Waterford, Wisconsin). Many were made with True Temper tubing. I rescued one from my dumpster years ago. It was originally purchased at Alan’s in Oceanside. I still ride that bike regularly.
Schwinn was soon purchased (the first time) by Zell-Chillmark group and immediately became a sad shadow of its former self.
