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| 1959 Schwinn Corvette 3 speed |
Last week I posted about the Schwinn Corvette 3 speed and how I had freed up the frozen rear hub. I thought I would give you all an update on this bike. I've taken things as far as I can given the mission of the Collective. Now it will have to move on to someone else that will either give it a home as a object to admire or as a restoration project.
My goal was to make the bike operative, inspect it, and clean it up. I have no idea how long the bike had set, but given that it will be 66 years old this year, I'm betting it sat for the better part of half a century.
I think I am on to something here because this bike has all of its original parts right down to the grips, pedals, tires, and all else. There is only one thing missing here and that is the headlight. The mount is still there, but the piece broke when my assistant at the Collective was doing the initial clean-up on this project.
What amazes me about things like this Corvette 3 speed is the detail on the bike. There are things I found on this bicycle that made me stop and wonder. Like that "AS" stamped stem wedge bolt. Or the piece of steel, about 3mm thick, tack welded behind the chain guard where it attaches to the rear of the frame. A thing done to help reinforce that area so it would not fail. Did any buyer of a Schwinn cruiser ever know about this detail? I doubt it, but Schwinn did this to make the chain guard more durable.
Other details like the bearing races, which are machined and not stamped out like they would be now, and the sharp, crisp edges on bolts, are things you just never see on bicycles today. Of course, ALL the fasteners were SAE standard and not Metric. Not that one is better, but it just points to the USA manufacture of this piece. Which leads me to one more thing about bicycles for kids from this era....
They are TANKS! These things were made to last and last. Wearable parts are serviceable and replaceable, well.....back then they were! It is not easy to find parts now, but you get the picture.
Bonus picture of this Schwinn Typhoon from 1963 which was donated with the Corvette.
We received a Schwinn Typhoon, which according to my research, (which could be wrong), is from 1963. These two Schwinns came in together, and both were salvageable. The Typhoon, if anything, is even in better shape than the Corvette. It simply is mind boggling to me that any boy's bike from this era would ever survive use. I am left to assume that both bicycles were little used, seeing that both have original tires, and other wearable parts like the grips and pedals. Cool feature on the Typhoon= It has a "red stripe" two speed kick-back hub. It works as well. Pretty neat.
These are available from the Cedar Valley Bicycle Collective if you are interested. My thought is that we'd raffle them off as a fundraiser during our next membership drive, but that is not written in stone. Hit me up if you are interested.
More Industry Musings:
Last Sunday's post stirred up some of you out there. I could tell by the numbers that post drew out of the gate. This isn't a subject which is relegated to me, or even a few social media savants. This seems to be perplexing and has had an effect upon many folks from disparate parts of cycling.
Once we exited the pandemic, many were predicting that sometime during 2024 things would right themselves, inventory levels would be "normal" again, and that we'd be out of the woods in terms of the post-COVID sales slump.
Well.....that hasn't happened. So, we are seeing many folks scratching their heads wondering what is going on here. I've seen athletes posting about lost sponsorships, I've seen sales discounting continuing, and rumors worse than anything I've heard before are beginning to swirl.
N.Y. Roll asked me to listen to a podcast, (I won't name it here because I don't want to throw anyone "under the bus"), and I gave him my reaction as to what I think is going on here. Like I said Sunday, part of this is the old way of thinking which includes just pumping out more product every year that the industry assumes will find a home. Well, that doesn't seem to be working anymore. Anyway, here are my thoughts in bullet point form:
- The all-human powered bicycling folks are aging out of cycling
- Many youth are not interested in cycling, (USA) and if they are, they are most interested in assisted cycling or e-scooters. They are least interested in 100% human powered cycling.
- There are NO SAFE PLACES TO RIDE (in most cases)
- COVID skewed the market. Those that would have purchased bicycles from 2020 - 2025 did so in two year's time from 2020 - 2021. They have their bicycles and are out of the market.
- Overreaction to demand spike caused over-production leading to massive inventory levels at historic levels which are still being worked through.
- Current pricing, even at discounted levels, is not attracting buyers as hoped
Meanwhile employees, rents, bills, and all else needs to be payed out but revenues are lacking in many cases. Even the robust European e-bike market pre-COVID has taken it on the chin. So, it is a perplexing issue and unless more people can be enticed into cycling I just do not see how this gets better.
Maybe I'm all wrong....
4 comments:
The AS on that stem stands for Ashtabula, as in Ohio. The Ashtabula Bow Socket Company forged those for Schwinn. They also did cranks and the forged steel forks like your example has!
@Tman - Cool information there, thanks. I was of the mind that "AS" stood for "Arnold, Schwinn and Co.", a compilation of the last names of founders of the company. (Ignaz Schwinn and Adolph Arnold) I figured it was an example like many of the other parts are marked with "Schwinn Approved", and not the actual manufacturer. As is the case with the 3 speed hub, I assumed that the "AS" was another "Schwinn Approved" kind of thing.
I'm probably in the wrong, but you have to admit, that makes sense. Thanks for the comment.
Holy cow… I have the green version of that bike. It’s missing the original fenders, light and seat, but is othwise pretty correct. After getting a couple bikes stolen on campus, I started riding it to University back in the mid-90s. It was my grandpa’s bike and he gave it to me when he stopped riding it.
Ironically, Grandpa Gersib only learned to ride a bike in his 60s. Born in 1919, he was the son of a Lutheran pastor and a Pearl Harbor survivor. As a kid, I remember he always lamented never learning to ride a bike, but he was given the Typhoon as a gift, and he learned to ride it very quickly.
Even more ironically, his wife, my grandma, rode her bike to work as a church social worker every day. She was well into her 80s when she stopped riding… She sheepishly told me one day that she just couldn’t risk a fall, but she missed the feeling of riding a bike. She’s 98 now, and I’m thankful for every day with her.
… but I digress.
@MG - Holy cow! That is an awesome story about your grandparents and cycling. I've never heard this from you before, so thank you for sharing that. That is such a rich and beautiful heritage for you to have. I am really happy for you!
And thank you for sharing that here. Love ya, Brother!
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