How To Identify Chicago Made Schwinn's

schwinn's do you know that your schwinn is a genuine made in chicago usa schwinn how do you know are you sure that's what you got if you're a schwinn person that's why you're here you probably know a lot of people don't know schwinn pretty much closed up shop in 1982 and that was the end now from 83 to 84 murray assembled twins from genuine schwinn parts you know for those two years and i'll get to that in a minute but first i'm going to talk about the easily recognizable details of a genuine schwinn frame so you know that's what this video is all about i looked all over youtube i can't find it so i'm doing it for you this here is a like a 1950s straight bar this is a frame that a lot of us guys that build clunkers want what we really want is the pre-war schwings now those frames are denoted by dropouts that are rear-facing dropouts these are called safety dropouts now one of the things you're going to look for to know you have a genuine schwinn frame most easy thing to notice right off the bat is an electro forged head tube you see these nice curves here that's not welded that's not brazed the way they made that is this head tube is two pieces if you were to look in here you'll see a seam it's two pieces and it's flash welded together with a lug into this top tube and this down tube and every frame you look at you'll see there's a little imperfection here because that's where they you know use whatever tool they use to try to sand that smooth this super strong head tube it's very hard to break this head tube it's one of the reasons why schwinn is what it is cadillac of bikes right so that's the number one thing you want to look for if your frame does not have an electro forged head tube it was not made in chicago usa period so that's it number one what else are you going to look for well you're going to look at the bottom bracket you're going to look for a seam right here along this bottom bracket it could be here it could be here it could be back here but it's always on the bottom there another thing you look for these seams here where the chain stays meet the bottom bracket that was a cold forged ramming process that created that you want to look for the integral uh kickstand mount now some of the older schwinn's didn't have a kickstand i don't know what the year is there i'm not going to get in all that serial numbers they don't really mean anything if it's not a real schwinn as far as made in chicago this one happens to have it here on the left rear dropout earlier ones have them on the bottom bracket and then later they switched and they started placing them right here on the right side of the head tube what else you're going to see here there's some pinching in the chain stay and the seat stay where they meet the rear drop out that's it that's what you want to look for now this bike here happens to have a fender bridge that's shaped there so it's hollow under here this frame is also cracked here and here it happens a lot with these bikes so in the right way to fix that by the way is brazing not welding just so you know you'll also see on some of these bikes where there's a higher rise flat piece of metal here and that's called the brake bridge you call this a fender bridge it owns a brake bridge because you would mount a caliper brake to it those are the identifying marks for a genuine made in usa chicago usa schwinn frame we're pretty much done but i'll talk about some of these other frames here so this is your standard cruiser frame this frame in particular is kind of interesting you learn a little something more here this frame is a 5 speed atom drum brake frame how do i know that well number one well serial numbers 1979 tells me the sticker here is warning me for the wet rims for a hand brake up front caliper brake side pull some you call it it's spaced for a five-speed wheel and that's a fender bridge not a brake bridge so that means this bike came with a drum brake kind of a rare frame so if you want to build the correct drum brake five-speed schwinn main chicago usa schwinn this is the frame you want another thing about schwing's main usa schwins the head badge is attached with screws if you see rivets holding your head badge on not made in chicago you got me you're learning aren't you again you'll see a seam down here you see the pinches at the at the chain stays in the seat stays see where the kickstand goes in there this is a genuine made in usa chicago schwinn this is a triangle frame right this is like a varsity phrase happens to be a suburban same thing electro forged head tube pinch to stays same at the bottom bracket chicago doesn't have a head badge on it but chicago made frame good to go this is a taiwan frame start making these and i'm not sure if it was as early as 85 i know 86.87 i'm pretty sure they were out there i got some weight to them and you'll notice a couple things number one the head badge is held on with rivets if you see those rivets not made in the usa you see the down tube top tube the way they attach to the head tube those are welds right there if you see welds not made in the usa they made him in taiwan then they made him in hungary the hungry bikes are a little nicer in my opinion but those are not made in the usa now they're made in china garbage no pinches at the stage you can see these dropouts does have the integral uh kickstand mount that's what throws a lot of people off what's next right here i have a 1984. i'm going to take this here and show you what to look for i'm sorry it's a 1983 schwinn cruiser frame it has the electro forged head tube it has the brake bridge it has the pinched stays it has the kickstand mount it lacks the seams where the chainstays come into the bottom bracket that always throws people off you see that odd seam that doesn't protrude it does have some markings here on the bottom bracket and there's always a glob of weld right here where the down tube meets the bottom bracket i don't know why this doesn't want to focus it's always giving me a hard time there you go if you were to pull this crank set out it was all made from schwinn parts so it's an ashtabula crank and you'll see a date on there this one is 1983. and they also put a piece of steel an extra piece of steel that wraps inside the bottom bracket from here all the way around to give reinforcement to those tubes into the bottom bracket and this frame let me flip it up for you without too much of a problem i apologize for not being super pro but i am not a professional videographer if you see here that's a b u which or d u sorry which denotes it is 1983. this is kind of neat it's got this part here that allows you to run a caliper break on a blade fork it's a neat little detail there again there's your brake mount and i mean here is a varsity that i've turned into a clunker again this is an 18 and a half inch frame but it has the electro forged tube head tube right there that's what you want to look for and that's it people this is these are the identifying marks of a genuine schwinn so if it doesn't have those pinch stays if it doesn't have the electro forged head tube um if it if the badge is held on with rivets and not screws then it is not a genuine usa made schwinn and you know look everybody's got a different opinion out there on this stuff i know that there's a lot of bikes being made that are new schwins there's bikes that have been out for 20 or 30 years that are not schwinn they say schwinn they got the schwinn name on them people will argue about it but it's it i get it if you see a schwinn that you want to own and it's like a springer front uh stingray you wanted one as a kid you could buy the chinese knockoff i get it but it's not worth any money have a good day and i hope this helps

Channel: Michael Zicopoulos

Views: 2,081

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: j3Uz4Y7t3Xc

Length: 9min 22sec (562 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 01 2021