Enjoy the freedom of cycling with Schwinn sting-ray lowrider. The Sting Ray came with a chromed brake lever. The other two models were chromed steel levers. The Sting Ray came with a chromium finish on the brakes. The other two models didn’t have any finishes on their brakes. The bike that changed the cycling world!
I regret every day in the summer of ’93 when I skipped sharks & minnows for Sega Genesis. Too young for it, and if you showed me a picture of one 15 years ago I would laugh at you. But today I think it’s one of the best bicycles ever made and it makes me sad to be young… well… maybe just for a second. I envy you all who can say you had and loved one. I think I remember tweaking a set of bars as well.
A scene from the quintessential moto movie, “On Any Sunday”. This is arguably the first depiction of “BMX” committed to celluloid. And, yes, the kids are on Sting-Rays. Albert J. Fritz, former executive vice president of Schwinn bicycle company. The man, the myth, the creator of the Sting-Ray.
This was a barn find out were I live in the country. It is used with wear all over and in need of a restoration. Been sitting since the gentlemans daughter grew out of it. Amazingly the wheels still spin pretty straight and no major breaks or cracks.Tires are dry rotted and tubes are bad. It does need lots of TLC which I do not have the time to give it. What you see is what you get except for the blue grips.
Although the strike ended in February 1981, only about 65% of the prior workforce was recalled to work. By this time, increasingly stiff competition from lower-cost competition in Asia resulted in declining market share. These problems were exacerbated by the inefficiency of producing modern bicycles in the 80-year-old Chicago factory equipped with schwinn bicycles outdated equipment and ancient inventory and information systems. After numerous meetings, the board of directors voted to source most Schwinn bicycle production from their established bicycle supplier in Japan, Panasonic Bicycle. As Schwinn’s first outsourced bicycles, Panasonic had been the only vendor to meet Schwinn’s production requirements.
The entire first production run sold out in a matter of months and they were not able to make more because of supply problems with the tires. The Grape Krate has been rumored to have originally been made back in the 1970s, but the jury is still out as to whether it ever happened. The story goes that back in mongoose bmx bike 1969, Schwinn came out with two Grape Krates as samples, but those bikes never made it to showroom floors. Internet sleuths say that in 1976 Schwinn built 15 Grape Krates as Christmas gifts for certain employees. In 1999, Schwinn finally brought the Grape Krate to production with a limited amount of units.