WELCOME TO THE BICYCLE MUSEUM. The museum includes all the bicycles I have had since 1971. Unfortunately, I did not keep the two Sting Rays I had as a boy. Those sell for hundreds of dollars today. Bicycles are wonderfully simple, eloquent and efficient machines. They are grouped here into four major categories: 1. Road - lightweight bikes for traveling on streets. The road bicycles are the museum's largest category and are divided by manufacturer, with first U.S. companies (Schwinn, Trek, and Raleigh America), then Italian (Bianchi), French (Peugeot, Motobecane and Roold), Japanese (Nishiki, Fuji, and Kuwahara), and Taiwanese (Giant). 2. Hybrid - allow a more upright riding position and riding over more rugged terrain at some lost of efficiency. 3. Mountain - sturdy bikes which allow riding off road. 4. BMX and Other - Bicycle Moto Cross - Small bikes usually with 20 inch diameter wheels used for dirt racing, jumps and tricks. Included in the "other" part of this category are vintage children's bikes and a stationary exercise bike. Most bikes are used for recreation. I use to use mine to commute to school, however. Besides being fun and great exercise, they use no gasoline, do not contribute to global warming and do not pollute. Click on a category below, and pedal off to a great adventure!

The main tubes of my bike are made of Alcoa 6061-T8 Aluminum. The tubes are joined by thermal bonding instead of being welded as most joints are today. The rear triangle is steel. Aluminum is about a third the mass of the same volume of steel. In other words Aluminum is about a third the density of steel. Steel in general terms is about two to three times stronger. Things are actually more complicated than that, but in general you can make a somewhat lighter bike out of Aluminum than steel. The longevity of Aluminum is not as clear as with steel. Aluminum will fail after repeated flexing. Also, damage to an Aluminum bike frame is difficult to economically repair. Poorly made, cheap bikes can be made out of either material. What frame material to use is a complex issue and is only one of many factors in bicycle design. While choice of frame material is a hotly debated issue, clearly nice bicycles can be made out of steel, Aluminum, Titanium or Carbon fiber. (See Sheldon Brown - Frame Materials, Waltworks - Steel Rules, Aluminum vs. Carbon vs. Tituanium, Horwitz, Building Your Own Recumbent Trike, Chapter 1, Choosing the Materials, Schlitter, Steel and Aluminum Bicycle Frames, RANS Bikes.)

The Raleigh Technium Tri-Lite is discussed at several sites. Raleigh Technium? - Bike Forums, Raliegh Technium ID? - Bike Forums, Raleigh Technium 440 - Bike Forums, Retro Raleighs Models. The last site gives at date of 1988. An August 1987 Money Magazine article (McNatt, "In Search of the Perfect Bike") describes the Tri-Lite as an excellent $450 (about $825 in 2007 dollars) entry level racer. It is a twelve speed with Suntour Alpha 5000 index deraileurs. Other components include Saeka SX crank set with 52 and 40 chain rings and sealed bottom bracket, Dia-Compe Alpha 5000 brakes, Road Champion Saeke Custom handlebars (England), Sansin sealed rear hub with Araya alloy rear rim, Maillard front hub (France) with alloy rims (label came off - brand unknown), Michelin Tracer 700 x 25c tires, and Cyclepro "Titanium" seat. The bike is in generally good condition. Either the front or back wheel must have been replaced since the wheels do not match. It shifts fine although the front shift lever is stiff. A unique feature is handlebar tape with little skulls. Not my choice! Purchased for $60 on 11-4-07 in the Serra Mesa area of San Diego from an ad on Craigslist.

Photos: brake, head set, joinder of rear tringle with seat tube, at nearby lake in evening

Larger image

Nishiki bikes were made by the Japanese company Kawamura and imported to the United States by West Coast Cycles according to a discussion at bikeformums.net (bottom entry). John E. in another bicycleforums.net discussion indicates Nishiki started off as American Eagle in the early 1970s with two models, the Custom Sport (roughly $80) and the Semi-Pro ($150). By 1973 Kawamura changed the name to Nishiki and added two intermediate models the Olympic and the Kokusai (International). The mixte tube model of the Custom Sport came later, e.g. 1975. (See also Sheldon Brown, Japanese Bicycles in the U.S. and Yahoo Answers Canada - History of Nishiki International.) The Sheldon Brown site states Nishiki later became part of Derby along with Raleigh and Univega. The Nishiki and Univega brands were retired in 2001. See also A Nishiki History. While researching bicycle company history, it becomes apparent that bicycles are big business with intriguing corporate histories and boom and bust cycles. Interesting histories of Raleigh include Raleigh in the Last Quarter of the 20th Century, bonthronebikes.com and Raleigh Bicycle History.

Exactly what VALite tubing is appears unclear. A bikeforums.net discussion states: "Fuji Valite is a proprietary chrome-vanadium steel tubing." (See also oldroads.com.) I assume the VA is short for Vanadium. Vanadium is a metallic element, symbol V, atomic no. 24. Chromium (Cr) is also a metallic element, atomic no. 25. Just below chromium on the periodic table is the metallic element Molybdenum (Mo), atomic number 42. All of these appear to be used in steel to strengthen it. Vanadium is also used in Aluminum frames. Todd Downs in Bicycle Maintenance & Repair page 22-23 (5th ed. Rodale 2005) describes VALite simply as a high carbon steel. A portion of a discussion on bikeforums.net from fbagatelleblack states:

The quad-butted Valite tubing was a seamed tubeset made for Fuji by Ishiwata. Ishiwata marketed it as EXO-V. It was a manganese-moly steel alloy (similar to R531, if I remember right), and many consider it to be the first "decent" tubeset to come out of Japan at a price sustainable by the mass market.

Here is a link to an old Ishiwata catalog shot showing the tube specs:

http://www.equusbicycle.com/bike/ishiwata/page-02.jpg

A post at roadbikereview.com by fbagatelleblack again states:

"The EXO-V is Ishiwata's house-brandname for Valite. They were pioneers in producing high quality seamed tubing, both cro-moly and cro-vandium [Vanadium]. They were able to take advantage of the greatly improved potential for creating varied wall-thickness in seamed tubing vs. seamless. . . .[V]alite was chrome vandium [Vanadium].

Because the tubing was seamed, Ishiwata could (more or less) contour the wall thickness any way they wanted to. They could put it lots of different butts, with nice tapered transitions between the different wall thickness sections to minimize stress risers. Once they tooled up, they could just roll out the steel in sheets with the right thickness profiles, bend the sheet over a mandrel, and weld them together at the seam.

T-Mar in a www.bikeforums.net discussion states:

VaLite was reportedly a vanadium steel alloy. It was stronger than hi-tensile but not as strong as chromium molybdenum. It is commonly found on upper entry level and lower mid-range Fuji from the early 1980s. In order to control costs, lower models would often employ Valite main tubes with hi-tensile stays and/or forks, while the better models would often have VaLite forks and/or stays paired with a CrMo main triangle. Forum member Beaverstuff has reported VaLite frame with Ishiwata steerer, so these tubesets appear to have been made by Ishiwata for Fuji.

Maynard Hershon Thoughts describes the history of Fuji Bicycles in the United States and describes VALite tubing as "the first highly developed tubeset for mid-price bicycles."

The frame tubes are quad butted which is a sign of high quality. Double butted tubes have thicker tube walls at the ends with the middle thinner. A quad butted tube might be thick, thin, thick again, thin, thick. (See, e.g., Frame Materials.) The advertised weight of 24.2 pounds and quad butting indicates it is at least a reasonably high quality frame. Sheldon Brown indicates that Fuji beginning in 1971 was the first Japanese company to enter the United States bike market. He states: "The Del Rey was an excellent sport-touring bike." Classic Rendezvous has a Fuji page. When I lived in Boise in 1984-1985 I remember seriously considering buying a Fuji del Rey very similar to the one at the Marcus Wandel site. (That site also has a lot of interesting computer history information.)

My bike is in excellent condition. Very few scratches. Nice charcoal color with a lighter grey seat. It came with a Zefel pump, a "KryptoLok" lock by Kryptonite with keys, and a seat bag with a hex key, plastic tire irons and two patch kits. Purchased on 8-12-07 in the Hillcrest area of San Diego for only $25 from an ad on Craig's List. The seller was the original owner who purchased it in 1986, road it until the early 1990s when he took up running, and stored it most of the rest of the time. It required no repairs or cleaning of any kind! Great deal!

Hybrid Bicycles

Mountain Bicycles

Singrays, BMX and Other Bicycles

Stingrays were likely inspired by the Chevy Corvette Stingray and other muscle cars of the 1960s including "fastback" models. The car theme is carried on with the large stick shift lever. The large handle bars and "banana" seat are also reminiscent of chopper motor cycles. The Stingrays thus allowed children to have their own muscle car or motorcycle. Stingrays were designed for tricks like "popping a wheelie." The Stingray largely replaced 24 or 26 inch wheel bicycles for children. Those prior bikes were lously for popping wheelies, but were much better for efficient transportation as explained at the wonderful Sheldon Brown site. Sheldon Brown calls Stingrays and similar bikes "the most horrible children's bikes ever made" and "an unmitigated disaster" which, while successful in the short term, resulted in a "serious long-term setback for the American bicycle industry." In large part the Stingray represents a design based on marketing and it was very successful. Throughout my childhood, Stingrays were all the rage. Schwinns were always the original Stingrays, but the basic design was used by many bike manufacturers. The New England Muscle Bicycle Museum has a huge display of 1960's and 1970's muscle bikes including a green 1967 Fastback in mint condition. By the later 1970s and 1980s Stingrays were replaced by BMX style bikes which continued the small frame and wheels but lost the banana seats and extremely high handlebars.

The Stingrays were all made in Chicago like other Schwinns at the time. Most every part on this bike is made in the USA with the exception of the Belgium Weinmann 810 side pull brakes and the Sprint derailleur made in France. Schwinn made their own frames with a unique "electro-forged process" explained in detail at Chicago Schwinns. This process resulted in very sturdy, although heavy, bikes. Schwinns even included a welded on kick stand. It was so sturdy that my friend and I use to sit on our Stingrays being held up by the kickstands.

Original Stingrays often sell for hundreds on eBay. I assume most are purchased by now middle age baby boomers like me perhaps searching for their lost youth! I purchased this Stingray as a 50th birthday present to myself.

I purchased this Stingray on eBay on 5-14-07 for $206.59 plus $45 shipping. Actual shipping was close to $70. It did not come with a chain. I purchased a chain for about $14 with $10 installation. I replaced the original front tire with a modern 20 x 1 3/8 inch tire which sort of fits but is fairly loose. It cost only $3 at "Ye Olde Bicycle Shop" in San Diego. (That bike shop and coffee shop by the way has a fabulous collection of vintage bicycles dating back to the late 1800s. See Our California Travels, signonsandiego and UCSD Guardian.) A new tube cost $3. The original front tire and tube held air for awhile. It is a Schwinn Fastback Nylon 20 x 1 3/8 to fit S5 or S6 Schwinn Tubular Rim. I saved it, although it is heavily cracked. The tube had been patched twice and there was no rim tape. I purchased some rim tape for about $3. The rear tire is a Schwinn Fastback Slick, 20 x 1 3/8. It is heavily cracked but still holds air. I cleaned up the bike and lubricated all the moving parts. I have not yet overhauled any of the bearings. The bike is in reasonably good cosmetic and working condition now. I rode it around my rather long block with no problems. Most all the parts look to be original. The paint is somewhat faded but is in generally good condition. There is some rust on the wheels, but most of it came off with steel wool. The chrome on the "Mag" chainwheel is beginning to buckle and has come off on a portion of the inner side of the chainwheel. The bike shifts well and needed no adjustment. (See image of drive train.) The shifter lever does not have the "stick shift" label and the 1-5 numbers. The brakes work well. The rear wheel is somewhat out of true, but not bad. The seat is discolored and cracking. Overall, a wonderful addition to the museum!

The bike is also illustrative of cultural stereotypes regarding girls. The color is pink. The seat has brightly colored flowers. None of the boy's bike seats ever had flowers. When introduced in 1964 it came with "attractive white flower-trimmed basket for purse or packages." (1964 Schwinn Consumer Catalog page 20.) Searching through the catalogs at the Bob Hufford Site it appears the baskets ended as of 1975. The boy's Sting-Ray never had wicker baskets. The Fair Lady is "beautiful" and "for mother, daughter or even grandmother." The Sting-Ray is not described as beautiful and is not for dad or grandfather.

The Fair Lady was only one of a few female Sting-Ray bikes. The naming and minor styling differences are confusing to say the least. One wonders what the Schwinn marketing staff had in mind. The year following the Fair Lady, the very similar "Slik Chik" came out. The frame seems to be identical and indeed the part numbers are the same. Differences seem to be mainly cosmetic. For example, some years the Slik Chik has white wall tires but sometimes the Fair Lady does. The Slik Chik is described as for girls and the Fair Lady is described as being for mother or daughter. The Slik Chick usually costs slightly more. The Slik Chik or Fair Lady name appears only on the chain guard. The Slik Chik continued only until 1970. The Lil' Chik appeared in 1966 for girls age 5-7. The Lil' Chik name continues throughout the time of the Fair Lady but along the way changes from 16 inch wheels to 20 inch wheels for older girls. In 1969 the Stardust appeared. It is described as a lightweight and has a straight down tube. Otherwise it is similar to the Slik Chik and Fair Lady. It's for mother or daughter but appears to be directed in the photos to the mother. (Apparently a single woman would not ride a Sting-Ray but a mom would.) The Stardust only continued until 1972. The Fair Lady continued until at least 1982, however, when mine was made.

Names are recycled. For example, the "Fair Lady" name was used prior to the Sting-Ray style bikes from at least 1959 to 1961. See Schwinn Heritage and 1961 catalog. The "Slik Chik" name is present again with the 2007 Slik Chik, a 1950's style single speed beach cruiser with balloon tires, steel fenders, one piece crank, large spring seat, and a lot of other metal which seems to defy all the rules for efficient bicycle design! Manufacturer's suggested retail price is $349. In my opinion you would be better off with a recent used mountain bike or hybrid which would also have upright seating and be comfortable. If you want a new bike, the 2007 Schwinn World GS is only $50 more the Slik Chik and has upright seating, front suspension, an Aluminum frame, alloy parts throughout, sealed bearings, V style or linear brakes, fenders, rack, and 24 speeds. The V style brakes should stop much better than a coaster brake. Index shifting today is very easy to use. A hybrid like the Trek 7000 for $279.99 would also be a good bike. It also comes in Trek's trademarked "WSD" (apparently for Woman Specific Design) design with a sort of modern retro girl's bike look, also for $279.99.

My "Fair Lady" was purchased on 7-20-07 at Chula Vista, CA from an ad in Craig's List San Diego for $50. It is in very good condition. There was some minor rust on the rims, handlebars and other unpainted steel parts, but it cleaned up very nicely with steel wool. (The photo is before I cleaned it up.) Mechanically it is sound. It is a one speed with coaster brake. It has the Schwinn Chicago label and I assume was made in Chicago. It is one of the later Schwinn Sting-Ray bikes. The seat is in excellent condition. While the girl's Sting-Ray style bikes tend to go for less than the boy's Sting-Rays, the $50 price seems pretty good comparing it with prices on eBay. I assume an earlier one, especially with a basket, might go for more.

Recumbents tend to weigh more than traditional bikes. Their major advantage, however, is that they place the rider lower and more prone resulting in less aerodynamic drag. Aerodynamic drag becomes a major factor against cycling efficiency as speed increases. Speed records are therefore usually set with recumbent bicycles. Rules usually prohibit them in traditional bicycle races. Many people also like recumbents because you can lean back with your back supported resulting in less back and neck strain. Handling is more touchy, however, and takes some getting use to. There are many different designs. The BikeE has more traditional above the seat steering and is fairly easy to ride. Manufacturers tend to be relatively small which unfortunately can result in some like BikeE going out of business.

I purchased my BikeE from an ad in Craigslist on January 28, 2008 in Poway, CA for $100 (asking price was $125). That's about the lowest I've seen for a recumbent. The bike is in good cosmetic and working condition. I appear to be the third owner. The bike was originally purchased at Bicycle Man in Alfred Station, NY, according to the sticker on the bike. That store has a very wide selection of recumbents and excellent information about recumbents on their Web site including information on BikeE, the CT, and the owner's manual in PDF format. The CT styling gets mixed reviews. Some of my students said it looked very old school while a little kid on my first ride said to his mom "look at the neat bike." At $100 it is an excellent way for me to try out recumbent cycling!