The Kick-back
In May 2012, Ron, a worker at Old Smokey's BBQ (a restaurant in town where I often eat), told me about an old Schwinn bicycle he'd recently acquired. A few weeks later he said it was for sale, if I was interested. We arranged that he'd bring it to work when I'd next be there. I was thinking it was a derailleur-type bike, which I've never owned. "This might be a good way to get used to that type of bike," I thought. My wife mentioned to me that I didn't need a third bike as I headed over to see it - maybe she was right. I'd eat breakfast before I made up my mind.
Well, the bike turned out to be a black Typhoon model - just like my childhood bike, except it was 26-inch instead of 24-inch, and two-speed, instead of single-speed. Ron said it was a "kick-back." I’d actually never heard of a "kick-back" before - "kick-back" being the popular name for a bike with a "Bendix Automatic 2-speed" rear hub. I was intrigued. I had to have it, so made the purchase ($100) and rode it home.
There's lots of information available on-line about "Chicago-built" Schwinns, and I soon found out that my bike's serial number (FA44369) can be used to determine its birth date: June 15, 1965. Cool!
The shifting worked on the bike (back-pedal a couple of inches to shift from LOW to HIGH, or from HIGH to LOW), but the coaster brake had a bad, almost grinding feel to it, indicating to me that it needed grease. So I parked the bike and got back to my plan to use the bike I'd purchased a year before - a Trek Belleville - on my 2013 trip.
My Trek 3-speed is a good touring bike (for me), but I got to thinking this Schwinn 2-speed might be even better. It'd give me a gear-set without any handlebar clutter. So, this spring I decided to see if I could get the kick-back's rear hub apart, cleaned, greased, and back together - and still have it working. That May 9 endeavor was successful - thanks in part to a blow-up parts diagram I found on-line.
With that success, I continued on, servicing the rest of the bike.
A few items got changed out. I now have little faith in vintage pedals, so got modern ones of those (Wellgo B087 BMX Pedals). I wanted the seat higher, so purchased a longer seat post (13/16" diameter, 14" long). The tires that came with the bike (Kenda K106 26 x 2 x 1-3/4" (54-571)) were in fairly good shape, but I wanted puncture-resistant tires. That's when I found out that my Schwinn rims (marked "S-7") require special size tires, which are not that common now-a-days. In fact, it appears to me that only one company (Kenda) currently makes them, and only in one design (Kenda K75 26 x 1-3/4"(47-571)). It slowly came to me that I'll probably not be able to get S-7 tires at a bike shop, if I need them while on-the-road. So I purchased a set on-line and will have to carry them with me. And to get some sort of puncture protection, I'm trying out tire liners (RhinoDillos Tube Protector Tire Liner 26 x 1.5-1.95").
After adding baskets and water bottle holders, I rigged up the Schwinn with the same battery/wiring set-up as my Trek, except I'm using a bottle generator (Tung-Lin 12V, 6W) in place of the hub dynamo.
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1 year ago