1964 Schwinn Deluxe American...girls...

[HARPO]

Well, here she is, in all of her rusty glory! This was from a Craigslist ad that was fairly local (30 miles), and was being sold by the original owner. She got the bike in 1964 when she was eight years old, but as your can see, not well taken care of before being put away.

It's all original, right down to the bald Schwinn whitewalls. How the heck all the decals manged to vanish over the years I don't know...and neither did she. (Paint is original, I checked.) This will, of course, be a total tear down, but I've worked with worse looking Schwinn's and brought all the chrome back to lustrous life. This will an ongoing project, but I figured I'd show it "as found".

Well...good luck to me!...

 

[Jeff54]

It's all original, right down to the bald Schwinn whitewalls. How the heck all the decals manged to vanish over the years I don't know...and neither did she. (Paint is original, I checked.)
]

That is quite strange, no decals but that color does not 'feel' right. It's like there's a tad more gray in that blue then what I expect. I zoomed into your photos and see there's old oil that's migrated into the fork from the bearing, indicating it's been that color, long, long time.. But, zooming into the tank that looks sloppy and repainted. The white is bleeding across the edges.

Not even a hint of any decal anywhere, no residue or yellowing, no paint on fork nor screen printing on the chain guard. Perhaps though, hints of decals under the paint on the seat post?

Yet on the top end of the chain guard, there's white, is that chipped paint? If so, then that's wrong because, it would be red primer under the paint. also on chain guard, at frontt of blue over the edge to the chrome, is that also white hiding there, under blue spray? If so,, that may be a refurbished bike the day she got it?

Could be the colors of photograph not showing the right colors, but dang, that there sure looks like what I did with rattle cans too sting ray's and varsities in 60/70's except, I dipped mine in acid, red primered em, get the decals too but, unless age makes old rattle can paint better, it would have more chips by now. .

 

[HARPO]

That is quite strange, no decals but that color does not 'feel' right. It's like there's a tad more gray in that blue then what I expect. I zoomed into your photos and see there's old oil that's migrated into the fork from the bearing, indicating it's been that color, long, long time.. But, zooming into the tank that looks sloppy and repainted. The white is bleeding across the edges.

Not even a hint of any decal anywhere, no residue or yellowing, no paint on fork nor screen printing on the chain guard. Perhaps though, hints of decals under the paint on the seat post?

Yet on the top end of the chain guard, there's white, is that chipped paint? If so, then that's wrong because, it would be red primer under the paint. also on chain guard, at frontt of blue over the edge to the chrome, is that also white hiding there, under blue spray? If so,, that may be a refurbished bike the day she got it?

Could be the colors of photograph not showing the right colors, but dang, that there sure looks like what I did with rattle cans too sting ray's and varsities in 60/70's except, I dipped mine in acid, red primered em, get the decals too but, unless age makes old rattle can paint better, it would have more chips by now. .

She got the bike brand new as a Birthday gift, so it was brand new. But there seems to be a faded (not covered over) decal on the bottom of the seat tube. Once I remove the fork it will let me know if anything other than original paint is on that. I'll look closer at the chain guard. A scratch with some rust on a rear fork shows only one layer of paint...unless the entire bike was stripped down which seems highly unlikely.
Colors change in photos due to different light hitting it when photographed, along with the fact that on a monitor it's being viewed in RGB. Time will tell all once it's been taken apart...

 

[HARPO]

I used some WD40 and a brass "toothbrush" on the front and rear racks. Being very nervous, I was hoping for the best...and the best it was! It's only surface rust, and the chrome beneath is shiny and perfect. Very minimal rubbing to get the rust off, and the fenders just have a few very small bad spots, otherwise all that rust came right off with WD40 and a 0000 steel wool pad. The Schwinn quality once again shines through all these years later.
I'll post some pics soon...

 

[Adamtinkerer]

The factory sikscreened the chain guard logos on in the 60s, it did wear off.

 

[GTs58]

The fact that every single Schwinn marking is completely void on this American is really odd, especially when the paint is in that condition. Someone had to remove all the decals and screening, the only other explanation is a repaint.

 

[HARPO]

The fact that every single Schwinn marking is completely void on this American is really odd, especially when the paint is in that condition. Someone had to remove all the decals and screening, the only other explanation is a repaint.

I'm still working on the bike, but I'm now convinced that the paint is original. A deeper scratch reveals only one layer of paint, so if it was repainted, they took the entire bike down to bare metal. No drips, orange peeI or uneven color. Nice job if it was redone! Oh, and the white on top of the chain guard was bird poop...or something. I'll just deal with it if it was redone, but I won't be happy.
I still need to remove the fork to see if that will help in seeing if the paint is different on the post. Crazy that someone would take the time and make that sort of effort to remove all of the Schwinn markings should the paint prove to be original.

 

[HARPO]

Here's a screen shot I took from the 1964 Schwinn Catalog. Apparently there was supposed to be a headlight that came with the bike.

 

[HARPO]

RE-PAINT CONFIRMED. Damn. I guess I was hoping against hope, but once the fork was removed it was confirmed. Although full of tan grease, as soon as I wiped it away you could see the gentle overspray. A very, very nice job...but still a repaint. And I see that whoever did it didn't put back the chrome fork crown. Well, all the signs were there that it wasn't original...ESPECIALLY the missing decals which I hoped were rubbed off years ago.

As you can see, though, the front and rear racks cleaned up without much muscle being used...and I still need to do a finishing detail on them. Both are straight as an arrow, so either I keep them for a future project or I begin to part the bike out. Still to early to decide as I just took it apart less than an hour ago.

fred

 

[HARPO]

Another shot while being stripped down...