# 1964 Color change on Stingrays ….. almost Black



## 60sstuff (Jan 6, 2022)

While reuniting with my Stingray collection, parts, Schwinn Reporters and numerous other documents I’ve accumulated over the years I found a couple letters I’d forgotten about.
The bright yellow / green Schwinn Newsflash of 3/25/64 talks of a color change being made for the remainder of the ‘64 model year.

It turns out there was a suggestion made at the convention to include Black on “Deluxe” models.
There was a push for Black from within for the early Stingrays, but fell short of mass production.

I agree that Black would not stand up against those cool Flamboyant / Radiant colors on the showroom floor.
This Newsflash letter coincides with the April Schwinn Reporter article and the two ‘64 consumer catalogs.
Although “Red” was not mentioned in that letter. The Red replaced Terra Cotta for the remainder of 1964.

The second letter I found (12/31/64) mentions a supply issue of the New option for 1965 of the 2 speed Overdrive (Blueband) for Sting-Rays.

These are important documents pertaining to the early Sting-Rays.

Chris.


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## 1motime (Jan 6, 2022)

Good news about the soap residue problem being taken care of!


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## professor72 (Jan 8, 2022)

This is awesome! Thanks for sharing! Just some food for thought in the whole “are Black Stingrays real” debate; sometimes companies make products that are not normally available in general to everybody in all markets. They make what they call “test market” products or sometimes in larger scale a “regional specific market” product. These products are made to “test” how a new product idea would be received by the larger consumer market or to capitalize on something popular locally to a certain region. I find it highly possible after seeing this document that Schwinn may have made some of these black Stingrays as a test for dealers who may have been at the convention. Is there evidence for this theory? Not really outside of this document, but this adds lots of evidence to the story for me.


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