# Schwinn Superior?



## badbob (Dec 21, 2021)

Any idea of year for this unusual color Superior? Thank you, Bob


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## Rust_Trader (Dec 21, 2021)

@cyclingday


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## SirMike1983 (Dec 21, 2021)

1949 would be my guess. I believe U68913 was previously shown on this forum a couple years ago. It had a warranty card from summer 1949.









						1949 Green schwinn superior | All Things Schwinn
					

Picked up this 49 green ladies superior I have never seen this color before have original warranty card it cost 64.21 on July 12 1949 serial # u68913. Anyone know what the color is called?   thanks




					thecabe.com


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## GTs58 (Dec 21, 2021)

Same bike, and Bad A color. Opalescent Granny Smith's Apple.


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## detroitbike (Dec 21, 2021)

Here’s a new category of bikes to collect. Rare and not often seen colors and unusual paint schemes . Great bike.


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## Freqman1 (Dec 22, 2021)

detroitbike said:


> Here’s a new category of bikes to collect. Rare and not often seen colors and unusual paint schemes . Great bike.



There was a thread here for that but it became so polluted with common bikes and common colors that it’s worthless.


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## SirMike1983 (Dec 22, 2021)

The post-war Superior is an unusual model. Here is what I have found looking at the few examples I have come across. 

Few of these bikes turn up today. I suspect they did not make very many and it seems to have only been made for a short period. Most of the ones that have turned up, at least the ones I have seen, were all from the 1949-50 period.

The post-war Superiors I have seen have electroforge welded frames, but three-piece cottered cranks ("AS&CO") type. I had one apart last summer and I did not find anything remarkable about the frame construction other than that. The idea of the Superior appears to be a mildly upgraded New World - bigger graphics, newer and shinier colors, and three-piece cranks. There was a bigger step up from the Superior to the Continental than there was from the New World to the Superior post-war.

The electroforged frame is welded in the usual large joints and brazed to the three piece crank bottom bracket shell. The cups and spindle on this one are blued though the lockring is chrome.





Graphics are unique to the Superior. The colors I have seen are a sky blue (does not seem to have been the same as the Continental blue), a medium green with hints of blue in it, a shiny maroon that looks a lot like the Continental maroon, and this almost-neon green color on your bike. Some of the 1950s three speeds also may have shared some of the colors, but that's going a bit a field.

Sky blue (different from Continental blue?)




Medium green (a bluish green)




Maroon (same as Continental?)




The almost-neon green (your bike)


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## Oilit (Dec 22, 2021)

I also vote for 1949, mostly because I have a New World with a "U" serial, and the 3 speed hub is dated March of '49. Our serials are less than 1,000 numbers apart, but I don't know how many bikes got the three piece cranks. Your bike is in really nice shape, are the rims chrome or stainless?








						1949 New World with Stainless S-6 Rims | Lightweight Schwinn Bicycles
					

Reading some of the threads on here got me interested in the Schwinn New Worlds, and then this one showed up on Ebay, so you can guess the rest. I paid full retail, and then I spent as much again taking Amtrak to go pick it up, so I'm already in the hole on this one, but luckily I've still got...




					thecabe.com


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## GTs58 (Dec 22, 2021)

Here's a Gold girls Superior. Owner was Pastorbob. Seems the Uxxxxx numbers on the Superiors and other lightweights is 1949.


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## Schwinn499 (Dec 22, 2021)

Thinking this '52 Traveler might be the same? Perhaps a little lighter? Could be lighter from sun exposure?? Was never able narrow down a name on this color either.


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## GTs58 (Dec 24, 2021)

Here's a list of models and the color options for them. Seems that Lemon Lime Green is called Green Gold.


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## SirMike1983 (Dec 25, 2021)

That's a very good find. I've seen black Continentals, but never a black post-war Superior. Is the blue-green "Brewster Green", or is it one of the other greens?


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## DKB (Jan 3, 2022)

Are these frames electroforged? I sold a Varsity several years ago that was much like the Superior pictured except for an Ashtabula crank. The frame joints all seemed to be fillet-brazed (like my T&C tandem) when felt with a fingertip - not the even radius of the later frames. When was the new electroforging machinery first used and on which models?


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## Vicious Cycle (Jan 3, 2022)

I don't think Superiors were ever electroforged


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## SirMike1983 (Jan 3, 2022)

The post-war Superiors I've seen were electroforged, but the bottom bracket is brazed and takes cottered cranks. I have one of the blue-green ones. It's a lot like a lightly improved New World. The clean up on the frame joints was pretty good, but they were all the thick-wall electro forged tube. They all seemed to date to the 1948-50 era.


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## Jim sciano (Jan 8, 2022)

Here is a rough superior that I picked up last year. Also a U serial and it has a 1950 sturmey hub on it. Also, a 52ish New world badged traveler in what appears to be the same lime green color. I do have a 47 blue continental and it is a slightly different blue than the superior but pretty close.


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## SirMike1983 (Jan 8, 2022)

Those are very nice examples. The blue is a particularly attractive color on these bikes.


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