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Krate fakes

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Grey Ghost

Wore out three sets of tires already!
How many fakes do you think are out there?

I see a lot of these with many wrong parts on them. I understand that not everyone cares what nuts and bolts are correct and that apparently a lot of kids lost parts while “fixing” their bikes. However, do you guys think the sellers just don’t know what they are advertising or do you think a lot of these may be frames just hobbled together with generic parts?

I know cotton pickers, grey ghosts and sunset orange krates were just one year, but other than those, what are the hardest to find krates? I seem to see a lot of pea pickers and lemon peelers, not so many orange and apples.

Any estimates of how many of these, not including barn finds, are really left?
Do you think there are still many around and people just aren’t willing to part with the real ones anymore?

Thoughts?
 
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How many fakes do you think are out there?

I see a lot of these with many wrong parts on them. I understand that not everyone cares what nuts and bolts are correct and that apparently a lot of kids lost parts while “fixing” their bikes. However, do you guys think the sellers just don’t know what they are advertising or do you think a lot of these may be frames just hobbled together with generic parts?

I know cotton pickers, grey ghosts and sunset orange krates were just one year, but other than those, what are the hardest to find krates? I seem to see a lot of pea pickers and lemon peelers, not so many orange and apples.

Any estimates of how many of these, not including barn finds, are really left?
Do you think their are still many around and people just aren’t willing to part with the real ones anymore?

Thoughts?
Cotton Picker was a two year build.

Factory Original “Sunset” Orange Krate.

CJ, one year paint on the last year of the Krates.

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I know there are a lot of faked Krates, any Apple, Lemon or Pea Pickers are suspect because those were standard colors. I have seen frames selling like hotcakes for 15 years in these colors. Then there is a sudden shortage of Shock sissy bars, Krate Springers and Atom drum brake hubs/wheels.
Seats are understandable but the drum brake parts and forks are kind of obvious.
There are ways to tell the new forks and sissy bars from the originals.
I bet that accounting for damaged/destroyed bikes there are more Krates in the standard colors than 3 speed or 5 speed Stingrays. lots of extra 20" Stingray forks and standard seats left over as well as 20" S-7 wheels.
 
No doubt and it started 25 + years ago However in the end the frames all were 20" and could any day be set up to be a Krate back in the day. Seen it being done at a shop in Joliet Il. back in 2001 . they were good new the bolts you would not tell
 
Car collectors have been putting up with it for years. All 442s are now W30. All 57 Chevy Bel Airs have Tri Power. Watch the auctions. Every Malibu is an SS. Every hobby has these issues. How about the poor suckers that spent millions on fake art. But it is a fun topic.
 
So, more “reconstructed” Stingrays than Krates? That makes sense. They would be easier to forge than Krates anyway.

I wondered why I see so many pea pickers for sale. Campus green was a very popular color in the late 60’s and early 70’s. They offered that color on Stingrays all the Krate years. That’s a lot of green Stingrays waiting to be “upgraded”.

I remember seeing a lot of yellow stingrays too for the the few years that they offered that color.
Definitely fewer Orange krates for sale than the other 3 colors. I would guess that orange and red were the most popular krate tones so one would think that there would be more of those colors left than the green and yellow but their aren’t, at least not right now.

After doing so much work on my bike I can spot a mistake pretty easily. If it looks wrong, it probably is. While recovered seats and repop grips are acceptable. I have noticed that the poorest examples for sale don’t even bother to get these parts right. Things like proper bolts/nuts on the shock hangers are another thing altogether. Some of this stuff looks like a local hardware store purchase.

The details make the difference. Asked me how I know.$$$

Not saying that most of these aren’t real Krates, just that some of these people are asking a lot of money for either poorly executed examples or copies.
 
Car collectors have been putting up with it for years. All 442s are now W30. All 57 Chevy Bel Airs have Tri Power. Watch the auctions. Every Malibu is an SS. Every hobby has these issues. How about the poor suckers that spent millions on fake art. But it is a fun topic.
The difference is that automobiles have a paper trail on their serial numbers that should tell the real story. If you get fooled because you didn’t do your homework it’s your fault because the code information is there on the vehicle.
The Schwinn serial numbers don’t tell us a whole lot past the month/year built. And even that is debatable around here as you well know. As long as the paint corresponds to the year, you can claim authenticity, more or less.
 
So, how many real Krates may be out there now? 1,000? 10,000? 100,000?

I don’t mean the ones rusting out in grandmas back yard, I mean restorable and/or restored examples.
Any educated guesses?
 
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