Southwest - Need help with Serial Number info

I looked all over the internet and found nothing but confusion. I have a Scwinn Super LeTour, Serial Number SG571330 Made in Chicago.

What is the info imbedded in the number ??? Any help is appreciated.

Thanks, Jay

This could be a pretty old bike. I used to work in a bike shop in Madison, WI in the early 1970s and the Le Tours were being sold by Schwinn dealers at that time. Are you sure it was made in Chicago? The Le Tours I remember were rebranded Japanese Panasonic brand bikes. They had "Schwinn Approved" all over the components but were not really made in USA. The funny thing was to have someone turn down the local Panasonic brand bike dealer, go to the local Schwinn dealer, and pay $40 more for exactly the same bike with the same components. Such was the power of the Schwinn brand. It didn't stop them from going belly up in the end.

You might ask your question in the part of the forum dealing with older bikes or you could google on "Yellow Jersey Madison, WI" and ask Andy the question. He has a lot of interest in old bikes and has helped me when I came across an old Holdworthy bike locally and wanted information on it.

Thanks for the reply. The bike says Chicago on the plate on the front. I think it is old. That is what I am trying to determine. I lived in Vegas for 5 years. Too scared to ride a bike there. Thanks !

Your Super Le Tour was built by Panasonic in Japan in July of 1975, according to this site (http://www.re-cycle.com/History/Schwinn/SwnB_Serial.aspx). All Le Tour serial numbers started with S, G is the month code (seventh letter of the alphabet = seventh month), the 5 is the last digit of the date (I'm inferring 1975; I think the Super Le Tour had been discontinued by 1985, and the Japanese-made Le Tours were introduced in 1972 so it can't be any earlier than that). 71330 is the serial number, although I'm not sure where they started counting from - surely they hadn't built over 70,000 of them that month! The head badge likely says "Chicago" because that's where Schwinn was headquartered.

All of the Le Tours were lugged steel (as opposed to electro-formed steel as produced in the Chicago factory), and most were Japanese made (some later ones were made in Mississippi, but AFAIK none of them were Super Le Tours and they differed significantly from the Panasonic Le Tours).