KerryP

Here's "Gumby", a '72 Paramount as I broke him down for the trip home from Wisconsin.

Kerry P

Velognome 

70's Schwinn Twinn Sport. Added alloy rims, swapped the rear drum for a caliper to save weight.

OldsCOOL

Deep in the pile of stuff in the basement I found this:


A completely intact "Bicycle Built For Two" Schwinn that is in fantastic condition right down to the bargrips and pedals.

Mr IGH

I spoke with an old Schwinn dealer from Cedar Rapids (Bud) about your three seater, he had a little history. Schwinn originally made a batch of 3 seaters for a School for the Blind in Texas. Once word got out, other dealers ordered some and a second limited production run was made. What state did you find yours in?

ColonelJLloyd 

Not mine, but my LBS has a pretty awesome fillet brazed Jack Taylor. It's easy to waste a half hour just looking at all the details. The Taylor brothers were obviously skilled.

KonAaron Snake 

There are SO MANY rumors...one of the prominent ones is that they were built for Disney World. Mine is in PA and was, like the others in this area, a Boardwalk bike. I spoke with Frank Schwinn when we got this and he confirmed that they were nearly all built as boardwalk cruisers and were distributed primarily in NYC and NJ as direct orders from Schwinn. Curtis of Bikeville/Via has had quite a few of these pass through his hands and still has one; his were also all boardwalk bikes at one time or another.

Mine is a 1949, which apparently makes it an earlier one. As per Curtis, as rough as it looks in the photos, mine is one of the more lightly used ones he's seen. It contains no frame damage, minimal rust and no repair work. Apprently due to the salty conditions there, and the often outdoors storage, many are VERY beatup.

I think most of you know this, and I've posted this before; the bike is living with me downtown. It is currently at Via and should be done reasonably soon. I just don't have the time or energy to overhaul three cottered cranksets. Curtis thinks he has access to original chainguards which is extremely cool.

The current plan is to keep it as is, see how it works, and then gear it with a 3sp drumbrake hub if neccassary. Zaphod graciously offered one.

noglider 

I look forward to it.

jimmuller 

I wonder if the OP is still following this thread. I see it just got bumped but was started almost a year ago...

French and blue, 1982:








Some of the components are original. The stoker's crank obviously isn't.

noglider 

jim, how much have you ridden it? I rode a tandem a month ago and was struck by the fact that it needed a much higher top gear than a single. I was in a 100 or 108 inch gear, and it was much too low. Man oh man, did we go fast!

jimmuller 

We've been out three or four times, maybe ten or twelve miles per ride. What with the recent weather opportunities have been scarce and we are still in "learnin' mode". But you're right about speed, it gets going pretty fast seemingly without much effort.

Climbing isn't too bad. Biggest thing I have to get used to is looking so much further up the road and anticipating every little move.

Further observations:

Re going fast, Sharon really doesn't like the feeling of spinning with little or no pedal pressure. So to keep her in a comfort zone I have to upshift sooner than I might on a solo bike. And then before you know it, we're spinning freely again... Yeah, speed creeps up!

scozim 

Oh yeah, still following the thread because my daughter still bugs me about getting a tandem. Love the look of this bike. I don't have the $ to go with a more modern one at this time - Rodriguez tandems are popular around here and really nice. I have patiently kept an eye for things but haven't found the right one yet - I've leaned toward and '84 or later Gitane but have also kept an eye on some early Cannondales.

jimmuller 

Thank you. This is a Peugeot TH8, repainted because the original owners rattlecanned it and then someone hit it with paint remover.

What may surprise some people is that the original or original-like componets work quite well. The Simplex long-cage RD shifts cleanly. The Simplex triple FD handles the range in front but is less enthusiastic about upshifts than I'd like. The Atom drag brake provides quite a bit of deceleration, and the dual-cable Mafac canti's on one lever stop the bike almost as easily as my solo bikes. With the two brakes together we have no stopping problem.

Just how much different this is from a modern tandem I have no idea. But it's pretty.

Ken Moore

I been trying to fine some info on this bike not sure on the year but my dad picked it up in 1960 or 1959. One story was that Disneyland order 12 from Schwinn but never took them.I would like to fine out more info on this bike thanks .
Ken

KonAaron Snake 

Your's is cleaner than mine...is it a repaint? The decals are different.

They were almost all boardwalk bikes...as near as I can tell, the Disney World thing is BS...and I got most of my info from Richard Schwinn and a dealer who sold them. Mine was a shore bike.

The tubing is 4130 and they were all filet brazed. There were a lot more than 12...I've heard several estimates, but the one I believe is 400-600 over about 10 years. Via, a local shop, has had 4 go through their store alone and still has one. I'm aware of 8 others...besides my own.

This might interest you:

https://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...uly-great-ride

I outfitted mine with an airzound, LED lighting, front basket and an iPod dock...it's become our weekend rider/town bike. We take it shopping...we cruise it around the city...and it's convenient for picking up friends in town.

I can't remember where we found the serial number - it wasn't easy. I'm tempted to say one of the BB shells...maybe the 2nd. Mine is a 49' according to the serial. i'll look when I get home - it took me a while to find it.

Ken Moore

All original from the seats to the pedals, it is a town and country.Would like to find out what year I have the seral number T D 4024.Were did you find info on the year?
Thanks
Ken

Ken Moore

The bike is all origial.Would like to find out the year I have the #T D 4024 can you help.
Thanks
Ken

Italuminium

Especially after watching the documentary on YouTube, I need a Jack Taylor. It would be a challenge to find one in my/my stokers size, but that is definitely a grail bike!

KonAaron Snake 

Try using this:

https://www.angelfire.com/rant/allday...innCodes1.html

rat fink

Oh my gosh, that gorgeous! That has got to be the best looking tandem I have ever seen. I'd have to agree with Italuminium, that looks like a grail bike.

vincev

I also have this 1939 Colson besides the '48 Schwinn I posted.Its fun to sit on the back seat and steer[front and rear steering] .draws a lot of strange looks.

KonAaron Snake 

I've looked at this a few times, and I don't think the paint or decals are original...it's certainly not consistent with the ones I've seen. I don't see the box striping either. The shift lever is also a modification. It's missing the rear chain guard and the red grips look wrong as well.

It's hard to tell, but I'm not sure those saddles look original...it had the Schwinn mattress saddles originally. They're AWFUL btw.

Mine - out and about...

mapleleafs-13 

That's not a tandem! You cant fool me konaaron

jimmuller 

Those triple tandems are pretty cool. A few weeks ago we rode with a friend north from Ipswich, MA out to Plum Island. While we were eating lunch in one of the parking lots a family wandered over from the beach and the mom commented that a neighbor had a five-way tandem, for the parents and three children of course.

Or course she didn't say "a five-way tandem." She said "a bicycle-built-for-five." I must confess I'm getting awful tired of hearing "oh look, a bicycle-built-for-two." That phrase has been following us all autumn. It's all one word, you know, bicyclebuiltfortwo. BBFT for short, or BBF2 if you prefer.

The scene of that particular crime was this lunch:



In case you can't read it, our friend was riding a TREK-TREK-TREK-TREK-TREK-TREK.

I think we've done over 300 miles on our tandem since early October.

randyjawa 

There are some pretty nice multi seaters here! I have owned one tandem, a 1992 Motobecane Inter Club, but I never rode it very much...

jimmuller 

rj, nice Moto. That's sort of the look I was going for when I had ours painted, which is to say, make it look French.

Yours has some interesting details. Canti's up front, possibly the original Mafacs, but a standard centerpull in back because of the location. Like ours, yours has the factory configuration of a Mafac(?) dual-cable lever for the main brakes, but yours is on the left. I would have preferred the left for ours but the catalogs showed it on the right and more importantly the cable-stop braze-ons were better for the right side. Yours also appears to have the original Atom drum drag-brake.

I must correct one thing though. You don't ride a tandem; you actually ride only half of it!

One question (if you still have the bike): What sort of captain's seat post does it have? Does it fit into a collar in the seat tube? Here's why I ask. On ours the opening in the stem for the stoker's handlebar was larger than a standard seat clamp but smaller than the inner diameter of the seat tube. I'm curious how Peugeot did that. My guess is they used a narrow tube for a seat post, with the post fit into the seat tube via a collar like a UO8 used to be, and stepped down at the top to accommodate the seat clamp. Or less likely they could have used a triple-diameter (i.e. double-stepped) tube.