breeskin

Jim from Denver area. I am starting to restore a Schwinn Twinn tandem tricycle. Am I in the right place?

thanks!!

elboGreaze

Welcome , lots of knowledgeable folks on this site. Good luck !

non-fixie 

You are if you post pictures. We love pictures. We do almost anything for pictures.

iluvnoise

A tandem tricycle? Whoa. I had no idea those existed. Welcome and good luck.

breeskin

Here are a couple of pictures. This is the way it showed up.

silvercreek

Welcome aboard.

breeskin

iluvnoise, I put a couple pictures up there. Have since removed the cranks and seats to start the cleanup. I friend of mine who does high end guitar and furniture restorations has offered to paint. I said, ummm, like yeah....

brianinc-ville

Well, think seriously before you take up that offer. Keep in mind that collectors will value the original paint, even if it's not in great shape. I think most people here would recommend keeping the original paint -- just wash and wax. That said, it's your bike and if you want to paint it, go for it.

Some of those tricycles were driven by only one of the rear wheels; some by both. Which have you got?

OldsCOOL

Biggest training wheels I've ever seen.

Gravity Aided

Is that a bolt-on trike conversion? If so, and you wanted a tandem bike , sort of looks like you could unbolt and replace with a wheel . Looks to be in good shape . You might check that rear wheel system for a 3 speed hub. Also, a serial number may yield a year , and more information . There are plenty of websites that may help in this regard .

Glennfordx4

Wow what a great first post, very cool bi umm trike you got there or is it a Tramdem. I think that would sell like hotcakes around here. I would go ahead and let your buddy paint it as it isn't the original paint that's on it now so you may as well get it a color you like ( or to match the grips and seats) then get some custom decals made for it.

Glenn

breeskin

The paint in the pictures is not original. Someone painted over the original Schwinn blue with some kind of rattle can paint and it got all over the cranks and pedals, etc.

The rear end has a three speed Sturmey Archer hub on the left side. The right rear wheel free wheels. When I got it, the shifter had been moved to the rear rider's handle bars, so if you wanted to ride it alone you could either shift but not steer or steer but not shift.

Have you seen one of these before?

breeskin

It is a bolt on conversion of some kind. I think it says, "American Machining and Foundry," on the rear part. I've been told that it was an option at Schwinn dealers in the late 1960's. It looks like what they did was take a stock tandem bike, lengthen the chain, bolt on the two back wheels and then add a longer shifter cable. There is another very short chain that goes between the live axle and the gear hub on the drive wheel.

DsmBerg

I can only imagine the spousal disagreement that fostered this arrangement.

kc0yef 

There is even a Jack Taylor racing tricycle

Gravity Aided

I believe the British
had a penchant
for the racing tricycle .
You'll see more of that in Britain ,
so I'm told .

non-fixie 

You may be right. This is one of the very few I've seen here in the low countries. Looks pretty serious for a trike:

kc0yef 

I will post some pictures of the Jack Taylor tonight

ColonelJLloyd 

These are serious trikes.





Lot's more examples found on Google.

Velognome 

Holdsworth ( it think) even made a Triike Racing conversion axle. One was up on eBay a year or so ago. If I remember B.girl was looking at it too. Maybe some links or photo's are still floating around. I can't remember what the thread title was.

wrk101

Try using some acetone (fingernail polish remover) to remove the rattlecan paint. I have successfully used acetone multiple times to remove rattlecan. Just start in an obscure area, start small, and see how it goes.

RaleighSport

Hi Jim welcome aboard! Wow and I'm loving the trikes with full sized wheels.

Roll-Monroe-Co

That is brilliant!!

IthaDan 

I love this picture-

breeskin

(BTW, I love those racing trikes.)

Apparently it is a 1964 or thereabouts Schwinn Twinn. He said this model was made specifically for vacation resorts. It was a Schwinn Twinn tandem bike and the rear assembly was probably added at the factory and the bikes were sold to places that rented them to tourists such as Disneyland. He claims to have seen several before and commented that although the bike is not unique, it is certainly rare and definitely cools.

I dismantled the chains and cranks. The chrome is pitted on one crank and also on the part (stem?) that holds the front handlebars.

The bearings on both cranks were in great shape. I put them through a parts washer, smeared on a little synthetic grease and set them aside.

My friend gave me a Schwinn emblem for the front tube (head tube?). Lo and behold the rivet holes line up so I am starting to believe it is a Schwinn.

We are now thinking that the front wheel is a replacement because the brake pads don't line up with it very well and the front brake assembly is Schwinn.

The rear rims are sadly, I think, beyond repair. There is heavy rust inside and out. This is where I have to make a decision as to whether to proceed with a museum restoration or just make it functional again. I chose the latter because I can keep my eyes out for chrome rims down the road.

Another thing, the rims are 28 spokes and 24" inches which is apparently a more difficult size to find these days, especially in chrome. We need to use this size because that's how many spokes are on the 3 spd rear end hub so unless we change that hub out, we need 28 spoke rims at least on the drive side. We could mix and match left to right because only one wheel is driven, but I decided to make left and right the same.

The rear basket / gear frame part had some warpage in the tubing. We tapped this out with a urethane mallet.

Also, the rear sprocket housing that connects the pedal chains to the rear axle is surprisingly weak considering how much torque it has to deal with. So, I may lengthen the axle internally so that the force from the riders is dispersed to both sides of the vehicle instead of just one. As it sits right now, only one wheel is driven and all the force is being absorbed by a shaft that runs only halfway across the back of the bike.

We found one weird thing. The sprocket on the rear axle is attached to the axle with both a roll pin and a set screw. No idea why. It seems like the set screw may have been added to counteract wobble in the roll pin or vice versa. Which is why we are looking at putting an axle that spans the entire rear of the bike.

Okay, that's where we are at right now.

Sadly, the paint was roached, so I am stripping it all off.