Originally Posted by
merlinextraligh
for the love of god why?
After that effort and expense, you still have 28 pound bike with a gas pipe frame that rides like a turd. Same time and effort on any generic Chinese frame would be a dramatically better bike.
My first 10 speed was a Varsity and the bike had its place, but there’s no way that electoweld frame is worth putting coin and sweat into
In both cases, it is no more complicated than: "Because I could."
The prompt for the 28 pound green one was because on another bike I commuted on, the fully weighted panniers made it ride like trash with the load necessarily behind the axle to avoid heel strike. The Schwinn was a low cost way to see how a long wheel based bike would ride with the panniers in front of the rear axle & still be far enough behind to avoid heel strike. The result was when fully loaded was the CG rested between the bottom bracket & the seat clamp. The 70 degree HTA, the effective 73 degree STA (from the zero setback post) & 66mm trail made for a brilliant stable gravel/touring bike that"ll support tubeless 42's. The 19-109 gear inch range never left me wanting for more gears. I did my first gravel century on that bike.
A Schwinn Varsity's geometry is not that different than that of dedicated gravel bikes now. It just goes to show that the more things change, the more they stay the same...What's old is new again.
The red bike that weighs 25 pounds is my wifes commuter bike. I did that one to prove it can be done. For the love of the project. Just to be different. To save an old thing. To indulge sunk-cost tendencies. Take your pick.
As an added bonus, her bike, being a Schwinn; It presents a low-theft risk in the bike rack at her work where it lives 13 hours a day, 4 days a week. People see the head badge & keep right on walkin'
As for my bike, I like showing up to group rides & dropping the hammer with out all the loaded expectations & bias that my Cervelo loads into people. That -ish got real old. The Schwinn is disarming & approachable.