Le Tour - Dating
 

I could not find a appropriate forum for this so I'm putting it here. Anyways...

I just saved a Schwinn Le Tour out of the garbage of a fellow neighbor. At its present state it is a 10-speed, but I'm planning on converting it. But I first wanted to see if I could find out the date of it (curiousity). I looked all over the frame but the only place with any type of number was the bottom bracket. First at one place it has a "B" off to the side followed by nothing. The it has "W8677" in the center of the bottom bracket. Now you my also note that the crank set says "Japan" and the brakes are Wienmann (they no longer make brakes). Also all the decal have been removed and the bike has been repainted at least 4 times, so the only way I knew it was a Le Tour is because the cranks have "Le Tour" endented on them.

Thanks for the help

Do a search in the vintage forum... should give you a bunch of leads.

there use to be a serial number chart on the schwinn site, but the link to it from sheldon brown's site doesn't seem to be working. perhaps the link isn't valid on the schwinn site any longer... there is a collectors forum on the schwinn site though. this site might be of use as well:

http://oldschwinn.com/how_old_is_my_schwinn/index.html

Paging "schwinnbikelove", where are you and can you help this person????

Well I assumed it was made in Japan because of the cranks, and this site says that the serial number would be on the name plate on the stem. But the name plate is missing, so...not quite sure now what to do

Just because the crank is Japanese doesn't mean the bike is...