Within a few years of incorporating their bicycle company, partners Ignaz Schwinn and Adolph Arnold were leaders in the American bike industry. These innovators brought built-in kickstands and balloon tires to bicycle riders. They wheeled out one of their most popular models, the Sting-Ray, in 1963, and it was an instant hit. The Sting-Ray remained in production until 1979, with a nostalgic reissue in 1998.
Low Riders
In 1960s Los Angeles, lowrider cars were very popular. Soon the trend spread to motorcycles. Kids joined the movement by bending the forks in their bicycles to stretch them out and lowering the bikes to make them look like chopper motorcycles. They tricked out their bikes by adding mirrors and streamers.
Birth of the Sting-Ray
Al Fritz, a young engineer at Schwinn in Chicago, got a phone call from a friend in Los Angeles in 1963. His friend told him that used Schwinn 20-inch bike frames were in high demand. Kids were converting them into low riding bikes with long handlebars and banana seats. Fritz built a prototype based on his friend's description. Initially, his colleagues mocked it, but they had to admit it was a fun bike to ride. Fritz came up with the name Sting-Ray for his new design.
Immediate Demand
Fritz was confident of the Sting-Ray's appeal. In an interview with Liz Fried, author of the book "Schwinn Sting-Ray," Fritz said he bet Frank Schwinn, son of Ignaz, $20 that they'd sell 25,000 Sting-Rays in the next six months. They sold 40,000, and would have sold more if production had kept up with demand, Fritz said. By the end of 1964, Sting-Rays accounted for 70 percent of bike sales in the U.S.
Muscle Bikes
Muscle cars reached their height of popularity in the 1970s. New versions of the Sting-Ray incorporated muscle car features, like treadless rear tires and sissy bars. Some models had stick shifts and front sprockets that looked like the mag wheels popular on cars. Schwinn reinforced this connection with drag-racing by doing Sting-Ray photo shoots at race tracks. Soon Deluxe and Superdeluxe Sting-Rays were available at correspondingly high prices. A series of high-end Sting-Rays called Krates was introduced in 1968. These were discontinued after 1974, when the Consumer Product Safety Commission banned stick shifts on bikes because too many wheelie-popping kids were impaling themselves in the groin. By the end of the 1970s, BMX bikes were rising in popularity, and public preference swung towards these lighter weight bicycles.
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