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I own five lightweight Schwinns, two Racers, two Travelers, and one Speedster. With those five-speeds, I thought that I had died and gone to heaven! Enjoy it.Thanks VS, for the detailed explanation on the desirability of those pedals - makes total sense! And, thanks for the Schwinn catalog links - greatly appreciate those (and have bookmarked them)! I was able to locate my first new Schwinn in the '69 catalog - a Collegiate Sport in Sierra Brown. Your '68 Racer 3 speed is a nice bicycle that was built to last. I could take a coaster brake apart and reassemble with no problem, but once I got that 3-speed apart I had no idea what all those bits were. Indestructible unless you had a curious little brother with a few hand tools at his disposal. Lightweight (relatively speaking!) with those skinny 26 X 1-3/8 tires and the indestructible Sturmey-Archer 3-spd hub - it didn't get much better than that especially when faced with climbing the hills around our neighborhood! Really makes one appreciate what is available to us, now. If you had a 3-spd (we called them "English bikes" back then) you were king-of-the-hill. It's funny, I grew up in the age of single-speed, coaster brake bikes. So, thanks again, for all of the kind words. And, the mechanical bits which are pretty simple, even the S-A rear hub. Thanks, all, for the nice comments! And, in the scheme of things, the Schwinn Racer really was just a "light" restoration.
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Your probable closest maximum market valuation would likely be what noted Schwinn volume seller (shadow27.on Ebay) routinely gets for his completed ebay sales transactions of such bicycles. Schwinn electroforged lightweights have no real collector value at the present, though they are great bicycles. Fear not, however because your old Racer still has the value of being a functional, good condition, quality constructed, durable, ordinary general purpose bicycle. Your modern aftermarket pedals on your '68 Racer 3 speed today are better from a practical-actual riding standpoint than the ancient oem style pedals, but to the very very small collector subset that wants all original '68 Racers or other Schwinn lightweights it reduces value by at least what the current market value of those oem Schwinn pedals, which likely in most cases exceeds the market value of entire '68 Racers and other Schwinn lightweights. Often, they'll acquire a typical Racer, Collegiate, Breeze, Speedster, CO-ED, Traveler from the Sixties, and then just pirate the pedals and otherwise dispose, part out, or junk the remainder of the old Schwinn since their sole focus is the high rise banana seat bikes and the cantilever boys' Opie Taylor type style that dominated before the banana seat bikes hit the scene in 1963. The banana seat folks that love the 20 inch wheeled sting-rays and the folks that love the 26"(559mm) wheeled middleweight cantilever frame sixties beach cruisers from sweet ol' chicago will pay for those ordinary black waffle pattern Schwinn pedals. Vette people want the original GM part that is time period correct and the lowly unloved Corvair also had that tele column as a factory option on the '65-'66 Corvair CORSA. The Corvette people began paying more than $200 for them twenty years ago for the Corvair tele column, outbidding the notoriously tightwad Vair folks, essentially depleting the used parts supply of Vair tele columns immediately each time one comes to market. It is like car restoration folks doing Corvette restorations that pay a thousand bucks for a telescoping steering column from a '65 -'66 Chevrolet Corvair. That is the sole reason that the pedals that thrifty bill mentioned are more valuable than many entire Varsity, Racer, and Speedster models. As wrk101 pointed out, the crazies look for sources of those ordinary black waffle pattern Schwinn pedals without reflectors that are period correct for the other more valuable children Schwinn bike restorations.