I have almost no experience with unicycles, only once for about twenty minutes with a friend’s 20" uni but that one try at it got me hooked. Since then I have spent a lot of time online learning about unis, the mechanical and technical details of the various sizes of unis and the website opinions of numerous riders, and the two most important bits of information I have gathered are; 1) by far the most recommended size for a beginner is the 20" uni, and 2) beginners invariably crash, drop and fall MANY times while learning to ride one, so it makes good sense to get started with an inexpensive beginners model and not a fancy new expensive one. And so two days ago I placed an order at my LBS for one of the new Schwinn 20" models, a slightly modified reproduction of the earlier Schwinn unis and I should have it in another week or so. The good thing is that I am not in any hurry to learn how to ride one, so I have the luxury of being able to take my time about it. Anyway, I am looking forward to this.
Congratulations on your purchase! Have fun learning. It will be impossible at first – you probably read that too. One of the best things about unicycling is knowing you’re doing something that you were once 100% sure was impossible.
I’m surprised that you ended up choosing the Schwinn after all your reading. How did you decide on that one? The conventional advice on here is to get something used/inexpensive, because you’ll “buy up” later on, once you decide which direction you want to go with unicycling.
The Schwinn is a classic, and the modernized version corrects some of the older version’s quirks. But it still has the limitation of 1" increments for setting the seat height. If you want, you can modify this to 1/2" increments, but this is only necessary if you don’t like any of the available holes.
The crashing and dropping isn’t a reason not to buy an expensive one. Crashing and dropping doesn’t really end if you want to keep improving your skills and good ones handle it anyway.
Advice to start on a cheap one is to save wasting money if it turns out you don’t take to it. Cheap unicycles have very little resale value so it is best to get one from someone who gave up rather than buy a new one.
It is easiest to learn in a trials uni which has a fat tyre and relatively long cranks. If your friend had one of them you might find it surprisingly harder on your Schwinn.
Either way, learning is mostly about persistence. I can’t believe that I learnt at all on my first little uni but I did because I was determined and never gave up.
If you take to riding it doesn’t matter what you learn on because you will end up with a collection. My original $10 investment in my first uni led to my current collection of about 18 wheels with replacement value in the thousands of dollars.
Post how you are progressing and everyone will offer advice. Some of it might even help.
Part of the reason as to why I did not look for a well-used, garage-sale uni is because I quite recently moved into the area I am now in, so I do not know where to look around here, and even then I want to physically check one out for any mechanical flaws which might not appear on Internet advertisements, etc. So, I went to the uni website probably most everybody here could be familiar with (does mentioning a commercial website here constitute advertising/spam?) and took a long look at all of the different unis for sale there. Along with the 20" beginner models, I noticed that Freestyle, Trials and Street unis are big on the 20" wheel, too, which makes a 20" beginners model even more attractive.
Eventually there were a few, low cost 20" beginners models which had my attention and the Schwinn won by only a thin margin for technical reasons but the other two were close contenders. Yes, I agree about the longer crank arms and the Schwinn comes with 125mm crank arms on its 20" wheel, which leans it away from the Freestyle category and more toward the Street and Trials category, my thinking that good maneuverability control at the slowest of speeds is what I need to focus on, and the Schwinn also comes with a slightly wider tire, which also is more in line with Street and Trials. Yes, I read the part about the Schwinn having only a singlewall wheel rim not suited, not strong enough for extreme use. But its sales price was not extreme, not like the expensive other model I liked, and I thought OK, the relatively low cost of the Schwinn is the price I pay to find out whether I can learn how to ride a uni, or not. And yes, I have no doubt that persistence is the key to success when it comes to learning how to ride a uni.
I responded to both of you in some detail three days ago but apparently I got timed out for my lengthy writing so I had to login again and then resubmit my post. I thought as a new user here that I was being checked out or something like that, hence the delay, but on my phone just now I got a notice that I have your posts waiting for my reply. Anyway, hello, and here I am.
unicycle.com gave me a great look at the wide range of uni choices, smallest to largest, and the 20" uni is most recommended for beginners. I considered that beginners invariably crash, fall and drop their uni a lot, making a scratched and dinged up mess of them, and so I decided to go with a very basic, low cost beginners model. The Hoppley, Club and Schwinn Retro 20" models became my choices, and, for the same list of reasons that got me timed out a few days ago, I went for and am now going with the Schwinn. My objective is to learn how to ride one on flat, level, unobstructed places, and the Schwinn looks just fine for doing all of that.
Thanks! Yeah, I agree that numerous short attempts will be better than a fewer number of smaller ones. And yeah, I can see where persistence is necessary. But all I need to do is remember that gravity always works straight down and so it becomes a matter of dealing with that.
I like how you put the quotes on “IMPOSSIBLE”, and your (current) avatar is of what UDC calls an Impossible Wheel. I prefer to call them by their earlier name, B.C. Wheels. Guess why.
That is a signature-worthy quote for sure. That simple fact about which way gravity goes, takes me back to my earlier days of learning. Suprise! Yup, gravity is still working…
Of the lowest cost beginners models, there were three I was looking at, but by using information I had gleaned about the top-grade unis and by review comments I had read, the Schwinn 20" uni seemed to be my best choice. True, it is not designed or made to perform wild and crazy stunts and tricks, but it seems to have about all of the necessary beginner qualities at a reasonably low price. Well, if I ever do learn how to successfully ride a uni then maybe I could upgrade to something better but for now I think the Schwinn will be just fine.
I got my new Schwinn 20" Retro uni last week, unassenbled as requested, gave it a long lookover, a nice piece of machinery and I did not find any objectionable faults.
