Vintage_Cyclist

Frank Berto wrote an article, called Sunset for Suntour, that outlines the history of Suntour and the factors that led to its demise.

Sunset for SunTour

pcb 

Suntour was just a brand name, owned by Maeda Industries. Maeda Ind. was the driving force behind everything branded Suntour. When Maeda (meaning chairman J. Kawai) perceived a need to offer complete component groups, they worked with their JEX partners to develop and produce the Suntour-branded components necessary to form a coherent grouppo. Early on some of those parts were just rebranded (Sanshin ProAm/Superbe hubs; MKS Unique Custom/Spb pedals), but by the time Spb Pro was released most of the outsourced parts were Suntour exclusives.

Shimano wasn't very different at first, they had JBM (Japanese Bicycle Manufacturers) before Maeda had JEX, with KKT making Shimano pedals, SR making Shimano cranks & probably seatposts, Suzue making Shimano hubs, etc. As Shimano grew they brought a lot of this manufacturing in-house, or became majority shareholders in their suppliers. Probably the only reason SR decided to merge with Suntour was Shimano bringing all their product in-house. When you only have one customer, and they cut you off, where do you go?

The thing about JEX was that, before indexing, bike mfg product managers weren't always spec'ing complete groups---they would try to spec a Suntour drivetrain w/DiaCompe-branded brakes, Sugino-branded cranks, MKS pedals, etc. Suntour didn't have Shimano's monopolistic mindframe or power to stop them, but it made them mighty angry. I was at a spec meeting with maybe Schwinn, where DiaCompe snagged brake spec on one model, and the Suntour account mgr was hopping angry. For months, anybody mentioning Yoshigai in the office triggered an angry rant from him.

DiaCompe, by the way, was also just a brand name, owned by Yoshigai Industries. In Japan they were usually referred to internally as Yoshigai; DiaCompe was only used when discussing specific components, or DiaCompe USA.

Shimano wouldn't allow product mgs to break up groups, by either pricing the individual components impossibly high when spec'd individually, or quoting impossibly long lead times for non-group orders. Somebody sued them in the US for monopolistic practices and won, but by that time indexing was happening and not many product managers were looking to spec anything but Shimano.

pcb 

Berto IMO is off on some of the details, but his general outline is pretty accurate. Maeda was hurting for both capital and manpower at a time when ATBs and indexing were increasing product complexity and shortening lead times. And J. Kawai's top-down management and product development made the problem worse.

One thing Berto didn't mention was Japan's lack of confidence in Suntour USA's pulse on the US market, and value in pre-production product testing. Long story short is most of the later product that failed in the market (ie, the US market didn't need/want it) or failed in the field (ie, insufficiently tested in Japan, breaks quickly in the US) was sent to Suntour USA for evaluation/testing after it was too late to make any changes. We'd get something useless, or that broke quickly, only to be told: "We already made the molds, can't make any changes." You could try to argue that engineering didn't have enough time, but they had enough time to test product in Japan before making the molds, and FedEx existed, so we could get stuff next day. And all it took was a fax asking "What do you think about this?" Didn't happen.

In fact, they usually didn't believe us when something broke. Pre-digital days, we couldn't shoot digipix/video and upload it, so we'd rush samples to the usual suspects, guys who broke lots of stuff, and rush the broken bits back to Japan. And they'd say Oh NO! What are we going to do?...

pcb 

You could argue that in the pre-indexing world. From '83-'84 onwards there were lots of under-designed, insufficiently-tested Suntour products rushed to market.

Shrevvy 

pcb 

Yessir, Suntour USA '84-'87, Maeda Kogyo '88-'89. Joined the season of "doesn't click, doesn't sell," and it was mostly a slow death spiral from there. Mostly great folks with mostly great intentions, doomed by lack of capital and poor Japan-side management.

Lascauxcaveman 

The inter-cooperative manufacturing/ownership structure of keiretsu is something that is foreign to most Americans but is quite common in Japan, and has been since the rebuilding their industrial machine after WWII. It's considered one of the main reasons Japan got so good, so fast, on many manufacturing tangents.

twobiscuits

I have a Q about SunTour hubs. I have a pair of XC 9000s (threaded freewheel version) on my 32 yo Alves bike (Alves = framebuilder Charles Ralph, in Scotland) and basically I couldn't expect any more from a hub. Solid threaded axle = indestructible, it would seem, and a while ago I got the tools and gave them their 2nd set of bearings = easy. I’ve also just bought and tried out an IRD freewheel and it works fine, so as far as I'm concerned, the hubs have an unlimited future.

Now I've just picked up a Mercian frame of about the same age, same 126 mm rear dropout spacing, and I'm looking at a pair of NOS SunTour XC hubs. I basically want to build up a very similar bike with just a slightly smaller frame, & very attracted to the idea of sticking to the thing that works. Question is, are the XCs the same thing? The XCs are a year or two earlier than the XC 9000s. Are they SunTour's first cartridge-bearing hubs?

Two points in particular:

1. Over on Velobase there's a comment to the effect that these have an odd sized bearing you can't get. I find that highly implausible. The XC 9000s have 6001 12-28 bearings. Anyone know what bearings are in the XCs? Oops I can't post a link bc I'm new here, but it's not too hard to find.
2. There's this odd shaped thing on one end that needs a special wrench (is it the GreaseGuard thing?) I could make the wrench if I have to, but can't you just unscrew the other end of the axle instead?

Many thanks to anyone who can enlighten me on this 👍🙏

VtwinVince

I just picked up a vintage wheelset for a Bianchi build, the rear is Suntour and the front is a Sunshine. The rear hub is certainly higher quality, but I'm impressed with the condition of these after 40 years.

twobiscuits

A post on my SunTour XC9000 hubs here, solid threaded axles, threaded freewheel and cartridge bearings. Interesting combination. https://www.twobiscuits.at/bikes/3815/

The Golden Boy 

Nice writeup!