Johnny Alien

There was a thread in the value section about a Miyata 1000LT and I mentioned that I thought the LT was made in Korea but I guess I don't really remember where or when I heard this or if there is any truth to it.

Anyone know what (if any) the differences between the 1000 and the 1000LT are. I know the LT came out in the late 80's or early 90's but don't have alot more info than that.

High Fist Shin

This website might help answer some of those questions:

https://www.miyatacatalogs.com/

miamijim

No Miyata 1000 or 6XX series was ever made anywhere other than Japan.

LT = Luxurious Touring similar to Peugeots 'LE' (higher luxury or more luxury). Miyatas were never known to be lightweight bikes, if your peruse the catalogs you'll notice weights aren't listed. LT's were lighter than previious non-LT 1000's.

High Fist Shin

Thanks, Jim, for clearing that up. I must admit I didn't know the difference.

Bruce Enns

Au Contraire,

The Technical Spec sheet in every catalog shows the weights of all the Miyata's. Model for model with most other brands they were NOT heavy.

1000LT Miyata's offered the splined triple butted tubing that is held in high regard to this day, they were a bit lighter than the early 1000's which used double butted tubing. Some of the best bikes Japan ever built in my opinion.

Miyata racing bikes were as light as any from that era.

illenvillain

I know Im resurrecting a very old thread, but was hoping to get some more info on the subject. Apart from the LT being lighter what other differences are there between the 2 models?

seedsbelize 

I saw High Fist Shin and knew something was amiss.

sd5782 

Not sure about details, but my 1989 LT has the 7 speed freehub vs a freewheel on the previous year. Also new that year was the intro of 105 brake levers and shifters I believe. Perhaps that was enough to inspire the LT name.

rgvg

I think the 1000/LT changed specs over the years. Probably every year was a little different. In that sense, it seems to me it's just a name change.

RiddleOfSteel

The only difference, truly, is the addition of "LT" to the end of the "1000." It is literally the same bike, just with more letters in its name. Top of the line, with whatever componentry they saw fit to outfit it with. 1986 was the last year of the "1000" or "One Thousand" name, and 1987 was the first year of the "1000 LT" name. Here are the catalogs.

We need to sticky the Miyata catalog location as it has changed since 2009.

illenvillain

Really no difference in ride quality?

John Nolan 

https://www.ragandbone.ca/Miyata/miyata_selector.html

RiddleOfSteel

I suppose this is more obvious than my link of the same address "Here are the catalogs" in that quoted post.

RiddleOfSteel

Dude, I don't know what to tell you. I would encourage you to click on the link in my post (to the Miyata catalogs) and do some investigative work yourself.

I hope that I am remotely correct in assuming that, in your life, you've seen a number of companies change the name of their product without changing the actual product. Or that most every company incrementally changes or evolves a product year-to-year. Or that every bike company is constantly changing their bikes year to year, and thus performance, comfort, ride quality, and feel/geometry are inevitably bound to be different from one year to the next.

If the stem length, for a given size of frame offered for that year, is changed--even as little as 5mm (trust me)--the ride quality will change. If the tire company is different from one year to the next, the ride quality will change. If the tire size is different, the ride quality will change. If the tire manufacturer's spec's for that tire (that has no name change) are different, the ride quality will change. If the saddle, or the bar tape, or the bar, or the brake levers, or the brake lever position, or the spokes, or the spoke count, or the rims, change, the ride quality will change.

You have to ask a better or more specific question. Or, you have to, honestly, divorce yourself from the (misleading) premise that an extremely minor name change of a bike model--within one year's span--somehow results in a massively different version of that model. As I said before, every year is an evolution in bike land. That's obvious. A minor name change/addition to a given model, in this case, from research, is not the droid you're looking for. In the early '90s, Cannondale changed the name of their touring bikes to have a T-xxxx format instead of an STxxxx (so, an ST1000 became a T-1000; an ST700 became a T-700 etc) and nobody was thrown for a loop as it was the same bike (or rather, frameset)

I will do you a favor and state a few things from the 1986 and 1987 catalogs that I found. The ad/descriptive copy for the 1986 1000 and the 1987 1000 LT is the same. Literally. That tells you, if the "1000" in the name didn't already, that this is a model in the same station or rank as before. Miyata had long had a 1000, a 6xx, and (later) a 2xx in their touring/touring-focused model range. The 1000 has always been the top, grand touring offering. The 610/615 GT has always been a sport touring offering. The 2xx has always been the budget touring offering.

These years saw Miyata firmly in the "Splined Triple-Butted" tube era. The spec chart at the back of the catalogs describes the frame and fork in identical terms. The tires are the same, best I can deduce from the cut-off catalog scans (of those back pages). After evolving from 1979 to about 1984/5, Miyata dialed in the 1000's geometry and altered it minorly after that. Now, a 5mm chain stay length change certainly could/does affect ride quality. 1985 1000's had 450mm chain stays, 1986 1000's don't have any geometry listing (geometry and tubing being the usual suspects for ride quality changes/assessments), and 1987 1000 LT's have 445mm chain stays. The head tube and seat tube angles of 72° and 72° (in the normal to large sizes) had been set in stone years ago, and remained. Fork rake and resulting trail was essentially unchanged.

Anyway, that's all I got. Your best recourse may simply be to buy both a 1986 1000 and 1987 1000 LT, build them identically, and report back to us. Not only will you have an answer, but we will, too, and we'll all be better for it.

The Golden Boy 

RiddleOfSteel has it- it's JUST a name change for the model year.

The Miyata 1000LT isn't a "Luxe Touring" package added on to a Miyata 1000. There was no "Miyata 1000" beneath it. It's just one year it was called a Miyata 1000, the next year it was called the Miyata 1000LT.

John Nolan 

Sorry, RiddleofSteel, I didn't notice the link.

RiddleOfSteel

It's alright. Having the URL written out and then used as a link is helpful. Rag and Bone is a seemingly weird domain to host something regarding bicycle catalogs, so I think you help it stick in people's minds better by having it written out.

John Nolan 

Yeah, it's my domain...I'm a puppeteer, and when the old locale went missing, I thought I might as well host.

The Golden Boy 

The "Rag and Bone" name as always intrigued me when I've seen it- I just went poking around your site- that looks so cool!

And in case no one else has said it today- thank you for hosting the catalogs.

Hobbiano 

A big thanks from here too!