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Honda History


Honda Motorcycles - A Five Decade JourneyBy Staff WriterHonda has grown to become a top manufacturer of motorcycles. Its history can be considered a journey through five decades of forward thinking and technological innovations.Soichiro Honda's success parallels the classic rags-to-riches fable - the lone individual starting in a humble setting, battling odds and succeeding, through talent, ingenuity, and good fortune. In a nation noted for reserve, Mr. Honda was and is often direct, frequently exuberant, sometimes hilarious, and always confident. He preferred getting his hands greasy in the shop over shuffling papers in the office. He chose learning on the job over academic paper chases. Yet when he realized that there was a deficiency in his technical knowledge, he did not hesitate to enroll in a technical high school - at age 29. The year was 1935. The motivation: learn why he was having problems manufacturing piston rings.Before his venture into piston rings, Honda was employed as a technician. Automobiles, rather than motorcycles, were his first love. He dreamed of racing. After completing eight years of schooling, he joined an auto repair shop at age 15. Two years later, he became a Harley owner and then an Indian rider.He opened his own auto and motorcycle repair shop in 1928 while pursuing his hobby, building racing cars. That same year, he applied for his first patent, for casting automobile wheel spokes. He organized Tokai Seiki Company, Ltd. to experiment with manufacturing piston rings. After initial failures, he sought further education which enabled him to successfully produce piston rings for automobiles, motorcycles and airplanes.In 1945, Honda sold his stock to Toyota and took a year off. His sabbatical included music-making and merriment. Refreshed, he launched Honda Technical Research Laboratory in October of 1946. His new venture added war surplus Tohatsu and Mikuni generator motors to bicycles to provide basic transportation for the war-torn nation.In November 1947, the 1/2 horsepower A-Type Honda was being manufactured and sold as a complete motorbike. Because the motorbike gave off a lot of smoke and a stench of turpentine it was known as the "Chimney".Soichiro Honda started Honda Motor Company in 1948, at the age of 41. Soon after, he hooked up with financial whiz Takeo Fujisawa and together they built an empire. Honda enlisted 13,000 bicycle shops in Japan as Honda dealers. This move, combined with a decently reliable product, catapulted the company forward.In 1948, Honda introduced a 90cc version of the A-Type known as the "B-Type".By 1949, Honda came out with the "D-Type". Mr. Honda was involved in every step of the two-stroke D-Type Dream's design and manufacture. This was Honda's first motorcycle. This was far from simply slotting a motor into a pushbike frame. Honda called his machine 'The Dream', because his dream of building a complete, motorcycle had come true. Soichiro Honda was an engineer and was always looking to produce better and more sophisticated machines.Honda had another dream and it turned out to be the 146cc, OHV, four-stroke E-Type Dream. A powerful machine producing 5 1/2bhp capable of 50mph. It had a steel frame and proper suspension front and rear. By October 1951, the new Dream was in production at the rate of 130 units per day. Sales success allowed Honda to focus vigorously on two key ingredients: quality and design.In 1952, Honda produced the first "Cub" F-Type, a 1/2 horsepower, 50cc, two-stroke engine that was produced in huge numbers. You could get one to fit to your pushbike or buy the complete red and white Honda "Auto Bai". Less than a year after its introduction, production was 6500 units per month, at that time it was 70% of Japan's powered two-wheeler market.Sales continued to boom, but the end of Korean War in 1953 triggered an economic depression in Japan that almost ruined Honda. The company survived, bolstered by the sale of Cub clip-on motors that were attached to bicycles. Healthy again, Honda produced the 90cc, four-stroke single, a motorcycle of even greater sophistication. This was known as the Benly; in Japanese this means "convenience". The J-Type Benly had a three-speed gearbox, produced 3.8bhp, a pressed steel frame, rear suspension with the engine and swinging arm on a sprung pivot, and telescopic front suspension. Before long, they were selling at a rate of 1000 units a month.

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