Suntour
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| Traded as | SR Suntour Inc. |
|---|---|
| Industry | Bicycle components |
| Founded | 1912 |
| Headquarters | Changhua City, Taiwan |
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Area served
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Worldwide |
| Website | srsuntour-cycling |
SunTour® (Maeda) was the most important Japanese manufacturer of bicycle components based in Osaka until 1988, when Sakae Ringyo Company (abbreviated S.R.), a major Japanese maker of aluminum parts, particularly cranks and seat posts, bought what was left of the bankrupt SunTour, and the combined companies are now known as SR-SunTour. SunTour reached a zenith of sales and commercial success from the late 1970s to the mid-1980s. Its products range from suspension forks to derailleurs.
Begun in 1912 as Maeda Iron Works Company manufacturing freewheels and sprockets, the company concentrated on producing bicycle gearing components.
In the 1950s, the company began producing its version of pull-chain, rod-guided, touring derailleurs, similar to those of French derailleur companies such as Huret and Simplex.
In 1964, Suntour invented the slant-parallelogram rear derailleur. The parallelogram rear derailleur had gained prominence after Campagnolo's introduction of the "Gran Sport" in 1949, and the slant-parallelogram was an improvement of it that allowed the derailleur to maintain a more constant distance from the sprockets, resulting in easier shifting. The SunTour derailleur cost less than Campagnolo, Huret, Shimano, or Simplex and it performed especially well shifting under load, as when changing to a lower gear while pedaling up a steep incline. A contemporary Consumer Reports test reported that "SunTour was far and away the easiest to shift and the most certain of arriving at the right sprocket."
Suntour's slant-parallelogram, spring-loaded top pivot rear derailleur provided the best shifting on the market. When Suntour's rear derailleur patent expired, the design was promptly copied by Shimano.
In 1969, SunTour was the first Japanese gear and shifter manufacturer to introduce indexed shifting on bicycles (indexed shifting appeared at least as early as the Funiculo derailleur fitted to 1935 Shultz bicycles). Although their system, called Five-Speed Click, worked well, it proved an idea ahead of its time and did not catch on with the riding public. Another design innovation was the first practical Japanese freehub — the Unit-Hub - which combined freewheel and hub in one component (unit hubs were available at least as early as the 1938 Bayliss-Wiley, probably earlier). The freehub greatly increased the strength of the rear wheel, but the idea was not pursued.
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Wikipedia