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kuwahara Laserlite and fork  december 1982



Kuwahara kz1 chrome

Kuwahara was founded in Osaka, Japan in 1918 by Sentaro Kuwahara. It was a family run business with help from his wife and eight children that made and sold bicycles and bike parts at first in his neighborhood, then growing and expanding more. In 1925 Kuwahara began to export bicycles and parts to Russia, China and Southeast Asia. Kuwahara closed their doors for business temporarily from 1940 till 1945 due to World War II. In 1947 Kuwahara reopened again for business and Sentaro Kuwahara became the first chairman of the board of directors of the first bicycle wholesale association in Japan. In 1959 the very first and small shipment of bicycles were delivered to the USA. Sadly in 1960 founding company president Sentaro Kuwahara passed away and his Son, Masao Kuwahara took over in his place. In 1962 Kuwahara sent it's first shipment of APOLLO brand sport (10speed or 12speed road racing) bicycles to Canada. In 1968 Kuwahara started exporting bicycles to the USA as private label bikes for other companies such as Schwinn, Takara, Puch, Concord, Apollo, Azuki and others. Kuwahara had never produced their own Kuwahara brand bike outside of Japan until 1972 when Kuwahara began developing BMX bicycles for the US, Canada, European and Australian markets. During the middle 1970's the BMX boom had started and Kuwahara was regularly exporting Kuwahara brand BMX's to these countries. In 1979 Takuo Kuwahara became the new (and present) President of Kuwahara. He started up a Factory Kuwahara BMX team each in The US, Canada, Europe and Australia. In 1980 Kuwahara also started developing and exporting Mountain bikes to Canada and Australia. In 1982 Steven Spielbergs hit movie E.T. featured Kuwahara BMX's and famous riders of those days including Bob Haro. Many famous riders raced for the Factory Kuwahara teams such as Gary Ellis, Clint Miller, Joe Baumert, David Cullinan, Lee Medlin, Leo Green, Matt Harris and Kevin McNealve. Kuwahara International was founded and Kuwahara road race bikes were used by the Canadian Olympic team at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, Korea. Kuwahara's were also used by Germany, Switzerland, and Finland of the KUWAHARA MTB mountain bike XC team for the world cup. 1991 saw Kuwahara win it's first world championship UCI MTB series in Switzerland. In 1992 due to the escalating Japanese Yen, Kuwahara closed it's Japanese export business in Osaka and shifted that part overseas where it could be more competitive. Kuwahara International was then moved to Osaka, Japan where many interesting new bicycles were designed and won many awards around the world. In 2001 Universal Studios opened an amusement park in Osaka, Japan and Kuwahara set up a small exhibition for display. With the last remaining KZ frames from the 1980's Kuwahara re-released a reproduction model in the classic E.T colors. Kuwahara is still active today and very popular in Canada and other European countries.

1986 kuwahara bravo KT:


spray bomb

Won my first national as a 15Inter on a black Kuwahara Lazer Lite so there's always a special place in my heart for Kuwi's. 
But here's the thing....  I've looked into the database here and some other places and there is one model of Kuwahara that is never mentioned.
The Gary Ellis model.  Basically it was was an XXL Laser Lite with only 200 to 250 of them made.  I know because I had one.  I used to ride for the infamous Earl's Bicycle Factory in Belluve, Nebraska where many knew him now-a-days as the internet eBayer who had everything NOS before his passing.  I ended up selling that frame for $50 back in like 1993...  biggest mistake ever (that I'll admit to).  Have never seen one since.  I believe I still have some pictures of me jumping on it.  I'd hate for the history of Kuwahara to forget the greastest ride it created up until that point.

1984 Exhibitionist













Note two head tube decals installed / Looks like authentic factory mistake