Miyata
Japanese manufacturer of bicycles, unicycles and fire extinguishers

Miyata is a Japanese manufacturer of bicycles, unicycles and fire extinguishers. The company has been in operation since 1890. Miyata was also one of the first producers of motorcycles in Japan under the name Asahi. The Asahi AA was the first mass-produced motorcycle in Japan.
Miyata claims to have been the first Japanese manufacturer of flash-butt welded frame tubes (1946) and the first to use electrostatic painting (1950).
History
Miyata was founded by Eisuke Miyata (宮田栄助 1840-1900), a bowyer and engineer from Tokyo who also made components for rickshaws. Eisuke's second son, Eitarō, apprenticed in a local munitions facility and later earned a degree in mechanical engineering from Kyoto University. In 1874, Eisuke moved the family to Shiba and in 1881 opened Miyata Manufacturing in Kyōbashi, Tokyo. The factory produced guns for the Imperial Japanese Army including the Murata rifle, and knives for the Navy. In 1889, a foreigner visited Miyata to ask the gunmakers to repair his bicycle.
“Miyata” enters the record as japanese manufacturer of bicycles, unicycles and fire extinguishers. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Miyata, Japanese and manufacturer can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 16, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2869287. VIAF identifies the subject as 252622358. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1890, 1946, 1950 and 1840.
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This entry incorporates text from “Miyata” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.