How old is my uni?

Just got given on, no photo yet, but it has a crazy coyote uni sticker on the front,
The seat post is of the old lever clamp style 16" wheel ,says made in Taiwan

Just learned to ride this year

The bearings are of a enclosed type and slide up into the fort and is held in place with 2 bolts





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It seems to be a basic unicycle from the 80s? Lollypop bearing holders were standard until somewhere in the 90s, the saddle is from the pre-miyata era I think.

@johnfoss would be able to do a pretty good guess of age on this uni I think!

Did Miyata create the standard unicycle seat post to saddle interface?

thank you for the info!

MIYATA? not a clue what that is!

Similar to your uni but a different seat mounting and seat style. This style is the fore father of the modern unicycle saddle. Check out these two eBay listings.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.unicycle.com/nimbus-miyata-standard-seatpost-25-4-x-300mm/&ved=2ahUKEwi7htPP_aaJAxX0EFkFHW_OEVsQr4kDegQIFRAD&usg=AOvVaw1qO7R0RMRkJPO89V2HduZy

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.ebay.com/itm/256395284459&ved=2ahUKEwjql-Tw-6aJAxWMN2IAHRqrNtAQr4kDegQIGhAD&usg=AOvVaw0uSL-BvZQ4THLrGgXSuqrh

A bit of history of the (US) market around the 80s: That particular type of bearing was never the standard; it represents bad engineering. They were a less expensive solution, but you should never attach bolts to a curved piece of thin steel; if you put any stress on that joint, the metal will eventually come apart around the bolts and the frame will be toast. Good solid design otherwise (not counting saddle), but hard use would always lead to frame failure.

If there was a standard for that particular era in the US/Canada, Schwinn would still probably be it. Miyata, which was arguably the best unicycle available at the time, were hard to find; not common in bike shops. They had a lollipop bearing also, but flat on top so it wouldn’t fall apart. The bolts were undersized though; heavy duty riding would lead to stripped bolts but those were much easier to replace.

Estimated age of your Coyote uni? 1980s. Hard to narrow down from there. It’s nearly an exact match for a batch of 50 we bought for a school on Long Island around 1987. Those had the same saddle but painted frames, and a better bearing setup, with the half-circle cap on the bottom, and a bolt in front and back of the bearing.

Yes and no. Miyata may have manufactured more unicycles than any other maker, due to the large size of the Japanese market. Japan has more unicyclists than the rest of the world combined, and multiplied several times. But their post/saddle interface changed multiple times during the 80s and 90s. When Unicycle.com and other newer companies started making unicycles, many started with Miyata-type posts. Kris Holm, at the time, preferred the Schwinn design, which lead to people later thinking it was the KH standard. That would be accurate except for its point of origin. While Schwinns were derived from the Loyd design, they were the ones who came up with that style of seatpost mount and bolt pattern.

Miyata definitely had an influence on the designs of saddles in the 2000s and beyond, probably because they were used by tons of riders in the 2000s, held up well, and had replaceable (and functional!) bumpers.

I never saw that Coyote sticker before; it may have been put on by a store that was reselling them. What you have is a solid, basic unicycle from the 80s. Fine for learning, basic riding around, etc. but not recommended for lots of jumping around, Trials, etc. :slight_smile:

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Miyata is a Japanese unicycle brand, these unicycles are primarily ridden by Japanese people. (They also built Koga Miyata bicycles). I think the brand still exists. 25 years ago I bought MKS G6000 pedals and Miyata saddles here for my shop :slight_smile:

The site and the unicycles are still there and they still look the same.

https://item.rakuten.co.jp/mys/c/0000000242/

When I think about what this steel saddle was like (like in the picture above). I used it to set my 24-hour record in 1991. After just 1 hour everything hurt because it only had a bit of foam on a steel plate and the screw threads on the side wore holes through your trousers and caused wounds on your inner thighs when you rode long distances.

The Miyata saddles were much, much better. They are actually still good now because they have a flat design. I once fitted one with my Unicorn grip and it rode really fast. But it was less comfortable compared to today’s saddles. You quickly feel your tailbone.

Thank you everybody for posting, very interesting to find out about this old uni i got given and resurected!

There is no doubt that the Schwinn dominated the market for a long time in the 1970’s and 1980’s. I have owned a few and I still own one and ride it every now and again. It is actually a very clever and simple design. I can find a Schwinn uni for sale on eBay, market place or Craigslist any day of the week. They are out there and rideable ,a tribute to their quality.

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Yes Miyata is still around, though they appear to have a lot more competition in the Japanese market (for unicycles). Miyata represents the high end; the competitors mostly come in at a lower price point. Miyata Bicycles dates back to the 1890s or early 1900s. They were present in the American market up until the mid 1990s or so, but left due to competition eating away at their bottom line. But they arranged a deal to keep importing unicycles via their warranty parts department. This meant we could still get them (in the US), but they were only sending two shipments a year. Including replacement parts. So if you broke a hub and there were none available, you might have to wait up to six months for the next container to arrive to their US warehouse. Those were the days…

But those extra few years were a gift to the unicycling community; they got us to the beginning of unicycling’s dot-com era, with Unicycle.com starting to make their own unicycles and innovate into newer areas of unicycling, namely Muni, at first, followed by Road (following the Coker), then Trials, etc.

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As described, that post is a “Rosetta Stone” for unicycle saddles, with both the Schwinn/KH bolt pattern and the (recent) Miyata bolt pattern in one. Very handy if you have a mix of saddles laying around. Note that older Miyatas may have a different bolt pattern, though that one goes back quite a few years. The Miyatas I have date back to 1979, with that oldest example having the seat riveted to the post. That one may have been a prototype; don’t know if the production ones were like that. All the Miyatas I remember from the 80s had bolts/nuts.

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