In 1938, Soichiro Honda, who was working for Art Shokai, decided to design his own piston rings which he sold to Toyota and soon after began construction on his Honda Piston factory in order to supply to Toyota but the factory was devastated during the Second Word War.
The first vehicle produced by Honda was a motor powered bicycle in the aftermath of the Second World War and he named his new company Honda Giken KŨgyŨ Kabushiki Kaisha or for those of us who only speak English it is quite simply the Honda Research Institute Company Ltd. Honda's first factory was nothing less than a small wooden shack in which he attached his Honda engine to bicycles and by 1948 Honda was officially a Japanese Company.
Over the next few years, Honda began to move their efforts into scooters and small motorcycles in which the designs continued with a small 98 cc engine well into the 1950's.
Today, Honda still continues to lead the world in technology, not just with motorcycles and cars but with their robotics and artificial intelligence research. While in most of the world, people only see the large dirt bikes, sport bikes and cruiser bikes as well as the small CR50's, but in Asia, where it all began, Honda still offers a line of small scooter like motorcycles with a horizontally opposed overhead cam single cylinder that produces over 20 horsepower from its small 98 cc engines. These scooter like motorcycles see a top speed of roughly 70 miles per hour and are available as both enduro and street models.
Original Authors: Nicholas
Edit Update Authors: M.A.Harris
Updated On: 04/06/2008
