1996 Kona Kilauea

[sam_shelton]

Just did some reading around the serial number. If I understand this correctly the F means it is the Fairly bike company and made in Taiwan. The 5 would indicate a 1995 date? The plot thickens!

 

[Pipmeister]

Blimey, this is indeed curious. The frame was indeed welded at the Fairly Works in April 1995, which rules out it being sold in 1994. The 1995 Kilauea is also made from Tange Prestige Concept Tubing, and your frame's serial number is just about in keeping with production for that year - most but not all frames are welded up during the previous year from the Catalogue model.

The Kilauea in particular has thrown up a few anomalies in the past with regards to a colour that differs from the Catalogue listing, but I'll give this some more thought.

Pip

 

[sam_shelton]

I quite like having an outlier! I preferred this colour scheme to the green ones I see so often.

 

[sam_shelton]

Blimey, this is indeed curious. The frame was indeed welded at the Fairly Works in April 1995, which rules out it being sold in 1994. The 1995 Kilauea is also made from Tange Prestige Concept Tubing, and your frame's serial number is just about in keeping with production for that year - most but not all frames are welded up during the previous year from the Catalogue model.

The Kilauea in particular has thrown up a few anomalies in the past with regards to a colour that differs from the Catalogue listing, but I'll give this some more thought.

Pip

Would that suggest that this is an early 1996 model welded in 1995 but using prestige tubing? Perhaps it was then also painted in 1995 colour but decals applied in 1996?

 

[Pipmeister]

As I indicated earlier, your frame is in keeping with a 1995 model, both date of production, and tubing. It would appear that it was somewhat late in production for 1995 (for the reasons that I mentioned earlier) and as such has ended up with the next years Decals. The Silver colour threw me a bit, as that was the colour for the 1994 model, which has the same Tange tubing.

You do have therefore a cool example of a mixture from 2 different years. Tange Prestige Concept Tubing, but with Decals from the following year's production of 1996, which ordinarily had Columbus Cyber Tubing.

Pip

 

[Pipmeister]

We are leap frogging with our posts here, but yes your frame is an early 1996 model, but using the previous year's tubing - an accolade usually found on the Custom models, like the Hot. It is the case that each year's production is usually started around the middle of the previous year, so yours has ended up with the tubing from that previous year's spec.

The 1995 Kilauea is painted with a Pearl White finish, so yours with it's Silver colour is also a further anomaly

Pip

 

[Pipmeister]

Here is the best example that I have on record of the 1995 Pearl White, which has a bit of a pearlescent finish

1995 Kilauea 19_1 by Philip Mock, on Flickr


Pip

 

[sam_shelton]

Thanks Pipmeister. I quite like the white as well.

 

[pw_pw_la]

Not knowing anything about Kona's or their codings and workings, but is it possible this could be a model made specifically for their 96 catalog shoot?

Might explain why it's an older frame in newer (then forthcoming) colours...

Dunno. Interesting bike tho!

 

[Mortonm]

Nice looking bike! Glad to see the experts are on the scene as it looked odd to me as well with all those different attributes.

Partial to special edition Kilaueas myself. Looking forward to future updates