| | | KHK Story
The path Tomizo Kohara followed
- devotion to gear-making
17. The Postwar Gear Industry | 
A scene of the completion ceremony of the new factory
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There were three types of gear producers in the postwar period:
- The one that took care of gear-cutting as a subcontractor.
- The one that mainly produced gearboxes and speed reducers.
- The one that carried out all the gear production process; material-sawing, turning, gear-cutting, heat treating, grinding, etc.
Of these three types, not a single gear producer belonged to the category of "big business."
As for Kohara Gear, it fell under the type (a). The problem that the gear producers of type (a) had, in those days, was that they tended to be easily affected by the economic fluctuations. Business was at the mercy of the market. So, planning production schedules was extremely difficult for them.
Tomizo Kohara thought he must do something to improve the situation. And he decided to take action for reform at full tilt. His conclusion was that the future lay in the standardized gears. Thus, he hit on the idea of manufacturing standardized gears and then paved the way for today's KHK stock gears.
Go back to Story No.16
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