History - Development, Manufacturing and Team
DiamondBack originated from the US in Southern California. It was a division of Centurion Bicycle Company (parent being Western States Imports) who had been selling 10 speed bikes for the past ten or so years.
Diamond Back was so called because Centurion thought the frame resembled two diamonds and snakes were 'kickin'
The original frameset kits started to show up around the end in 1976, though manufacturing started in 1977 after early race testing and improvement recommendations by Wheels 'n Things.
Their initial intention was to concentrate on getting the bike into the Californian market rather that national.
When production started, early models were constructed by the same company who assembled FMF and SE using materials such as Chromoly and mild steel. The original forks were dual dropout copies of a race fork “speedo” because Sandy Finkelman liked their design and some early DiamondBack went with a similar format.
Early bikes were more commonly known as just DiamondBack and not 'models' even though brochures advertise the 'very first' as MX.
In late 1978 manufacturing was moved to the Koizumi factory in Japan (which was probably due to the strength of trading overseas) with the launch of the early pro models, Small, Standard and Large, all Chromoly with Steel dropouts.
By 1980 (March) and backed up by the experience and assetts of Centurion, Diamond Back formed a race team to spearheard a National push, compiling of the already and well established DB rider David Clinton and additional names such as Harry Leary, Doug Davis, Mike Horton, Aaron Stevens, Eddy King and Pete Loncarevich under the umbrella of Sandy Finkelman.
It wasn't until 1981 when the more successful updated Pro range was available in Mini, Medium and Senior, or a custom Kit was available (all were full Chromoly framesets)
With Harry Leary on board and design/development driven by Sandy Finkelman, the Senior Pro became the testing platform and benchmark for the later released Harry Leary signature 'Turbo' in mid 1982. Leary himself provided vast input into the Turbo since it was to be his signature model. Later that year cam the tri-moly Silver Streak, similar geometry to the medium pro, but a mild steel rear triangle and slightly thicker dropouts (steel).
In 1982 DiamondBack had already commisioned Akisu (Taiwan) to produce a low end model, the Pro-Star and with the economic climate weakening in the US by late 1983, some model production was moved to Akisu, these being the Pro-Star replacement Viper and Pacer 500. Higher end styles such as the Formula One and 2nd generation Harry Leary continued to be manufactured in Japan, but the original "large diamond" gusset underwent a facelift (as did the Harry Leary ) and were replaced by a noticeably smaller diamond/gusset amoungst other changes.
DiamondBack dropped the Pacer, fearing the name was the main reason for reduced BMX sales and decided to continue with the highly successful Viper, hence the Super Viper, which was primarily a Pacer 500 frame and forks and the last of the looptail frames.
1986 came which saw the end of the Diamond gussett, DB were using the same frame for several models and for some, the end of an era.