I have seen JAL release award seats as little as 3 days prior to departure. Also, the times I am seeing lately from Central time zone would be convert closer to 4-5AM Tokyo time. There has not been any rhyme or reason to the releases of unsold award seats for the last 9 months. All of this I find very frustrating, as JAL and ANA have lots of unsold seats. At least JAL is releasing award seats to their JAL Mileage Bank members.