Where is arai helmet made

Robotic arms and lasers ensure a perfect cut for the eye port. The shell will go through an initial inspection, then a second baking, and onto one of the very few machines used in the entire process of making an Arai, that of the laser which cuts out the eye port.

From there, the shell goes to the paint department, undergoing 10 to 15 different steps, depending on the model created. Wet sanders prep a shell for graphics. By the time an Arai is ready for graphics, it will have gained the weight of about four quarter-size coins. And the graphics are laid almost entirely by women, who company management say have more patience and ultimately do a better job than their male counterparts. Once an Arai is ready for shipping, it will have seen nearly 40 different pairs of hands.

The application of graphics is done solely by women. Helmets can indeed be beautiful, especially given the shape of an Arai, which has been in a continual evolution since the s. But the fact that an Arai has gone through so many people before it saves you from your next crash gives it a special significance.

Each size, and each specific model, has slightly different recipes. You might see as many as 20 separate materials in one helmet. Superfiber is threaded on a loom-like machine—mesh, matte, and reinforcement pieces are stamped out with huge die cutting presses, and all those components are distributed amongst the various factories.

In Shinto, skilled employees preassemble each set of the reinforcement pieces, either by stapling them to together or tacking them together with a heat-gun.

Those preassembled sets of reinforcement material are then inspected and weighed before introduced into the production line. Again, all these reinforcement sets are unique to the model and size of their respective helmets — a Ram-X will feature different construction than a Corsair-X, for example. A simple open-faced helmet made for low-speed riding may not feature the same mesh technology designed to keep the laminate pieces from sheering apart during high-speed impacts, for example.

Mesh technology is exactly that — a mesh that is introduced to the laminate process to help improve durability. When the shell laminates are pressed together, the cross-section of the mesh is the thickest point and digs into each side, effectively acting like rebar and preventing the two halves from delaminating.

Another example is the peripheral belt, a feature found on most Arai lids, which supports the upper area of the viewport from deformation during an accident. Again, not all helmets employ this feature. Even things like resin, which I previously thought were one dimensional, are always being analyzed and remixed to capitalize on their respective properties to improve the performance of the helmets.

Each helmet calls out for specific formula of resin and, in the case of certain helmets, these resins can have shelf lives as low as six hours—shell makers need to work fast. What goes in the mold is crucial to our story, but equally important is who is doing it: The Shell Expert. Each Shell Expert goes through a rigorous training process that can last over a year, working directly with a mentor before eventually being left to their own devices among the piping hot steel molds.

Even then, these Experts are initially only allowed to operate one molding station in the beginning, working their way to greater independence and responsibility. By the end, a well-rounded Shell Expert can command up to five molding stations at once. The Shell Expert lays all the materials into the mold, which changes for each make, size, and model.

He then puts his signature stamp with his actual name on it, pours the resin in, and seals the mold up. Should you credit an Arai lid with saving your life, you could rip the EPS liner out and know the name of the man who built your shell. Each shell spends roughly 15 minutes in the mold, and the Shell Expert must be able to determine the exact time to pull the shell, based on experience. It feels primitive as an observer. The workshops are undeniably hot and uncomfortable, especially when you factor in the humid Japanese summer.

Shell Experts watch the clock, managing multiple molds at once, moving down the row, prepping each station and repeating the process over again. Once a shell is done, the Shell Expert pulls it and carefully inspects it for any issues. If it passes, he signs off on it. The significant difference in quality control between Arai and other manufacturers is its quality control process, which was instituted 42 years ago. At a location just a few miles away from the Arai offices is the Amanuma factory.

There, the thickness of the shells is measured a second time. The same inspection process is repeated by Shell Experts who do inspections exclusively. The shells are then signed off on by the Shell Expert for a second time and sent to paint at a separate location.

In either case, it requires the shells to be shipped by truck. That means that shells are made in one facility, loaded onto a truck, driven to Amanuma where they receive the final inspection, and hurried back to the original facility for further production. It also means that each shell is signed off by three separate Shell Experts — the maker, the first inspector and the final inspector at the Amanuma plant — not to mention being weighed twice.

That is the kind of rigorous QC that Arai has always touted, but never articulated to the consumer so clearly. Shell Experts work their way from the hot, muggy, shell molding floor, and will often end up as inspectors as they gain experience. Eventually, they may return to the molding floor and mentor the next generation. Interestingly, if a shell needs to be patched because it has a thin spot, the whole inspection process starts over again. One or two thin spots are okay. Brian Weston, Managing Director at Arai Helmet, informed us that it means the shells are getting as close as to the threshold as possible, meeting their standards for thickness, strength, and weight.

This also highlights how outstanding the job of the Shell Expert is when working the molds. If one of their shells is rejected, they will stay back and make additional shells on their own time under their own volition.

To give you an idea of this, a well-trained Shell Expert can crank out roughly shells in a single shift. The same expert will produce two carbon fiber shells in the same amount of time. We need to back up a second. How does a mold become a mold? To do that, an original helmet is sculpted by hand, scanned by a newfangled 3D scanner, and analyzed so that the helmet is entirely symmetrical.

The clay form is then reworked until it is ready to be used as the reference guide for the steel molds. This process needs to be done for every model and every shell size, as the molds are unique.

Arai puts an emphasis on the human element, citing that even with advanced technology, a human hand is an extremely sensitive tool, which is the exact reason why the original shell shapes are all designed by hand. Essentially, the 3D scanner is there to check their work and aid in CNC milling. From there, a steel mold can be developed by using the scan from the 3D rendering and letting a modern CNC mill cut one out.

The milling process takes about 24 hours, so a new model can enter production quite quickly. Each steel mold can produce roughly , units before being retired. Arai has often been criticized for their seeming lack of interest in following technology trends.

Basing judgment solely on the appearance of their helmets, one could draw that conclusion. Standard steel is used in place of costlier, but more robust, stainless steel for the molds.

For example, an engineer could alter the design of a Corsair-X and, in less than 24 hours, new molds are seamlessly put into production. According to Michio, Arai is not focused on revolution. New technologies need to be integrated into their products without compromising what is performing better in internal and standardized testing. The development of carbon fiber helmets, which is a necessity for their F1 drivers.

Cutting the viewport and trimming shells is done by robotic arms equipped with laser cutting devices. Arai was one of the first non-automotive industries to integrate these into production lines. Now, it makes perfect sense. Initially, the helmet shell is extraordinarily porous and to fill the large cavities; a filler is used, and then scrubbed off. Once the filler is applied, dried adequately, and the excess is scrubbed off, the shell is then sprayed with a series of base coats and wet sanded at each step of the way, eventually becoming ready for its final priming stage.

Usually, a helmet manufacturer may only use a couple coats of primer and calls it good. However, having a perfectly smooth surface to work with is essential for the next step in the process—graphics. For an average full-face helmet, the total added weight in paint will be 25 grams. The complete shell is then able to be sprayed with a solid color and sent off to the graphics department where every intricate logo is laid by hand.

For example, the extremely loud Nicky-7 graphic is painstakingly done by a human. All registration marks for the graphics are penciled on the freshly primed helmets with a carefully designed template.

A while ago, a colleague and I perused a variety of Arai helmets and noticed that some graphics would have minute discrepancies from helmet to helmet. Sometimes the lines between molded bits and the graphic were bang on, while others, were ever-so-slightly off. It is something only revealed with extreme scrutiny. The truth is, human beings are laying these graphics down, and there is bound to be slight variations when inspected under a magnifying glass.

He will eventually place them into what is essentially a cast steel oven that, when resin is added and a pneumatic bag inflated, pushes the resin outwards into every possible gap and crevice, binding the parts to eventually form an R75 shell, named so as it has a continuous curve radius of no more than 75mm—the shape of each new Arai. He will also put his name on the inside of the shell so you can always know who made it. The Shell Expert must work fast. The resin used is good for six hours from the minute it is mixed, and while that may seem like a long time when you factor in a Shell Expert can knock out about shells a day and the amount of resin that requires, everything is a time-restricted science.

The shell is cooked for 15 minutes, and a senior Shell Expert will have five on the go at once—all in various stages cooking. Unlike many helmet manufacturers, Arai has complete control over every step from the first laying of fiberglass to the boxing of a freshly finished helmet.

Almost nothing is outsourced, nothing left to chance. A bit of a maverick, Hirotake is the guy depicted in the famous photo of the young man in a top hat standing on the seat of a moving Harley-Davidson that Arai uses in its advertisements. My father came up with a hat using bamboo. The Japanese army liked that idea, so they asked him to do some more for them. But he did not make helmets—there was a company in Tokyo doing that for the army.

Following the cessation of hostilities, in the early s, Arai became the helmet manufacturer we all know today. At the time, it was near impossible to import a helmet as the country rebuilt from the war, so it fell on Hirotake to make a helmet himself. The company was initially called HA Hirotake Arai and only changed its name to Arai late in the s.

Hirotake can also take credit for the creation of what would become the basis for almost every motorcycle and car helmet for all brands to follow in the implementation of the foam EPS liner. Yet there was no bad blood between Arai and Bell, and the two iconic brands share a mutual appreciation to this day.

Mitch had competed on a semi-pro level, knew the market, and knew what racers wanted and needed in a helmet. Like an egg—the strongest form in nature—the ESF narrows at the bottom, similar to the shape of the human skull. The ESF is also one of the main factors at the heart of the current helmet industry—rotational impact absorption.