For years, I'd heard rumors of a private racetrack belonging to HKS. Supposedly, it was behind the company's manufacturing headquarters, but was shut down by neighbors complaining about the noise. While I can think of nothing I'd rather wake up to than a racecar rowing through its gears, it seems the chickens of society would prefer a rooster's cackle. I guess the pungent howl of a tuned open header is an acquired taste.
It's a story we're all too familiar with in the States. Arizona Motorsports Park only lasted a few months before being silenced by local residents-and that was situated next to Luke Air Force Base. Even our most historic racetracks are in jeopardy, with Laguna Seca subject to strict decibel restrictions and Road Atlanta rumored to be on the chopping block. What made the story at HKS different was that the neighbors really were chickens. The rancher next door had argued successfully that his chickens were unproductive due to noise from the track.
Homeowner associations have been the enemies of racers for a long time. But the thought that poultry outranked us just didn't seem right. The whole thing sounded fishy, even by Japanese standards. I confronted a few staff members at HKS USA. While they did little to discourage the rumors, they were uncharacteristically light on specifics. To get the details I had to check things out personally. Unfortunately HKS' headquarters is a little out of the way.
I spent three days in Tokyo last winter. As luck would have it, Jun Toyoda, group chairman of HKS USA and Europe, was also there and making the trip to HKS. I tagged along from taxicab to crowded rush-hour subway to bullet train to a small rental car lot at the base of Mt. Fuji.
For anyone who has imagined HKS as being a massive, immaculately kept compound carved into a foggy forest on the side of a mountain, well, you pretty much hit it dead on. One minute we're heading up a narrow mountain road and the next we're surrounded by three-story concrete structures. I blurt out: "How do you get trucks up here?" Toyoda replies: "Yes, it is difficult." But efficiency doesn't seem so important at this point.
Within the plant's 1,570,250 square feet are rows of white buildings branded with blue HKS logos. Surrounding them are lines of heavily modified cars, from Fits to Zs, all black. Regrettably, I have failed to capture the scope of the facility in any photos. For that, I would have needed to approach the forest's edge, where Ninjas were surely lurking. I've only managed to snap a few shots of cars in the open dyno bays. Once inside the factory, photography is strictly forbidden.
It's amazing to see the extent of production done on the premises. In our global economy, it seems everything is outsourced-blurring the lines between engineering, manufacturing, assembling and labeling. But this facility is more like an isolated tuning industry functioning as a single entity.
Inside the suspension building, you can watch raw material take form. A rod passes through a coil winder, then has its ends ground flat. Next, it goes on a hook to be powder-coated. Even the automated logo stamp is fascinating. Sealed doors lead to a clean room where dampers are assembled. This is the first time I've witnessed a human production line in action. A dozen or so workers stand along a workbench. Each installs their part then passes it down the line. Any efficiency lost by the facility's remote location is more than made up for through the time management of its 302 full-time employees.
In the next building, the raw materials and machines get bigger. Massive CNC machines are turning out everything from crankshafts to sequential transmission housings. HKS re-invests heavily in tooling. In a country known for its lack of dynos, there are close to a dozen, ranging from Bosch AWD to Dynapack. One engine dyno has been running for several days straight while endurance-testing one of the company's light aircraft engines.