Matt Romanowski

I was just talking with Safety Solutions and on Wed. they are coming out with a kit to allow you to use the threaded Hans inserts in helmets with the R3 mouthing equipment. I was told it's the "M6 Anchor System."

My R3 and mounts are supposed to ship Monday, so I'll let people know how it mounts up.

JerryW

Greant news - thanks for the update

mrbill_fl

yes, please update when installed!

Circuit Motorsports

Yes, it's a response to the SAH helmets which have the 'built in' M6 backing plate. I'll be using the setup on the new helmet.

mhm993

about damn time....I called them repeatedly in the winter, and never got any response of any kind, not even a return call. The one time I actually reached a warm body, that person obviously didn't have a clue, and gave an obviously wrong answer, about having to dismantle an SAH helmet to use an R3. I realize they were purchased by Simpson, but that's no reason to ignor the customer base.

Matt Romanowski

Interesting. I first talked to them a couple of years ago at PRI and they were great. When I called to order, the lady who answered the phone was great and knew her stuff pretty well. When she wasn't sure about something, she put me on a hold a second and then had all the answers. Maybe it was a problem during the transition after being bought by Simpson?

mhm993

Matt, do you have a contact/phone number to order?

Matt Romanowski

I ordered direct from Safety Solutions. I just called the 800-731-4404 number and hit zero to talk to somone. They don't come out officially until Weds, so she didn't have a price or anything. It didn't matter to me because I need them.

Dave S

I called safety solutions and spoke to someone who said they had no hardware yet for the Hans Ready new Helmets. She told me to go to the hardware store, find the screws that fit the fitting in the helmet and use that to attach the R3 rings from my old helmet. I called Hans to see if they would give me the proper cap screw size but they would not.
Any one else fare better?

mhm993

David, here's the deal.

The hans brand connectors don't use screws but rather machined billet indexable thingies that tighten with an allen wrench. Not compatible with the r3 ring hardware. Not even close.

Go to a large sears hardware store with your helmet, and they'll have graded, metric, allen head cap screws to fit the helmet's threaded inserts. They were class 10 or 12, fit the helmet and the rings perfectly--with one exception below--and I figure graded fasteners are significantly better quality than the original machine screws. I might have gone to two sears stores to find the right ones. Probably cost a buck each.

The diameter of the metric screw is a red hair smidge bigger than the hole in the flat plate that holds the ring to your helmet--maybe no more than 1 /32 in.--so I carefully clamped and drilled the plate to enlarge the hole. It's such a small increment that the hardware didn't get warm, virtually no metal was removed, and I'm confident I didn't reduce the it's strenth.

If they told you all you needed was new screws, then they haven't actually tried the rings on an SAH helmet. Not that it matters. I'd rather have purchased a couple rings and screws from Safety Solutions, but as mentioned, I couldn't get any useful response from Safety Solutions and gave up.

Matt Romanowski

I talked to them on Weds becuase they were running a day late on my order. After that, an engineer called me back to help with setting up my second helmet with the same system. Did you ask for the M6 Anchor System?

I'll let you know what it is on Tuesday when mine arrives.

Steamboat

I have an R3 coming this week and was told that I might need to go to a hardware store to get a couple of screws. We'll see, I guess. More as it becomes available......

Dave S

OK Marc now I get it. I thought you originally said you were drilling out the thingies in the helmet to make the new screws fit but that is not the case. What you did makes perfect sense..think I'll be visiting the hardware store. When I called safety solutions (if I recall correctly) they told me the M6 setup would require re-webbing my R3 because the M6 does not work with the hardware my R3 currently has.

Matt Romanowski

^^I beleave that is correct. I was told that the M6 Anchor Kit puts the releases in a different spot than the D Rings do and you can not easily move from one system to the other.

Matt Romanowski

UPS just showed up. The kit is the quick detach peice a screw, and a backing plate that can be used inside the helmet if you don't have the hans anchors built in. Nothing extra is needed to make it work. Sorry for the crappy photos.