good the new
in
good
so for our factory tour of Sennheiser they actually decided on at what I
thought was a really cool way
I love are showing us how it works are we got to follow
the entire production line for the HD
800 headphones so they're top top top of the line
top-of-the-line over-ear headphones we essentially got our own like guided
to our how it's made episode so now of course we're gonna start making HD 801
Linus tech tips edition headphones all Reese has me at all that expertise
know definitely saw how they they why so it starts with the coil
being wound by and automated coil winder machine
dad Scott this heat gun that or let's play on the list the wound coil kinda
stick to itself so it all stays
exactly precisely exactly the way it's supposed to be in that it comes out on
like a
a spool love up coiled spores and they just
if it's not exactly perfectly round they just digit
yet known as an entire band just no not around enough
they were ever so slightly of the curve so no
so the fish coils get delivered to the next station rest actually really
surprised to see
someone panda gluing coils
onto diaphragms at this stage in a brat I assume something like this would be
automated
I seems the entire process would be automated but no I don't most every
stage there's some amount of
I hand base intervention and they're saying the reason for this
is that for certain tasks it's apparently
still more precise good to have someone to help cuz there's lotsa products
they even showed us some microphones are a microphone assembly area that was 100
percent automated
start to finish being delivered in a MasterCard microphones but the AC 800's
gad a lot of hand assembly and then something I didn't notice until they
pointed out was how many in the workers in this area the factory where female
and not necessarily because females tend to end love playing around with
soldering irons more than other people or whatever else the case may be but
but they were looking for particular background very high skilled in fine
motor skills
so they would specifically hire people that were previously things like
hairdressers are Flores things that require small find imprecise motor
skills and attention to detail
and attention to detail specifically a so this next at their chassis for the
headphones which was actually produced elsewhere in the factory we never got to
see
raw materials being turned into HD 800
unfortunately pieces which would have been super cool sold these get beyond
the coil
and the diaphragm actually installed along with the magnet in the whole
thing's clued in place
and at this point you basically got a fully assembled transducer that's ready
for
bed first QC stat in the assembly process
so they have to make sure first of all that it fits within the
appropriate frequency response range and that it compare properly with
another transducers they need to test all these things
then find a good pair so they can both go within the same set
abated hundreds you you have the same sowed signature for each one back as you
might have
the surveyed the acceptable frequency response curve but there might be a
ranger that's so the actual had like an
a and ABI and that doesn't necessarily mean better or worse it just means
they're trying to look for ones that go together
as best as they can now what was interesting to me
was how many assembled pieces failed
which is not that it the fail isn't necessarily a bad thing though because
they're
they're being very tight about the regulations and making sure that if it's
not perfect
it's not getting through which is actually awesome and anything even a
high-precision product like I like a CPU processor is gonna have I yield rate
and a lot of failures the important thing is seeing that their testing them
and junking them at this stage entirely here not when there are your door
yeah but I just saw pretty cool now actually wasn't necessarily the coolest
thing about this
step in the process the final step in the assembly process
I'll but it was definitely the first thing that caught my eye
in the back all the tiny little late four or five square meter area
where by the way every single hd8
grid in the world gets built in this exact place by 105 people
they had 19 which counter a nineteen HD 800
on a rack ready to go out the door absolutely
freaking beautiful by the coolest thing about this workstation was probably help
optimize status
yeah you could tell as the as the work was moving through all the stages of
creating headphones that she
definitely had this place optimize just to even where the bins were placed
and the whole thing was made of extrusion to the point where you knew
that Sennheiser just made these custom for the employees and it looks kinda
modular even yeah extremely modular and that's because they cardboard prototype
all of their stations for the employees that will be working there
so they get all the employees that will work use that station in with these
cardboard crafted prototypes to make sure that everything's in exactly the
right spot so that
if some boxes a little bit too far to the way and I kinda crappy position
you can move that so won't make their arm source that working so all these
all these recisions are specifically built for them
now it should be noted that not every product gets the same treatment with
like every piece being hand the sound on the way the HD 800 does
I particularly in the very high end products especially the ones made in
Germany
this is going to be more common but sometimes you're gonna have certain
parts for the product made let's say for example I believe its momentum
where us certain components are made in the Ireland facility and then shipped to
China for assembly
so depending on the product it might be actually manufactured in Germany Ireland
I the US for some other professional grade stuff
orign:china it seems very common that they would make the
I acoustically important parts in something like Germany or maybe even
possibly Ireland
and then they would do a lot of the assembly in summer like China
was cool lows they were saying that regardless of where the manufacturing
facility is
is there still trying to keep things very "Sennheiser" in terms of the
other quality of life for the workers relation and the regulations and
you know same thing like at prototyping the workstations to make sure that they
actually are as efficient as possible uncomfortable as possible
sci-fi I thought that was really really incredible uncle next up was another Q a
station so this time
you put the headphones on a kind of an artificial head that will have a
microphone on each side so we can hear each one individual
transducers from the headphones the no roll it into a soundproof box so that no
sound is gonna be came from the factory
automatically on I can automatically track
yeah we actually didn't get to see it working unfortunately they do the q/a in
batches
so I'll buy but we had to explain to us in it looks pretty baller even if we
don't get to see it in action
yeah they're they're so careful about this box not having any other side know
is that it was even on dampeners
so the song was the walk by really heavily there would be none of that
transferred into the international parts
so it is making sure that all the frequency response is here and
everything is perfect
yes on and you and the unfortunately they don't include a print out in the
box or anything like that but what school
is with the HD 800 you can actually contact Sennheiser and they will mail
you
the exact testing report from your exact serial number because they manually
required them
at this stage in the process for type of has pretty darn cool
are they also have an artificial mouth on this
artificial head with artificial tears that is used for aviation headsets
and then they have speakers inside the sound chamber for our testing the noise
cancellation of
aforementioned headset cell very interesting stuff
so we were on our way to product development and they asked us if we
wanted to see the companion products in the 8800 the HD Media
800 so this is an amplifier and I think the coolest thing about it was
had has got to be the testing apparatus we didn't actually see it on the
actual assembly but we saw a little bit of it but again they really interesting
purvis the testing so he hooked up
everything you possibly can read all the banks tested multiple volume levels for
all
every single possible know that there was and tested it
everything on this thing so you know it's good the whole thing took about 10
minutes and then it wasn't until
after it passed testing that even got a serial number
and then it was polished Paul post twice last high school
I can finally put away and then ready to rock
then we made our way up stairs and this was probably one of the coolest things
about the entire tour
we got to visit the an echo echo chamber so this is a true story
chamber fall love noise dampening foam that Scott s
that's got this triangular shape that is designed to
pretty much eliminate wall reflections
it was super weird standing in the room just because and they only allow for
people at a time because you're actually standing
on MASH wire mesh yeah kiss because you're standing above an entire story I
love
more noise dampening foam below you I'm so the rules mostly mostly used for
microphone testing
but what's really cool is not necessarily the an echo chamber but
actually a new testing facility that they're in the process of building
which is going to be an entire auditorium in stage where
the lot only apparently actually have concerts but they'll use as a testing
ground for their professional grade equipment
which is pretty awesome and I think they're going to have another chamber in
there
so they can rebuild that one so they can use that in the future as well and
invents leave off to an
yeah crazy all I know is I want one yeah
political so with the factory on the way this was this was really cool we got to
actually see a little bit at the
Sennheiser company has tremendous toll actually a family owned business
which for a company that sizes are is pretty unusual but we got him
go and chill in the farmhouse which is at the very heart health
are the Sennheiser campus they just attack on new things
every time they they make some money and they they need in your facility
requirements so it's in various states of
Arvada
in depending on you can see how far along the company was based on how big
the building is and how modern the PPS
has very cool I'm so we actually got to go into
into the old farmhouse where day and the original said then engineers
started building audio equipment for other companies right at the end of the
second world war just to make ends meet
because there there s the audio engineers and professors that it worked
on University and the University had been unfortunately basically find
yet so it needed someone to work in that was a farmhouse and the americans came
along and put a sign on the door that said but basically we don't know what
you're doing here but
stop and the sign mysteriously disappear tonight nah
and they and they kept working and i guess i guess i ending audio files so
they're probably glad that they did
definitely so inside there they had some really cool stuff they had
I Sennheiser's first their their patented
are open headphones over 440
yeah something along those lines by today's standards they look like a joke
yeah but at the time that was that was really amazing
on they've got a lot of their earlier microphone products
I'll even had stuff for testing telecommunication cables which was one
of the first things they did
for a cannery building different parts of Germany just out of necessity
he has a Sennheiser had to make some some money at the time the centerpiece
here though and this was
unfortunately was under glass we didn't even get a chance to listen to it but
they haven't
orpheus arm and super nice super nice think that most amazing thing about the
manufacturing the office i think is the glass pieces
with 1000 holes right a thousand drill holes in them
I mean he ever tried to draw one hole in assets crazy probably give you some idea
how hard it is to draw thousands
yeah on and then they also had another little while afsane
inside that they let us have a look at so they've got grammys
Academy Awards are all kinds other words and some really cool products in the
case across from there
yes some stuff that they've never even Ashley released because they just
can actually find a market for it but was super cool in seeing all this
history stuff was really cool that then now we actually got an opportunity to
sit down with someone a Sennheiser folks and talk about
what they're doing today
with the consumer products like the momentum and the urbanites so
I will let them come to take it from here and talk about that
the philosophy and and especially in the way that
that product development the prime design is being translated into a
message that
the more mainstream public can can relate to a little bit better
yeah we don't see that the campaign is he does but we see it more as a kind of
project in the project is
that we would like to keep in contact with people who drive
sound one step forward as we do and
we will we would stay in contact yeah we would work on some projects together
in response a good example we are supporting
die main stone was some some the stuff
a she could use for performing bridges and
the I don't want to say the project and
short term plus a campaign you think is a kind of short term amid termed
a activity your YouTube you you
produce some Ben as you do some advertising stuff and you have a
short-term effect
but what we see is that
long-term relationship long-term impact
driven message is more successful for us
and that's reason by this this the
project is more kind of long-term project yeah well of course we have to
bring you stories in
from time to time but it's not the kind of all time effective cost
we need to be between we need to sell products and
a after after running this campaign for the first six months this year
big lifton in selling products but
again this is more kind of two years activity
instead of doing this for two months or a bit longer
because we started in a position it's pushing the US marked which is the
biggest market in the world
um who is not the strong position as we are
in
made of Europe so its form from the brand itself
not and everybody knows it's so it's more conover
who said highs so we need something other I would call a bridge
to talk to prove maybe not interested in the song
devise itself but terms although the
image I'm headphones especially the big ones like the producers now with your
man I'd
are became more a fashion heiden device
something you want to express your personality and
that people looking more what it means to them
in terms of of stylish company I'm so the idea
was 22 10 the perspective not talk about the device itself about the Sounders
style made
but talking about the end-user so from people looking to simply sound devices
um express a a different kind of style of music
harm and this was always a Sennheiser approach to be up some kind of neutral
was a Sennheiser sound it was a big very
clear crisp arm
could display meal every kind of music from bebop chairs to
hydraulic all whatever we have you found on stories studies that
really the audience prefer this kind of device is not some
display the whole area the whole range
up the music for 40 but have an expressionless
in very specific on music style and is this
um our gifts I would say our present to them
um and to really recognized at the
that the least experienced changed in
and the last five years I would say just saw when we were done the interviews
one of the most disappointing things in the day her moments was when we arrived
we were told that
axle growl the original designer the HD 800 headphones
was not able to be there because he was sick
after the interviews we found out he was able to make it see
is still sick we can check is there anything which I really wanted to do but
I
even cooler than
that probably he gave us a little mini lesson
he had the probably one of the coolest lessons I've ever sat in on
there was there was essentially to students headline it's in myself and he
went up there on and on this on this grid paper essentially with a marker and
just shows how audio drivers work
now wide bigger is good for some things but actually smaller is better for other
things and that and the delicate balancing act
that you have to go through to make a headphone product
and then how they overcame a traditional design with the HD 800
and and made it perform the way that it does it was
it was incredibly cool and %ah I think he might have felt a little bit awkward
at the end when I asked him to sign
the lesson shade it because I plans to roll it up and take it away with me but
because we're quite literally get a free min propaganda office yeah
so I was sold I was incredibly cool just take to get to
get to meet someone West his had that kind of an impact on
on headphones it's it's it's just its interesting being in the presence of
someone that
obviously knows that much about their specialty
and it's just whenever you meet someone like that it's like okay
I need to pay attention he probably lost more brain cells
sneezing from being sick that no more about audio clip I
level and yeah just just incredible sela
speaking an incredible are our trip to San hi there was an incredible ride I
hope you guys enjoyed coming along for it
I give this video a like if you like taking a dislike if you thought it
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see more of these
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