Roberto Sadowsky, Dainese USA VP of Operations: D|air Racing, Dainese Ready For North America
Four years after its introduction in Italy, the Dainese D|air Racing inflatable protection system – and the support network necessary to maintain the product – are ready for North America.
At the D-Store in Costa Mesa June 1, the Italian protective garment company announced that the D|air would be available to North American customers in September of 2015. With a suggested retail price of $2,499 installed in one of the company’s Misano race suits, the D|air is the first wireless airbag system available in the U.S., the company says.
The system is functionally the same as the first version introduced in Europe in 2011, says Roberto Sadowsky, Dainese USA vice president of operations. Various clearances needed to be obtained, and more importantly, the company needed to be ready to service the systems once they became commercially available.
The wireless system is a sophisticated, active piece of safety gear that is not user-serviceable and it does the customer no good to have her or his leathers waiting months for repair, he said. And the leathers will need repair, because there are two types of racers – those who have crashed, and those who will.
“We wanted to be really prepared for the North American market. Crashes happen. The system goes off. It is not something that the consumer can fix him or herself,” Sadowsky says. “They need to send it back to the headquarters. We were not ready to get the suits back and fix them. It would be too costly and inefficient [to ship back to Italy]. When it is the season to ride, especially in certain parts of the country, they want their suit back – fast.”
While the North American repair and service system was being brought up to speed, the company had to obtain electronic approvals for the telemetry and electrical components of the suit – as well as performing due diligence for liability.
“Dainese is an Italy-based company, and this is the market that they know the most,” Sadowsky says. “In 2011, the company was not ready to do it on the worldwide level for a couple of reasons. First, there was the production capability. Secondly, the product liability is always a concern in the North America market. Not being focused on the North American market, being more comfortable with the European market, the company decided to focus on the European market.
“This one has all the compliances with the North American standards as far as electronics goes – the U.L. standards and the F.C.C. standards which the first version didn’t have.”
The Misano suit’s aerodynamic back-hump houses seven sensors, three accelerometers, three gyroscopes and a GPS. The rider’s movements are monitored constantly, and when an eminent crash is detected, a sophisticated algorithm is used to trigger a Cool Gas Generator, the company said in a news release.
The four-liter airbag opens in just 45 milliseconds (15 ms triggering time plus 30 ms deployment time), protecting the shoulders, neck and collarbones; a blink of an eye typically takes 300 to 400 ms. D|air Racing also includes a data-acquisition feature that records information on lap times, speed, acceleration, braking distances and cornering lines, all of which can be downloaded to a computer.
Company officials point to the product’s safety record in MotoGP competition. Dainese says MotoGP riders without the D|air system have suffered 23 fractured shoulders and 29 broken collarbones; during the same period, MotoGP riders with the D|air system have suffered no shoulder fractures and one broken collarbone.
After the off-the-rack Misano product is introduced for the North American market, a made-to-measure Mugello version will become available. An optional Extended Service Package is offered for $299, providing unlimited re-arming for two years, plus a 15% discount for crash-damage repairs, the company says.