HONMA GOLF CO., LTD.
Industry: Golf clubs
Location: Sakata-city, Yamagata-pref, Japan
Website: https://www.honmagolf.com/int
The Company
For decades, the HONMA story has been set in the foothills of Sakata, Yamagata prefecture, Japan. Founded in a small workshop in Yokohama in 1959, HONMA is a premium golf club manufacturer and the only company that handles every step - from design to final production - in-house to create the highest-quality products on the market today. Their team of 360 craftsmen works alongside research and development personnel to integrate the best artisan skills, modern technology and high-quality materials, all sharing the common goal of producing the finest golf clubs. Each finished HONMA golf club requires the hands of 100 people and six months to build, undergoing stringent inspections at every stage - whether by supersonic wave analysis or the keen eye of a seasoned artisan - before being refined by the master craftsman until deemed flawless.
The Challenge
Before adopting ThinkDesign, HONMA faced several obstacles in its design and development process. Creating different versions of clubs - such as adjusting wood and iron models for various sizes or loft angles - took too long, slowing their ability to respond quickly to market needs. The handcrafted nature of HONMA’s products made things even harder, as the complex, freeform shapes of the wooden molds were difficult to translate into digital models. The tools they had were not intuitive enough for smooth surface editing, and making changes across multiple club designs was time-consuming.
ThinkDesign as a Solution
After a tailored demonstration focused on golf club design methods, HONMA quickly recognized ThinkDesign’s potential to enhance their manufacturing process. According to the company, among various high-end and mid-range 3D CAD solutions, ThinkDesign stands out as the most flexible and user-friendly for handling complex surfaces.
Golf clubs, by nature, are intricate models made up of free-form curved surfaces that don’t follow simple geometries like straight lines or circles. Despite this complexity, HONMA was able to reach proficiency in modeling and refining these shapes with ThinkDesign relatively quickly during their learning phase, during which they relied on ThinkDesign’s Help guide. With ThinkDesign, HONMA can easily design both the sole (bottom part) and the back of each clubhead. DPT’s CAD solution also simplifies the process of adapting a single club design into multiple variations by allowing easy adjustments to size and shape. For example, designers can adjust the loft angle - the tilt of the club’s striking surface relative to vertical - which influences how the ball travels. The software also supports quick modifications to create different versions of a base model, each tailored for specific performance needs or shot distances. All these shape and size adjustments can be made smoothly and precisely, without compromising the elegant look and high performance HONMA clubs are renowned for.
ADVANCED MESH CAPABILITIES - FULL HYBRID MODELING
At HONMA, every golf club begins with tradition. The process starts with high-resolution 3D scanning and reverse engineering of a wooden mold, meticulously handcrafted by a master artisan. This ensures the authentic, artisanal shape is preserved, while ThinkDesign refines and optimizes the model to meet the precision, performance and aesthetic standards that are required for final production. ThinkDesign’s ability to seamlessly integrate solids, surfaces and meshes within a single environment allows HONMA to work with scanned models with exceptional fluidity. Its advanced tools make it possible to import, repair and refine complex digital data, ensuring that every scan is clean, accurate, and fully aligned with the original handcrafted design intent. Combined with powerful Reverse Engineering capabilities, ThinkDesign enables HONMA to convert physical molds into reliable 3D models with high fidelity. This smooth transition from physical craftsmanship to digital precision significantly improves efficiency, reducing time-to-market while safeguarding the artistry behind every HONMA club.
ThinkDesign has significantly accelerated our development process,
all while maintaining the craftsmanship that defines our brand.
The transition from handcrafted molds to digital models has become far smoother,
enabling us to bring new designs to market more efficiently.
FREE-FORM MODELING
ThinkDesign’s Global Shape Modeling (GSM) functionality plays a key role in HONMA’s design process, especially when working with free-form surfaces that define the unique geometry of each golf club. GSM enables designers to intuitively modify and refine surface models using “Preserving” or “Matching conditions”, which help maintain continuity with specific design constraints. With these tools, HONMA’s team can precisely smooth and reshape surfaces, aligning them with target lines, points or edges as needed. This level of control is essential for maintaining both the handcrafted aesthetic and the functional performance of each club.
ANALYSIS TOOLS
Among the many analysis functionalities integrated into ThinkDesign, HONMA relies heavily on the “Mass Properties” command, which has proven particularly valuable in their design process. This tool enables the team to calculate essential physical parameters, such as total weight, center of mass and moment of inertia, even for clubs composed of multiple materials. Based on these measurements, HONMA’s designers can refine the internal structure of each club, redistributing weight where necessary to optimize balance and performance. These adjustments are made while maintaining the integrity of the model’s history, enabling precise, controlled iterations without the need to rebuild the design from scratch.
REDUCING TIME TO MARKET
After adopting ThinkDesign, HONMA experienced a remarkable decrease in the time required for product development. For example, developing the loft angle of a gold driver, which previously took half a day, now only requires about one hour. Similarly, creating different fairway wood models has been streamlined from three days down to just half a day. Iron model development time has also been cut from two days to half a day. Overall, the adoption of ThinkDesign has led to an average time-to-market improvement of approximately 78%, significantly accelerating HONMA’s ability to bring new designs to market more quickly and efficiently.
Conclusion
ThinkDesign is a key CAD tool for HONMA, playing a crucial role in transforming creative concepts into high-performance golf club designs. Its flexibility and advanced surface modeling capabilities allow the design team to refine shapes, optimize aerodynamics and balance weight distribution, ensuring every club not only meets HONMA’s exacting performance standards but also reflects its signature craftsmanship and aesthetic excellence.
