THE HELMET THREAD

[Flygonial]

I’ve always stuck with hand mirrors but those are genuinely quite nice. At higher speeds it saves you from raising an arm which with the wind resistance can feel a bit off putting even if it’s not as much as putting your arm straight out.

[FiZ_]

Which full face helmet under 150$ ? Look at LS2 helmets.

[Rawnei]

Helmet Recommendation: LS2 Advant X

 

So I was on the search for a new Autumn/Winter helmet, my Shark Evojet has worked fine but I wanted an upgrade.

My requirements:

• Flip up helmet, it's just so convenient, you don't even have to take it off when you go shopping in the store, can keep it on always (Essential)
• Large field of view (Essential)
• Pinlock Ready (Essential)
• Built in Sun Visor (Essential)
• Does not feel heavy on your head, regardless of helmet weight (Essential)
• Certified (Essential)
• Lower Wind noise than my Shark Evojet (Nice to have)

So after doing some research and testing a couple of different helmets I decided on the LS2 Advant X:

• Really nice flip up function, you put the chin bar behind instead of on-top, feels very balanced in this mode, great for technical off-road where you want maximum visibility and not wanting your head to feel heavy, you can use visor while chin bar is in upward position.
• Great field of view in all directions, even with chin bar folded down.
• Comes with Pinlock Max Vision in the box ready to install.
• Sun visor, check.
• Advant X weighs around 1600g (+-50g), it does not feel heavy at all, very well balanced and comfortable, there is also a more expensive Advant X Carbon that weighs about 50g less, not worth it IMO, I got my Advant X on sale for a very favorable price also.
• It has ECE 22.06 certification!
• The wind noise is pretty decent, not super quiet but not loud either, more quiet than my Shark Evojet, flip up helmets in general are louder by nature and this one is totally fine, has a small chin curtain as well.

The only caveat with this helmet: Even with the pretty good ventilation it can get warm, it's great for colder days but not so great if you take it off-roading in the forest when it's 20c out, you will get really sweaty 😅 so definitly a helmet suited for certain seasons and activities, other than that stellar helmet if you can find it on sale go for it!

For summer riding I usually wear the LS2 MX700 instead which is very well ventilated and works great even on the hottest summer days.

Edit: Oh and another mention, I installed a Packtalk Neo intercom in this helmet which has great sound (JBL Speakers), the reason I upgraded to Packtalk from my old Fodsports intercom was that Packtalk has created and implemented Open Bluetooth Intercom protocol together with a couple of other manufacturers and are working towards making Intercom connections a more universal thing and easier to connect between brands which is great and the right direction to go. For example if you have a Packtalk mesh active you can bridge another brand that doesn't even support OBI into the mesh and they can join the whole group, how awesome is that?

Edited October 13, 2023 by Rawnei

[Planemo]

Lovely helmet, £300 though! I appreciate thats still not a lot of money for a decent lid though..

[Planemo]

Never enough helmets lol... I have my nice airy IXS Trigger downhill MTB lid for super hot days and my full face, much less airy and visor-less 661 Reset for slightly cooler days or those which run into the night. But for proper autumn/spring riding it can get too chilly on the face even for the Reset. So I wanted to cover all bases and get a cheap full face with visor.

Just ordered one of these in the black friday sales - £54.99 delivered! Purchased from XLMoto which I think is EU only. Will do a review once received but all the reports I see have been very favourable. Just can't go wrong for the price IMO and the secondary internal sun visor is really handy.

[Rawnei]

12 hours ago, Planemo said:

Never enough helmets lol... I have my nice airy IXS Trigger downhill MTB lid for super hot days and my full face, much less airy and visor-less 661 Reset for slightly cooler days or those which run into the night. But for proper autumn/spring riding it can get too chilly on the face even for the Reset. So I wanted to cover all bases and get a cheap full face with visor.

Just ordered one of these in the black friday sales - £54.99 delivered! Purchased from XLMoto which I think is EU only. Will do a review once received but all the reports I see have been very favourable. Just can't go wrong for the price IMO and the secondary internal sun visor is really handy.

No anti-fogging visor int his season is a mistake 😂 could get a WeePro adhesive visor.

[Planemo]

Dude, I rode MC's all year round for 30 years and never had a so-called 'anti-fogging visor'. I'll manage 

[Rawnei]

17 minutes ago, Planemo said:

Dude, I rode MC's all year round for 30 years and never had a so-called 'anti-fogging visor'. I'll manage 

On an MC you have a lot of speed creating airflow in the helmet to help with fogging and I guess you never rode in the rain? It's a common thing and reason why pinlock exists, but ok you will discover for yourself. 😁

[litewave]

Etsy TSG Fangs significantly reduce fogging on my Pass Pro and will probably fit most other helmets.

$8USD for one pair.

[okvp]

Simple nose breath guard/deflector helps a lot. I was looking pinlock for my LS2 Pioneer evo but couldn't find it from local stores. So i took a breath guard from my old helmet, it's not a perfect fit but works pretty well, that I don't need the pinlock (at least temperatures above the freezing point).

 

[Rawnei]

1 hour ago, okvp said:

Simple nose breath guard/deflector helps a lot. I was looking pinlock for my LS2 Pioneer evo but couldn't find it from local stores. So i took a breath guard from my old helmet, it's not a perfect fit but works pretty well, that I don't need the pinlock (at least temperatures above the freezing point).

 

Nice, over here in autumn and winter it's very humid so I use a thin stretchy necktube that I can pull up over my mouth when riding, if I don't even my pinlock will fog up on the worst of days.

[Planemo]

On 11/10/2023 at 4:30 PM, Rawnei said:

On an MC you have a lot of speed creating airflow in the helmet to help with fogging

Anything more than 10mph is fine. Anything less and I dont need the visor closed anyway.

On 11/10/2023 at 4:30 PM, Rawnei said:

and I guess you never rode in the rain?

And I guess you missed the bit where I said 'I rode all year round'?

But no, I don't ride EUC in the rain. Or in winter. And I guess you also missed the bit where I said this would be my autumn and spring helmet.

On 11/10/2023 at 4:30 PM, Rawnei said:

It's a common thing and reason why pinlock exists

Brilliant. You realise that I had ridden, all year round, in the UK, for 15 years before pinlock even existed..

On 11/10/2023 at 4:30 PM, Rawnei said:

but ok you will discover for yourself. 😁

I've probably forgotton more about MC helmets than you have discovered 

My goodness, however did we all manage without the saviour that is pinlock...I guess the same way we did without mobile phones lol.

I have zero issue with pinlock btw. Its handy. But I'm certainly not going to discount a lid or consider it 'a mistake' just because it doesnt have it.

[Rawnei]

29 minutes ago, Planemo said:

Anything more than 10mph is fine. Anything less and I dont need the visor closed anyway.

And I guess you missed the bit where I said 'I rode all year round'?

But no, I don't ride EUC in the rain. Or in winter. And I guess you also missed the bit where I said this would be my autumn and spring helmet.

Brilliant. You realise that I had ridden, all year round, in the UK, for 15 years before pinlock even existed..

I've probably forgotton more about MC helmets than you have discovered 

My goodness, however did we all manage without the saviour that is pinlock...I guess the same way we did without mobile phones lol.

I have zero issue with pinlock btw. Its handy. But I'm certainly not going to discount a lid or consider it 'a mistake' just because it doesnt have it.

Probably the worst helmet take I ever seen, you do you.

[Planemo]

4 minutes ago, Rawnei said:

Probably the worst helmet take I ever seen, you do you.

And probably the most triggered I have ever seen anyone about a lid not having pinlock. Good effort!

[okvp]

Actually the pinlock works really well against fogging, I have had it in many of my helmets. But guiding the breath helps much also, you need to have a helmet without 'closed' collar portion below chin part so that exhaled air can escape freely out. I had to also block visor 'breathing' holes with a tape because they guided the exhaled air directly to the visor when it was closed.

[Z-Rabbit]

I'm looking at getting something with significantly better ventilation that my Icon Airflite. I love it, but jeeeesus do I get sweaty if it's even a little warm.

I'm also a bald guy, so the sweat goes direct from scalp to padding, sometimes enough that I can literally squeeze it out.

I've been eyeing various downhill helmets like the Bell Super Air, Fox Proframe, etc., but I haven't had the opportunity to try any on.

I also tried out the LS2 Subverter Evo helmet, which is DOT rated. I like the idea of that for faster riding, but I wonder if the ventilation would really be dramatically different enough from my Airflite to justify pulling the trigger.

Can anyone weigh in?

[litewave]

I have a collection of Troy Lee D4 (carbon and composite models) and an SE4 and 5.

They are great MB (D4) and moto (SE4/5) helmets.

You can find them on sale later in the year on Amazon.

[Brutal-Force]

On 2/27/2023 at 8:21 AM, Cerbera said:

Not actually that much difference in looks between TSG and ADX-2, once your chrome visor has arrived...

You can also get those in gold, dark smokey, black and few other styles. I got mine from the visor shop. It arrived in a proper box, nicely packed, so was undamaged on receipt. I will say I always HATE how much we have to stretch and flatten visors to get the pin lock film in place, but once done it's really a set-and-forget thing, and as long as you make sure that your seal is intact around the perimeter there will be no fogging at all on the outer visor, no matter how damp and drizzly it is outside. As mentioned before though, the same cannot be said of the inner visor, which can fog quite easily; quickly I learned that the way to avoid that is to keep the outer visor open a crack, or just raise the whole front of the helmet briefly (the shades don't move when you do this), which gets the air up it nice and fast so it clears.

I will say, on bright sunny days the inner shade is not quite enough darkening for my liking, but when combined with the chrome visor above, which adds a small amount of darkening too we get a level of sun-shading I am very happy with.

From the perspective of this photo, they look almost the same size. I know that the weight is like 1900ish on the ADX-2 and the TSG ~980. Could you put a picture side by side instead of with the TSG up front?  Weight and Size make a big difference for portability. I know that safety trumps looks, but if I have to carry around a huge weight, maybe a TSG or Predator is the go-to for every day low speed riding and the ADX-2 is for speed demons? I know that an accident can happen at any speed, but if they rating these for e-bikes and skateboards, then It can't be all bad. Not best but not worse by a long shot.

[Cerbera]

On 5/7/2024 at 11:33 PM, Brutal-Force said:

Could you put a picture side by side instead of with the TSG up front?

I could. They are very much NOT the same size ! ADX is longer, taller and wider than TSG... sorry about wanky photo, but hopefully shows you what you want to see...

As mentioned above, the weight difference is pretty significant also, because the Scorpion is Modular and has a lot more to it, generally.

Perhaps that is one advantage the TSG gets in a head-to-head between these 2 - there will be less risk of neck injury during a crash because it is SO light. But the corollary is that your head is also that much less protected overall, and much less so from impacts.

On hot days, the TSG is appreciated for its low profile weight, lack of padding and field of view, but the Scorpion, which undoubtedly feels hotter during those conditions, wins even then (for me at least) because we can so easily raise the front visor without losing either sunglasses due to its aviator shades or a rock solid chin bar, and because the modular part means we can eat and drink and talk without having to remove it. Also I think it probably has better venting / airflow when closed, and feels less like cooking your face in a sauna simply because less sunlight is getting into it ! And that's another thing - Scorpion has the top shade to help eliminate glare, so there is less of that than with the TSG, which is quite vulnerable to it if the sun is at the wrong angles...

Oh, just as further note for anyone thinking they want Lightmode LEDs on their Scorpion ADX's - forget it. There is literally NO WAY to make those fit on that helmet !

 

Edited May 10 by Cerbera

[Brutal-Force]

2 hours ago, Cerbera said:

I could. They are very much NOT the same size ! ADX is longer, taller and wider than TSG... sorry about wanky photo, but hopefully shows you what you want to see...

As mentioned above, the weight difference is pretty significant also, because the Scorpion is Modular and has a lot more to it, generally.

Perhaps that is one advantage the TSG gets in a head-to-head between these 2 - there will be less risk of neck injury during a crash because it is SO light. But the corollary is that your head is also that much less protected overall, and much less so from impacts.

On hot days, the TSG is appreciated for its low profile weight, lack of padding and field of view, but the Scorpion, which undoubtedly feels hotter during those conditions, wins even then (for me at least) because we can so easily raise the front visor without losing either sunglasses due to its aviator shades or a rock solid chin bar, and because the modular part means we can eat and drink and talk without having to remove it. Also I think it probably has better venting / airflow when closed, and feels less like cooking your face in a sauna simply because less sunlight is getting into it ! And that's another thing - Scorpion has the top shade to help eliminate glare, so there is less of that than with the TSG, which is quite vulnerable to it if the sun is at the wrong angles...

Oh, just as further note for anyone thinking they want Lightmode LEDs on their Scorpion ADX's - forget it. There is literally NO WAY to make those fit on that helmet !

 

Thank you Cerbera, that is what I wanted to see. I was looking at the Roof R200 for weight, but it is not modular. I was hoping that the Scorpion was equivalent in size but from reading it was almost double the weight of the TSG.  I want Modular/Pinlock but weight has a large bearing on my choice. I am new to EUCs and picked up the Begode Extreme. I don't plan on breakneck speeds for now. I live in Central Florida, so temperature/airflow does have a large impact on my decision as well.

At this point, I think I am down to the LS2 Avant X or the Roof Boxxer 2. Decisions, decisions. I already have two good bike helmets I can use to learn on, but I think I will outgrow them fast.

[Cerbera]

2 hours ago, Brutal-Force said:

I live in Central Florida, so temperature/airflow does have a large impact on my decision as well.

At this point, I think I am down to the LS2 Avant X or the Roof Boxxer 2. Decisions, decisions. I already have two good bike helmets I can use to learn on, but I think I will outgrow them fast.

Both those seem like good lids, but I am surprised you are not also considering an MX open face type jobbie, with goggles (and chin bar).

One of those will obviously be a LOT more comfortable to ride in where / when its very hot and muggy, as I am told Florida is famous for being...

[Brutal-Force]

1 hour ago, Cerbera said:

Both those seem like good lids, but I am surprised you are not also considering an MX open face type jobbie, with goggles (and chin bar).

One of those will obviously be a LOT more comfortable to ride in where / when its very hot and muggy, as I am told Florida is famous for being...

I think its more because my wheel will be able to do 50 after all, so everyone says for that I should be looking at a motorcycle helmet?

[Cerbera]

30 minutes ago, Brutal-Force said:

I think its more because my wheel will be able to do 50 after all, so everyone says for that I should be looking at a motorcycle helmet?

An MX helmet IS a motorcycle helmet, just designed more for off-road use ! As long as it's got that chin bar it should offer similar levels of protection without enclosing your whole face.

[Brutal-Force]

23 minutes ago, Cerbera said:

An MX helmet IS a motorcycle helmet, just designed more for off-road use ! As long as it's got that chin bar it should offer similar levels of protection without enclosing your whole face.

Thanks you for the clarification. I am new to this and soooo much reading.

From the looks of recommended helmets, the Bell-MX9 seems to be the go to budget starter helmet? Doesn't seem to be any MX style helmets that are modular? Any feedback on something like Klim F3 Illusion Carbon Fiber? It claims that it is lightweight but I can't seem to find how lightweight it is.

Edited May 10 by Brutal-Force

[litewave]

32 minutes ago, Brutal-Force said:

Thanks you for the clarification. I am new to this and soooo much reading.

From the looks of recommended helmets, the Bell-MX9 seems to be the go to budget starter helmet?

The Bell MX-9 Adventure is heavy, weighing in at 1.7kg. Over the years, I think there has been a general consensus that 1kg is the median weight for the community. The TSG Pass is in the 1100g range. The modular helmets are much heavier. Most riders would probably agree that motorcycle street helmets are overkill and have poor visibility. 

Many of us who began riding on older, slower wheels in ancient times (2016-2018) started with the Bell Super 3R and later the Air and DH. They are supremely light, have MIPS, have fantastic ventilation, and the DH is downhill-rated. However, they are probably not recommended by most for street riding above 30 mph. 

Also, the Troy Lee helmets should be considered. The DH4 (~1050g) and SE4-5 carbon (~1250g) models can be had starting in the $200 (DH4) to $300 (SE4) range on sale. However, I seem to be the only one wearing them! 

To sum it up, there is no real starter helmet anymore, now that EUCs have evolved for multiple use cases. Determine your criteria and take the plunge on your first one. You will eventually buy another one or ten anyway.

 

Edited May 11 by litewave