As I am researching helmets for my new bike, I stumbled upon this article. It is very interesting and could save you some serious cash. It did me. I just found the helmet I have been looking for at denniskirk.com at a closeout price of $35. It's snell and dot certified and matches the red KLX perfectly.

http://www.motorcyclistonline.com/ge...iew/index.html

Here's the helmet I am ordering.

http://denniskirk.com/jsp/product_ca...0103&mmyId=

 

im a sucker for flat black...... but nice lookin lid....

I read that a long time ago in a motorcycle magazine, that your more likely to get a concussion in a Snell helmet than a DOT helmet, so any offroad helmet i get only has DOT on it, no snell, they are harder. Im keeping my eye open on ebay for a cheap street helmet... thats a long article, but a good one, i didnt read the entire thing though.... IMO DOT is all that you need.

 

well, the main reason I found it is because I was trying to find out the main differences in carbon/kevlar/fiberglass helmets compared to polycarbonate. Long story short, the poly is more flexible and thus according to the article protects better and won't just disentegrate upon impact like the carbon/kevlar/fiberglass. The Z1R (partsunlimited brand) performed the best in the article so that's what I went with. To find the color and cheap price was even better.

 

yeah i posted that article up yesterday. helps put things into perspective. snell's 2010 standard is basicly the same as the ECE. so they know they are wrong and moving towards the same standard as europe. but they will never admit it of course.

 

they are changing their standards.

 

linky no worky. the article seems to have disappeared from the site.

 

it's from motorcyclist magazine. gotta be 3 years old by now. essentially what it says is that spending huge money on street helmuts is a waste since the best rating they got was from a $100 helmut. the big name helmut companies use a shell that is too hard and transfers too many G's to the head. it also attacks the rating system. it caused a prettygood uproar in the industry. the magazine lost a few advertisers because of the article at that time. in the end the magazine was right. they(snell i believe) have since changed the standard butthey still allow too many g-forces for an exceptable helmut but it's getting better.
don't be overly concerned though.if you land on your head above a certain speed your gonna die. doesn't matter much what your wearing.

 

Not really sure about that one. I'm sure Rossi and Hayden don't wear polycarb helmets.
The real benefit is the weight, or lack off, with a carbon/kevlar/glass helmet.
Current lid is a SixSixOne Flight(1400 grams/3 pound). Superlight and way comfy.
See here for a good price.

 

link still works for me.

the important part of the article is that all the helmets tested from cheap to expensive did the job.
HOWEVER, the snell standard is too stiff and causes too many G's to transfer to the riders brain.
non of the helmets came close to bottoming out so for the side they can be much softer internally to reduce the G forces.
the ECE standard is softer and is used by erope, snell is not accepted in europe.

snell is now changing their standard basicly making it similar to ECE.


so the common statement "how muhc is your head worth" is just ignorant. the more you pay the more brand name notoriety you are paying for, and the more perks you get. it does NOT mean your helmet will work better.

 

I look at it like I do a seatbelt, some are better then others just so long as you wear em.
I'm sure (and it was stated in the article) that helmets perform differently in various types of accidents and since you can't predetermine what type of crash you're going to be involved in you may as well buy the helmet that suits your needs best, we all have our own likes and dislikes.

What flip-flops hold up the best in a wreck?