Fancy Euro Helmets
They’re expensive, they offer minimal surface protection, but European designer helmets are always a really snazzy addition to a scooterist’s arsenal. If you like to use your scooter as a fashion accessory (or maybe you just enjoy being fashionable in general) you’ll probably love spending all your money on these chin-strapped fashion statements. Conventional motorcyclists love to crap all over these helmets (not literally of course) but I can truly see the value, because standard motorcycle helmets all start looking the same after awhile, and “Graphic Helmets” generally means dragons and skulls and horrible “tribal” stripes. A major hurdle to finding flashy fashionable overpriced Euro helmets is DOT-Approval. Naturally, if you’re wearing a helmet for the purpose of keeping your brains in your head after a crash, you’ll want the helmet to meet or exceed a certain safety testing standard. Not all Euro helmet makers want to bother with the hassle (money, bureucratic red tape, etc) so our choices are limited.
Steve Guzman blogged the U.S. arrival of the latest Nexx Helmets (http://www.nexx-usa.com/). The cost for these is between 250 and 280 bucks, and they have a couple of nice designs to choose from. Just like all Euro fashion helmets these days, the shape of these are all based on the “Chopper Pilot” helmet template, but they look nice and are DOT-approved. So if you don’t mind spending 300 bucks on a half-helmet in the name of fashion, take a look.
On another tip from Steve, you can add this “anti-pollution” mask to your face and look like a sci-fi movie bad guy with your new Nexx helmet. Looking menacing is all well and good, but if you have spring allergies (raises hand) and are tired of sneezing gobs of snot onto your visor for the entire first month of riding season, this mask could be a godsend. The mask has a replaceable charcoal filter and boasts that it “releases heat and water vapour” which means in layman’s terms “Won’t fog up your visor or glasses when you breathe.” A little pricey though, at 25 GBP (about 40 U.S. dollars) I should hope this glorified balaclava works wonders. Either way, worth the cost if you have terrible allergies. I wonder if they make goggles - sneezing is one thing, but red itchy eyes is another problem!
Here are some other DOT-legal Euro helmets…
Davida:
This “Cadillac of Retro Helmets” is expensive, and only a couple of their helmets are DOT approved. I love their new line of “Racing Helmets.”
Momo Helmets:
Another hot little lid. Comfortable and attractive, one of our club members has one of these and it’s really cool-lookin’.
Moschino Helmets:
I believe these came onto the U.S. market last year. Same Jet Fighter Pilot configuration as all the others, but still some fairly cool colors and designs.
Corsa Vinatge Helmet Recall:
Due to its failure during a recent DOT crash test, the “Corsa Vintage” retro helmet line has been voluntarily recalled by Helmet City International. If you bought one you’ll probably want to check in with the place where it came from (I know we have a couple scooterists in our club who rock the Corsa). It was a voluntary recall, if their next incarnation of this best-selling helmet passes the DOT crash test in the future then it might very well be coming back.
Kind of a drag - I had my eye on a gorgeous “Union Jack” colored variety, and the prices were great.
Originally published at BlueSmoke Studio. You can comment here or there.