Bill Lehman

Communication equipment is mandatory for the instructor in most PCA regions I instruct with. Most instructors use Chatterbox which is not compatible with most "wired" helmets without an adapter. Almost no students helmets are wired.for communication. I would not recommend helmet wiring for a new student. I wear eyeglasses and some helmets offer a larger eye port which is useful. Most helmets come with a face shield and NJMP requires one but it's not enforced. I'm also in SE PA.

93 FireHawk 968

Carrera51

Idamelio:
If you can try on various brands prior to purchasing, that would be ideal since each manufacturer's helmets will fit a little differently. There is a pro shop at New Jersey Motorsports Park in the paddock of the Thunderbolt circuit. I think it's about an hour driving time from the Philly area. www.njmp.com

They stock a good selection of helmets from Bell, Stilo, Roux, HJC, Arai and others. Not sure what their hours are this time of year so you may have to wait until February.

If you have a reason to take a drive down to the Washington D.C. area, we have a full service showroom and a large stock of helmets in stock from Bell, Arai, Stilo, Roux, Simpson, G-Force and will be able to get you fitted in the right helmet for you. Our website is www.ogracing.com

If you have any questions, please give us a call at 1-800-934-9112. We are open 9am-6pm Monday through Friday and will be resuming Saturday hours from 10am-2pm in February.

Kind regards,

ApexPerformance

Definitely try some helmets on if you get to a shop near you. Some brands fit better than others depending on the shape of your head. Also, brand sizing runs different. A BELL or Gforce medium will run larger than Roux or HJC in medium. So if you try on a "medium" and decide to go shopping, make sure you know the brand and model too.

Here's a link to our website showing how to test fit a helmet (resource from BELL) - snugger is always better - How to fit a helmet

Blue Chip

I'm fortunate in having you all at many of our events - there is no substitute for trying one on and finding the best fit... Apex lets you do this.

Kein_Ersatz

Quadcammer

take a look at zamp. great pricing, good no-nonsense helmet, fit me fine, not terribly heavy, etc.

SToronto

Definitely try before buying. Super happy with my Bell now compared to HJC I had before. Spent a bit more this time but the fit and weight is worth it.

daylorb

+ 1 on Zamp. Did some digging on them, and from everything I could find, Zamp is the same as Bell Europe. I picked up the RZ-44 Carbon in December on a 20% off sale for $400 shipped. SA2015, pretty lightweight, vented, etc. Hard to beat. Their glass helmets are less. I also think their Hans-style device might be the best on the market.

Clark-ApexPerformance

Zamp is owned by David Zamperin. He was in the Sacramento, Ca area but now is up on the Wash/Canada line. He was the Bell Motorcycle LIcensee in North America. He had all the contacts at the Chinese mills so he started his own helmet line close to 20 years ago.
One of his helmets was identical to the Bell GP2 but it was less expensive.
The BELL AUTO licensee FOR North America is now the European licensee. They took over after the introduction of the 2010 helmet line. THey shut down the US factory in Rantoul , Il and moved all production to China. When the 2015 helmet line was introduced Bell moved all production to Bahrain. They all but went out of business you could not get anything. People looking for a Bell got tired of waiting and went with another manufacturers helmet. ,This move to Bahrain had to be very very costly.
We have been a Zamp dealer for 15 years. He is creative and he has good stuff.

daylorb

Great info - I had never heard that longer explanation before. Thanks for posting.

ajcjr

Besides having snell rating best helmet is the one that fits you the best with the highest quality you can afford. I do believe when it comes to helmets you get what you pay for in means of dollars, i cant see how a 200 helmet is the same as a 1200 helmet.

daylorb

Well a rating is a rating - great write-up here. https://www.revzilla.com/common-trea...ty-ratings-101

Note the last line... "A $100 DOT helmet that is sized correctly will better protect you than a $900 SNELL helmet in a size too large."

ajcjr

ace37