Hello! I’m RyanF9 and these are my favourite flip-ups.
I normally shy away from cheap modulars like this LS2 FF325 Strobe. It sells for under 200 bucks and that scares me. Why?
Well when you make a cheap helmet, the struggle is keeping it light, safe and quiet. Those three things are difficult to do without expensive fibreglass and carbon fibre. But with a modular, that “struggle” becomes nearly impossible. This complicated flip-up design adds weight, and it fractures the helmet’s shell making it less safe and easier for road noise to leak in.
Put simply, cheap modulars fight too many battles with too few dollars. So they usually suck.
But this LS2 Strobe is a unicorn – the mythical modular helmet that is both cheap and competent.
See how comprehensive the neck roll is? It’s downright difficult to take the helmet on and off, but once I do this makes a tight seal with my neck and because of that, the helmet is decently quiet.
It’s also way too light for a basic thermoplastic shell. 1630g for a size medium … the thing’s a feather.
But it doesn’t protect like a feather. The LS2 Strobe got three stars from SHARP, which is a passable safety rating. And the impact protection is actually really good everywhere except for the left side, where it sucks so bad that the whole helmet lost two stars.
I’d tell you to avoid crashing on your left side, but that’s not useful advice.
LS2 has a bad habit of rattling. But this one is tight. The vents, the shield, the drop-down sun visor – it’s all slick and precise. Plus it flips with the smoothness of a 500-dollar Shoei and the top detente holds with the force of 500 Gs.
Cons include the lack of a pinlock visor. The Strobe fogs up easily so I wish I had one. Also I think LS2 just wrote glasses instead of actually carving eyeglass channels, because it’s hard to wear shades in this helmet.
And ventilation goes from bad to worse. This chin port flows a shit ton of air, but good luck opening that with gloved hands. Then the top vent doesn’t breathe much, and the rear exhaust vents are… umm… nowhere to be found.
Fitment-wise, the Strobe is a long oval head shape but it’s not the longest of long ovals. Most neutral heads should still be fine in here. Also it only comes in two shell sizes, so if you’re an XS or a Large you might notice that the helmet is more bobblehead-ish than it needs to be. The strap is a ratchet, which will please some people and pinch others.
Now, the best-looking modular also comes from LS2. This is the FF324 Metro Rapid.
It’s actually homologated from a regular full face, which kinda explains why it looks so good. I think the blacked-out vents and cowls, combined with the vibrant accent colours and chopped-off chin bar give a really aggressive look.
I’m paying 50 bucks more when compared to the Strobe, and the main upgrade is ventilation – these chin vents, which are more like chin holes, whip enough air into my face to make a motocross helmet jealous. Then the top vents are properly cowled to create high-pressure zones that suck a good amount of air. And I get two exhaust ports, which the Strobe forgot entirely.
I also get a pinlock visor this time around, which is ironic because I don’t need one anymore. The Metro is so breezy that it never fogs.
Other less-than-useful upgrades include this chin bar lock. It keeps the flip-up flipped up, but with LS2’s herculean top detente, it isn’t really necessary. Then there’s the helmet’s compatibility with a Linkin Ride Pal communicator… which would be great if that comm wasn’t entirely inferior to anything from Cardo or Sena.
The biggest failure of this helmet is that the chin vents aren’t closable. Or rather, they close with separate panels, which will break the first time you get stuck in a rain storm and push them with a little too much desperation. Very finicky things, these. Also the Metro has LS2’s famous rattle, which is only entertaining if you’re an infant. It weighs about 100g more than the Strobe, and it’s much louder too.
Fitment-wise, the Metro is one of LS2s only neutral head shapes. So for the majority of us, this is our chance to snag LS2’s famous value without their infamous head-pinching ovals. To be honest, the Strobe is a better helmet and cheaper too, but damn this Metro looks good.
Now here’s my favourite option for ADV riders – it’s the Scorpion EXO-AT950.
Basically this is a 350-dollar flip-up adventure lid with a drop-down sun visor. In other words, a cheapo attack on the Schuberth E-1.
Shots fired.
I think Scorpion will win this game of cat and mouse. Partially because Schuberth’s fat cats in the E-1, the C3 Pro, the new C4… they’re all needlessly stuffy and overpriced.
But also, this is just a slam dunk from Scorpion. Its heavily-molded lines are gorgeous, both with and without the sun visor. The neutral head shape will be familiar to most noggins, and while the cheek pads are strangely tight at first, they’re bound to relax over time. Overall I’d call the AT950 highly comfortable. It’s also about as quiet as my Variant, which is to say, nothing special but nothing awful either.
And the trim is all solid. This sun visor deploys with a cable rather than a spring, which I love because springs invariably get tired and fail to retract. I will say that it’s tricky to find the slider back here while riding, but I can’t really blame Scorpion for that. The conventional placement – along the chin line – isn’t really possible with the disjointed mechanism.
Also this visor uses something called Ellip-Tec, which is a fancy way of saying it sucks back on the last movement to create a tight seal. And damn is it tight. This visor has enough closing force to cut out the rain, cut out the road noise… I’m pretty sure it’d cut off my finger if I got it stuck in there.
Looking for more from the chin bar vent. Others good. Fogs a fair bit, cause of ventilation. Need a flathead driver, or at least a coin, to take off the shield or peak. And that’s a smidge annoying. Eye port is small as far as ADV lids go. Need little goggles to make it work.
1780g medium.
elf
Premium: HJC RPHA-MAX and Klim TK1200 (do ‘em together?) If you do want to spend your money, go one of these routes. HJC RPHA Max if you’ve got 500 to drop, and Klim TK1200 if it’s closer to 1000. RPHA MAX same choice as last year. Weird shape, but amazing modular. TK1200 similar to old Shoei Neotec – a legend in this realm.
Klim – massive panel gap, button hard to catch. Makes it loud – Klim had this problem with the Krios.
Scorpion Covert – still coming, but that looks stunning. Mention it. – will be up on website within a month or two.