Well yeah, it has probably been just as long that I posted as it has since I rode last but................
I got a new helmet for Christmas. My family went together and got me a Lumos Kickstart. I'd never heard of one, seen one but it looked pretty cool and you can definitely be seen wearing it. And as said, never heard of one before so I googled it and just about passed out when I saw the suggested retail price.

Very considerate gift, you are loved and they value your safety. Nice gift, be happy even though you would not buy for yourself.

enjoy!

Lumos helmet

Actually you can spend more than that on a helmet that has NO electronics built into it. Looks very cool and they can probably track you from space! The FBI, IRS, NASA or the Russians.

Retailers love Christmas! Extravagant spending, much by gift buying folk that don't care the cost. Nifty idea to put lights in the hat, but some better vents would arguably be more useful.

It's amazing how some things can pop out at Christmas lead-up and surprising price. Machka and I were browsing initially through a local bike shop when she spotted a new that looked good and seemed it might be better fitness than the other two she currently uses. Around a hundred bucks the shown price. Asked the shop person to try one to fit, and he said also that it was on special at less than half that price.

Wowsers... it not only fitted well, felt great, and looked good, but it was a bargain price. Christmas can sometimes be a great time of year.

Wow...if only we knew what that "new" item was?

That's a great helmet design. I attach lights to my helmets -- white front, red rear -- and have heard compliments from drives and pedestrians on how much it enhances visibility. But the Lumos is a better design than my makeshift solution.

Helmet, of course.

I'll post a photo one day.

Sorry, my bad omission. Goes with thread subject as a helmet -- a Specialized Andora.

And yet not a single photo of said helmet was posted that day. As to the price, I'm sure your family knows you're worth it.

When I used to ride motorcycles the saying was "if you have a $25 dollar head get a $25 helmet".

We said that about bicycle helmets in the mid-1970s, when the first hard shells (Bell Biker) started to supplant the cheaper traditional leather or vinyl "hairnets."

The MSRP on the top helmets from Bell, Giro, Specialized, etc. are all higher than that. So, yeah, out of touch (NTTAWWT).

With bicycles helmets, the $25 and the $250 helmet are both certified to the same safety standard.

So true, so true. But that is the minimum safety standard. Any manufacturer can go beyond that. There's also fit, finish and comfort. And of course we can't forget styling.

Whether those unique differences are worth the cost is for the individual to decide. After all, a $5000 Rolex can't tell time any more accurately than a $30 Casio. But they're still valued nonetheless.

But how does one prove that they used the extra money to do so?

Unless you have the sophisticated equipment to do helmet testing, you can't. You also can't prove anything else about helmets but you can study information which is available about new helmet technologies, such as MIPS, and make a somewhat informed decision.

Yep. Take information from any company trying to sell you something with a grain of salt, though. Any of us who cycled in the late 70s/early 80s will remember the Skid Lid ads gushed about what a great helmet it was. Independent testing found otherwise.

Here are some recent helmet test results. Cost is relevant,but not a strong indicator of safety.

https://www.helmet.beam.vt.edu/bicyc...t-ratings.html