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5/20/2026
Location
Montrose
GB
I'm away to Morzine next month and I'm debating whether to take my ~2014 Giro Cipher helmet or newish Fox Proframe. The Giro is a full on DH helmet that has mostly sat in the cupboard over its lifetime, and feels noticeably sturdier, heavier, and more padded than the Proframe, but does not have Mips. The Proframe is newer and has Mips, but is obviously a much more lightweight helmet in its design. I'm leaning towards the Giro, but I'm curious as to what people's thoughts are on what the safer helmet actually would be. They both meet ASTM-5 but I would assume many helmets would far exceed that specification and some would barely meet it.
Poll
A nearly 13 YO helmet is a total non-starter. The ProFrame is DH rated, and MIPS. That pretty much ends it.
I have a TLD D4. This will be its 5th year of use. That will be the end. It will be replaced next year. Will it suck to spend up to $800 to replace it? Yep.
I’m pretty sure Neuro ICU rates are pretty high too though.
It's 13 years old, but it's only been used a handful of times, never crashed on, and sat in a cupboard for the rest of the time (so no excess exposure to UV). I previously would have just used the discard after 3-5 years rule, but I saw a study recently that found that age does not affect the impact absorption ability of EPS foam, which made me wonder about my old helmet.
Maybe better to stay on the safe side and stick with the Proframe though.
Link to study: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/biomechanical/article/138/4/0410…
that study has a sample size of 63, and the abstract doesn't indicate how (or even if) the aging conditions were managed consistently across the sample set. i would take their conclusions with a grain of salt.
(note: part of my job function includes studying aging & performance of polymer based materials)
Im certainly not planning to bin off my rarely used 2018 fox rampage pro carbon. Bloody lovely helmet and the best fitting I've owned. Feels very sturdy, more like a motorcycle helmet.
I actually binned an original model proframe this morning, pre that stupid twiddly adjustor. Not used it for years as i replaced it with a leatt gravity 4.0 after a hefty impact. Felt absolute garbage comfort wise. Can't believe i used to wear it.
I notice dyfi, bpw etc saying helmet over 4 years(?) old are not to be used. I can't see this being enforced.
Fair point. Your job sounds interesting - with your experience, would you suggest that EPS performance is indeed affected over time?
I work in the medical device industry.
All polymers degrade over time, especially with exposure to UV light, heat, and humidity. Which properties degrade depends on the polymer and amount and type of exposure. Base Polystyrene is known for embrittlement over time especially under the conditions previously mentioned. While it can / does occur with eps, it tends to do so at a slower rate. Whether or not it's enough to reduce overall performance/ safety is tough to say, as there's a lot of factors (manufacturing quality, storage conditions over time, how much use it's seen, etc).
All that said, you'd probably be fine with the giro if it hasn't been stored in hot conditions as you said. Personally, I'd opt for the newer helmet given they both have the same rating. TBI (traumatic brain injury) is something I personally want to reduce the risk as much as reasonably possible.
Not sure about MTB, but moto helmets have a production date sticker inside. When I roadraced with WERA your helmet and leathers went through tech along with your bike.
Interesting article, I’ll pull it tomorrow to check out at work when I can log into asme with my work credentials. Worth noting that anytime polymeric aging studies are done you typically need controls to compare the new vs the aged materials to determine if there was degradation or not. Sounds like they just rounded up a bunch of old helmets and compared their properties against baseline material standards, which is possibly a valid approach, but possibly not. When we conduct HALT testing on bespoke polymer blends at work we don’t just pull crap out of a drawer and pop it on a tensile tester to determine if it’s good enough let alone generate any sort of conclusion to the level of degradation based on the date printed on the bag.
I don’t know how deep helmet manufacturers go into developing bespoke eps blends for helmets but at the end of the day they are a molded product that is going to inherit typical molded polymer process variation that will affect mechanical properties. Even the best compounders in the world will always have a range for Tg and MW of the most higher performance plastics that when combined with typical molded part process windows will create more variation than most people would typically expect.
It’s a helmet, it protects your brain, I wouldn’t screw around with that based on a single document that doesn’t look like it was independently verified. YMMV…
Have fun in Morzine!
based on how they described it in the abstract, i'm guessing they didn't have any time zero samples. they also don't reference any compendial methods for aging of materials.
You must know this already as you own the proframe, but my 2c.
I have a proframe for racing and a dropframe for every other usage. I litterally don't consider the proframe to be safer than the dropframe, the only scenario I think it would provide additional protection is a small face-perfectly-centered impact, I can't see that chin bar resisting any kind of serious impact. So to me the proframe is a safe trail helmet, but not a real DH/ bike park helmet.
That said, I don't own a real DH helmet anymore, so when I do go to bikeparks in the Alps I often just wear the dropframe and sometimes the proframe, but I'm not hitting huge jumps and staying well within my limits.
So my vote would be proframe, but if you have concerns about it then buy a Fox Rampage online for 160, or some other brand for cheap: e.g. Leatt have a DH helmet with a bunch of certifications and some MIPS equivalent for 90e.
I think if you are asking the question on a forum you might not have peace of mind with either current helmets.
Just buy a new Leatt Gravity 8. That’s also moto rated and will give you the best protection. Doesn’t solve questionable line choices though.
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