Initial impressions

As most things with Pure Savage, the Lumos Helmet sort of just landed up on our desk by complete chance. Having seen the kickstarter a few years ago and thinking how novel the idea was at the time, the opportunity to try the helmet was taken in a ‘flash’.

The helmet comes with a remote, some mounting bands and some “how to pamphlets” on how to social media the unboxing, like we needed that. #Blessed #Influencer
We were given the black variant of the helmet, which is perfect for us stealth roadies with black bikes, kit and socks. The other colours in the range are yellow and white.

The Lumos Helmet’s party trick is the built in lights. There is a white light strip on the front of the helmet and a red triangle in the rear of the helmet which are on the same circuit. These can either flash, random or stay on constant. There are two additional lights on the back of the helmet in the shape of arrows, which can either be orange to indicate or red to show braking.

Set up

Yes, this is the first helmet I have had that required some setting up. I quickly downloaded the Lumos App and followed the rather simple pairing procedure between the phone and helmet via Bluetooth.

On the app I was able to see the exact battery level of both the helmet and remote. I played with all the settings and was ready for my commute home.

Fit

When throwing the lid on for the first time you can feel the extra weight in the helmet compared to my normal every day Kask Mojito. It has a rear head restraint and some comfortable straps, the rear restraint is very similar to the one from by Bell helmet.

Travels

Since this helmet is designed to carve up the inner city streets, that’s where I went on my commute home. Heading through Cape Town centre and then making my way to the bike lane towards the Southern Suburbs. It is difficult to gauge how the cars around me reacted to the helmet, but I did not die, so bonus. I did notice that the built in indicators and auto brake light did attract attention from motorists in the traffic though.

The longest ride I did with the helmet was around two and half hours, after this length of time you start to feel the additional weight of the helmet. In my actual commuting which varies between 30 and 40 minutes I did not notice the additional weight.

Indicators

Found that the most improved safety aspects with the Lumos Helmet would be the turning right at an intersection, with the indicator on signalling your intention to turn right, both the car behind you and the one coming towards you in the intersection know what’s cooking.

The other great aspect of the indicators was pulling out of the non-existent bike lane in Woodstock into the road. I found that cars no longer tried to quickly squeeze past me or had to jump on the brakes which I have had on numerous previous occasions.

Auto Brake Light

After adjusting the settings on the APP for the auto brake feature I was easily able to trigger the auto brake light when braking on my road bike. It works on inertia, so those with the luxury of disc brake bikes or mountain bikes may not need it as sensitive as I had it set for the road bike’s rim brakes.

When braking all the lights on the rear of the helmet light up drawing attention to your change in speed to the driver behind you. I found this most useful when approaching stop streets as most cars stop at red lights, not so much stopping happens at stop streets. The brake light also works wonders for that “one guy” on your morning ride that randomly brakes for no reason at all when on the front.

Battery life

I found that on flashing mode I managed a full ride 3 hour ride in the morning to Chapmans Peak and work and another 30 minute ride home in the evening, after which the helmet needed charging with its provided magnetic connection. You can also check the battery level using the app on your phone or have audible warnings from the helmet itself.

In the two weeks I had the helmet I did not need to charge the remote once. When I gave it back it still had 35% battery life according to the app. The remote uses the same magnetic charge cable as the helmet.

Price and Distribution

If you were to head on over to the Lumos Helmet website, the helmet goes for $200 the only issue is they do not ship to South Africa. Lumos Helmet Western Cape has however teamed up with Brights Hardware to sell the Helmet in South Africa for R2999! That is pretty much exactly what you would pay if you managed to buy the helmet in the US, ship it here and pay duties on it, max kudos! Head on over to https://www.brights.co.za/online-shop/ and search Lumos to find it there.

Would I get one?

Yes, I commute 3-4 times a week to work in Cape Town and feel that this actually makes one seen a lot better than a standard helmet. Would I use it for racing or longer rides, no because it’s not really designed as a helmet for 6 hour rides. Same reason you would not take your fixie commuter for a 6 hour ride. This is also the first time my Mrs has been keen to buy me something cycling related, I guess she still likes having me around to change nappies now and then when I am not cycling!