I was happy with my Scorpion EXO-700 for about two years. That changed recently when I was 70 miles into a 500 mile road trip and my trusty Scorpion crapped out. In hindsight, maybe I should have seen this epic fail coming before the helmet literally fell apart.
I was riding south on a narrow two lane, facing a lot of north bound semi traffic. Suddenly, the wind behind one these monsters ripped opened my face shield. My sunglasses deflected most of the 70mph wind and I pulled the shield down again. Weird, that's never happened before, I thought. But, it would happen again.
After the third incident, I was pretty unhappy with the helmet. I pulled off the highway and into a parking lot to see what was wrong. I removed my helmet and flipped up the face shield which promptly fell off, along with the shield pivots on each side of the helmet. Now, the problem was obvious.
The face shield pivots are mounted on each side of the helmet with two plastic screws. The heads of all four screws had broken off. Not good news since I was not in a place to fix it. So, I picked up the scattered pieces and parts, put on my sunglasses, and rode on without a face shield.
Back at home, I had replacement screws, but the broken screws were stuck in the helmet. The longer I messed with them, the less I cared about fixing it. Frustrated, I pulled out a spare helmet and chucked the broken one into the closet. I may mess with it again, later.
Here are a couple pics of an unbroken EXO-700 highlighting these plastic screws. The pic below shows the helmet with the shield installed.
When these screws break, the entire pivot assembly shown below (circled in red) falls off. On my helmet, all four failed and that is odd. This helmet was never abused and had little wear, since I use a couple of other helmets, as well. There is no reason the helmet should have fallen apart like this.
For those wearing the Scorpion EXO-700, pay attention to those plastic mount screws on the face shield pivots. Be sure to carry the spare screws with you and stash a pair of sunglasses or goggles on your bike. They can get you home again when a good helmet goes bad.
I was riding south on a narrow two lane, facing a lot of north bound semi traffic. Suddenly, the wind behind one these monsters ripped opened my face shield. My sunglasses deflected most of the 70mph wind and I pulled the shield down again. Weird, that's never happened before, I thought. But, it would happen again.
After the third incident, I was pretty unhappy with the helmet. I pulled off the highway and into a parking lot to see what was wrong. I removed my helmet and flipped up the face shield which promptly fell off, along with the shield pivots on each side of the helmet. Now, the problem was obvious.
The face shield pivots are mounted on each side of the helmet with two plastic screws. The heads of all four screws had broken off. Not good news since I was not in a place to fix it. So, I picked up the scattered pieces and parts, put on my sunglasses, and rode on without a face shield.
Back at home, I had replacement screws, but the broken screws were stuck in the helmet. The longer I messed with them, the less I cared about fixing it. Frustrated, I pulled out a spare helmet and chucked the broken one into the closet. I may mess with it again, later.
Here are a couple pics of an unbroken EXO-700 highlighting these plastic screws. The pic below shows the helmet with the shield installed.
When these screws break, the entire pivot assembly shown below (circled in red) falls off. On my helmet, all four failed and that is odd. This helmet was never abused and had little wear, since I use a couple of other helmets, as well. There is no reason the helmet should have fallen apart like this.
For those wearing the Scorpion EXO-700, pay attention to those plastic mount screws on the face shield pivots. Be sure to carry the spare screws with you and stash a pair of sunglasses or goggles on your bike. They can get you home again when a good helmet goes bad.
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