I'm still fuming about wasted $$.
First of all, I bought an (for me) expensive helmet -- an HJC "GL-MAX." (Below --- )
Now, I do have to admit that this HJC fits "better" than my
old Vega. It's tighter, as the experts recommend; and it has a chin-guard
which will supposedly protect whatever teeth I have left if I kiss the
asphalt at 50 mph. (Ho Ho Ho.)
But it is half again as heavy as the Vega and generates more wind noise. That chin guard restricts my view of the instruments so that I have to bob my head to look down, and it seems to be quite a bit warmer on hot southern summer days. It's also damned-near impossible to put it on when wearing glasses, something I've learned to do handily with the Vega.
You're likely here because I linked you to this page from elsewhere, having said I'd report on a "visor insert" that promised to be a sunshade. Recall that I swore I wouldn't think of driving an auto without a proper sunshade, and could not understand why none was available as a "flip-down" inside helmet visors.
An Internet search found glowing reports on the Progrip 3000 Light Sensitive Lens. I took the description to a local powersports shop; I should have been warned; they had never heard of the gadget and had to search for ten minutes through catalogs before finding a wholesale source.
Ah, what the hell, it's only $20. Get me one.
There it is -- installed in my new helmet. (Ignore the lines; reflections from a nearby stairway.) An irritating but not outstandingly difficult chore.
Do you detect a potential problem? But regardless, I've already paid for it, so let's go for a ride and check 'er out!
Golly-Ned! It's a disaster!
Seen from inside the helmet through its visor, this is the normal "resting" color of the lens. A ten minute ride in Chattanooga's afternoon summer sun (slightly less bright than the Sahara Desert's) caused no visible change in color or density. I suspect the HJC's UV filtering visor defeated the phototropic design of the lens.
However, that has nothing to do with the fact that it is like looking through weak iced tea. My [purely unscientific] estimate of the lens's optical quality is somewhere above snot, and somewhere below those $3 sunglasses you bought in Cape May in 1998.
The proof; here's a photo of the same scene through the same helmet visor without the Progrip Lens, taken from the same location within minutes of the one above. I can say from personal experience that these two pictures tell the story fairly.
I should have listened to my engineering brain when I searched for the manufacturer's Website and found it in Italy. I should have thought more clearly when, after e-mailing them to ask if the material is truly phototropic, they didn't say "yes" or "no." They sent me the 'phone number of their U.S. representative in California.
I guess their grips are better than their NOFOG LIGHT SENSITIVE Lens RaceVision.