What’s a composite motorcycle helmet?
Motorcycle crash helmets are made in a wide variety of materials – but often they’re created using a mixture of different materials laid down in layers to form what’s called a composite helmet shell.
Technically, when you get more than one material involved, it becomes a composite fibre helmet: the helmet is made from a composite, or mix, of materials to create a new material that has the best characteristics from all its component parts.
As an aside, that does of course mean that fibreglass, carbon fibre and lots of other materials are technically composites. In these cases either glass fibres or woven carbon fibres are mixed with a resin (usually epoxy or polyester) to produce a new material.
Don’t worry, that’s as deep as I’m going to go!
Usually, though, if it’s not plastic (thermoplastic or polycarbonate), fibreglass or carbon fibre, and includes more than one of these materials, helmet makers will sell it as a composite helmet.
Are composite crash helmets any good?
Short answer – yep, they’re great.
Longer answer – composite fibre helmets are some of the best motorbike helmets on the market. They’re usually constructed from a combination of fibreglass, carbon fibre sheets or aramid (Kevlar).
| Helmet Shell | Avg SHARP safety score (Max 5) | Avg weight (Kg) |
|---|---|---|
| Carbon | 4.26 | 1.37 |
| Composite | 3.89 | 1.47 |
| Fibreglass | 3.31 | 1.49 |
| Polycarb/thermoplastic | 3.59 | 1.57 |
| Full Face | 3.59 | 1.47 |
| Modular/flip | 3.36 | 1.67 |
As you can see from the table, carbon fibre helmets are generally the best – the lightest and safest around if you look at SHARP testing stats. But composite fibre helmets are close behind, ranking next highest in terms of both weight and impact resistance.
Across all the helmets tested by SHARP, composite fibre helmets score 3.76 out of 5 for safety with an average weight of 1.46Kg. That makes composite helmets the second best for safety and weight, but they’re also the second most expensive type of helmet.
Should I buy a composite crash helmet?
Yes – composite fibre crash helmets can be great and some manufacturers like Arai, Nexx and X-Lite specialise in making helmets from composite materials.
But like any helmet, there’s good ones and bad ones. So use the following links to find the best composite fibre helmets on the market today:
Check out all our composite fibre motorcycle helmets.
Or visit our Smart Filter pages, choose composite and whatever other helmet features you’re interested in.
Alternatively, view our top 10 Safest Helmets, Budget Helmets, Flip-up and Modular Helmets, Full Face Helmets, or top 10 All Helmets sections.
