Tag Archives: helmet

Koden KSC25 Helmet Extras

14 Tuesday Apr 2015

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Koden KSC25 Helmet Extras

As mentioned in my previous blog, the brilliant Koden KSC25 Carbon helmet comes with a few accessories.

The peak is of no use to me racing an open single-seater, but I’m sure is great for rally drivers etc.

The spoiler, however, was of interest to me.

As a very good and very cheap helmet, I’m sure a lot of people will be buying these, but, not many will want to get them painted up because it’s The Law to keep your carbon weave on show!

There are absolutely no instructions with the helmet – perhaps unsurprisingly, as you probably shouldn’t be getting in a car if you can’t figure out which end to put your helmet on. This leaves a bit of a dilemma with these extra bits, and what to do with them, though…

The spoiler and the peak come with ‘sticky stuff’ around their edges, so you just peel the tape off and stick it onto your helmet.

Umm… where??

There are no images I could find online of a helmet with either accessory actually attached!

I’m sure the spoiler is more cosmetic than anything, but as a biker I appreciate the need to have vents and peaks and all kinds of nonsense hanging off your helmet. It just looks better!

Many helmets boast about their anti-lift properties (meaning the air won’t get under them and lift them up at high speed), and the Koden spoiler may have some kind of effect here. Looking at my trusty AGV Stealth motorcycle helmet, though, I suspect it’s more to aid the exhaust vents on the back of the helmet.

My AGV has a spoiler itself, but with ducting to channel air from the front of the helmet all the way back and past the exhaust vents. My best guess is that the Koden spoiler is supposed to be placed in a similar fashion, i.e. covering the helmets exhaust vents like this:

I’ve already seen a few weird and wonderful placements from races this year, and as I said, I don’t think it REALLY matters, but by my logic and experience, this is how it’s supposed to go.

I suspect most will just leave the KSC25 bare and not have to guess!

I am planning on a few small stickers with my name on to stick on the helmet – but am also conscious that scrutineers don’t like helmet stickers as they might be covering something up.

Oh, and please before you go sticking anything on your brand new helmet – SIT IN YOUR CAR!

You’ll be gutted if you go sticking stuff all over it only to find you can’t get your head on your head rest anymore!

If you’re driving a Sheane Formula Vee – you’re fine to use it.

Getting Kitted Out

03 Wednesday Jul 2013

Posted by in Formula Vee, Racing, Uncategorized

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Getting Kitted Out

Some of you have asked me what I’ve done about racewear, and how much I’ve paid.

The Lottery winner miracle still hasn’t happened, yet, and so I’m still on a tight budget.  This has meant a compromise between buying top-quality brand new kit for safety, and taking the second-hand gamble to get stuff cheaper.

I went to the NEC National Motorsport Show early in the year, with the aim of trying on things like a race suit so I had an idea of size, and hopefully grabbing some bargains.

The ‘bargain’ thing didn’t really happen.  Instead, after going in with the idea to buy a budget 2 layer race suit, I made the mistake of trying on a good quality 3 layer suit on one of the stands…

The quality oozed through in every aspect of the suit, and even the feel.  The suit I instantly fell in love with was up for an absolute bargain of £300 – but this was way over my budget, and by some miracle I managed to resist the temptation to buy it.

What I did decide, was that I was going to spend more money on a 3 layer suit rather than a 2 layer suit.  There is a simple reason for this: if you wear a 3 layer suit, it becomes optional to have nomex underwear.  That will save £100+ straight away.

Whilst a nomex race suit IS important for safety, it’s not providing you with active protection like bike leathers do.  Unless you catch fire – and then you want every penny you have invested in it!

I’d been watching and bidding on loads of suits on Ebay, and just missed out on one before it ended unsold.  I emailed the seller to see if the suit wa still for sale – it wasn’t, but as it turned out he did have a few others for sale.

After a brief flurry of emails, and finding out exactly who this ‘Martin Byford’ fellow was, we agreed a price of £120 for one of his old suits.  It’s a 3 layer Sabelt suit.

My fiancée made the final choice between two suits, because she said one of them ‘felt lucky’.  As it turned out, it’s the suit that Martin Byford won the Renault Clio Cup with in 2007! 

Sabelt 3 layer suit, modelled by my beautiful fiancée!

The downside is I look like I’ve just fell out of the Clio Cup – the upside is that this should terrify fellow open-wheeled racers!  I need to look into getting patches to cover up the worst of the sponsors…

I did pick up some cheap Sparco gloves from the NEC show – I figured gloves will wear, so best to buy these new.  I can also upgrade to better ones when I have more cash.  They did keep my hands warm driving on Winter roads, though!  £40 from Demon Tweeks.

I won a pair of fairly tatty OMP boots from Ebay for around £25.

It doesn’t seem all that clear whether boots and gloves have to conform to regulations, but I made sure all my kit meets the 2000-8856 standard, just to be sure.

I’m considering borrowing Glenn Hays helmet (if it fits!).  It does irritate me having to buy a car helmet.  I really should be upgrading my bike helmet, as that is getting old, now, but of course motorcycle helmets don’t meet car regulations!

As an aside, the reason for this is firstly that car helmets must have nomex lining, and also because a car helmet has to be able to withstand multiple impacts such as smacking against a roll cage on every corner.  A bike helmet is built to withstand one big impact and is then scrap.

Hedtec and V2 do good quality helmets for around the £150 mark, so I’ll be getting one of these for now, if needed.  If you’re interested, I’m also looking at around £3-400 for the latest AGV bike lid, but bear in mind I’ll be wearing thsi every day and travelling much faster!

I had my beady eye on balaclavas next.

I was going to spend as little as possible here, but thinking about it, decided to shell out for a 2 layer one.  The more expensive ones also have an extra cooling function which may well be made up nonsense.  I do get hot, however, so figure I may as well go for it.  £40 to £50 should get a Sparco one with ‘X-Cool’ coating.

Looking on Ebay, I found one for £15 that had ‘only been worn once’, put my bid in, and won it!

So, the running total so far, for some top quality kit at bargain prices:

  • Sabelt 3 Layer Race Suit: £120
  • Sparco gloves: £40 (bought new!)
  • OMP boots: £25
  • Sparco 2 layer balaclava: £15

The bad news is both Formula Vee racers are still in bits, due to other aspects of life getting in the way, and my debut at Rockingham International is off.  It’s a setback, but it’s only that.  I could have made the extra effort but it would mean jumping straight onto the track with championship contenders when I’ve never even sat in the car before… So I’m planning on at least one test to get the feel of the car first.

ARDS Test Part 2: The Go Racing Pack

01 Saturday Jun 2013

Posted by in ARDS Test, Formula Vee, Racing, Technique, Uncategorized

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ARDS Test Part 2: The Go Racing Pack

Note: This blog was first published 06 August 2012.

I’ve now got my Go Racing Pack, and am preparing to book the test!

In the pack you get a DVD of what’s expected of you for the test, which goes over lots of regulations and flags you need to know for the test, and also a fair bit of first aid.  You get the ‘Blue Book’ of all contacts/rules/regs in the motor racing world along with some quick reference sheets for flags and handling techniques, a Demon Tweaks catalogue, and the application form itself.

Next step is to book up a day at Silverstone.

I have made a few observations along the way so far:

Although bike part prices are wayyy above car ones, when you get into car racing the balance shifts.

Car helmets? Unless you buy from overseas you’re looking at £300 for a cheapo, and most double that. Or in the thousands. Compare that to a bike lid that will do the job for £100…

And the flame retardant suits themselves? More than a set of leathers! You might scrape a cheap suit for £300, but just over £1000 seems to be about right – and that’s into custom-made super-leather jobbies on a set of bike leathers!

And then you need Nomex boots, gloves, and ideally a full set of fireproof undergarments head-to-toe.

Luckily, having just called Silverstone up directly, all you need for the test is comfortable clothing (as a lot of the day is in classrooms) and they provide an open-face helmet (so you can speak to the instructors and hear them yelling at you).  The may let me use my bike helmet, so I’ll take this along as well – mainly to try and sneak a bit of camera footage out of the day!

The other thing catching my attention at the moment is:

Heel & Toe

Every racing driver uses this technique, right?

Wrong, from what I can tell! I’m trying to find out from various sources exactly how many use it, and is it just the fastest drivers, and so far results are inconclusive.

I know championship winners who never use it, fo example.

I mean, I use the bike equivalent (blipping on every downshift), so it would make sense for me to learn heel and toe. Probably not for the test, but for the future, certainly.

I’ve said before about how driving a car is a bit boring as it’s all in slow motion compared to a bike.  Maybe this will liven things up a bit for me!

I’m enjoying watching old videos of Ayrton Senna and suchlikes working the pedals.  One thing to watch for, is if you’re learning from videos of Group B rally drivers, be aware that because of the filthy great primitive turbos they used, they’d often keep the throttle wide open as they braked.  This kept the turbo in the narrow sweet range when they got back on the power.

As a slight tangent to this, I recently learned that Ari Vatanen(?) drove the Lancia Delta S4 on the Portuguese GP circuit in 1984, and clocked a time that would have put him in 6th place at that years Formula One race!  Is that a sign of how awesome those Group B cars were, or how good their drivers were?

Do you use heel and toe in the car?