Now that Santa has finally come to my house mid-spring to deliver me some PRE-bike goodies, I wanted to post a review on my first ever motorcycle helmet, the Icon Domain 2 SHA_DO.

If you are like me and enjoy doing research, you could read about the Domain 2 helmets on the web, and this is what you would find:

“The Domain 2’s composite fiberglass, carbon fiber, and Dyneema® handcrafted shell has been designed and developed with safety and comfort in mind. With our integrated Supervent system, dual density impact absorbent EPS liner, two shell sizes, and locking Proshield visor, the Domain 2 is built to help keep you cool, safe and focused.”

-Courtesy of Icon’s instruction manual.

Icon has gone the extra mile with the Domain 2 with some pretty radical styling and unique air vent structures. That is what first caught my interests when I went looking for helmets.

Initial Reactions:

Upon first opening the box, the helmet is encased in a protective bag. No slouch on the details, Icon has the logo of the particular type of helmet printed on the drawstring closure bag. The bag is soft lined to avoid putting any scratches into your new lid.

Once I removed the helmet from the bag… it was as if the heavens opened up, and lo and behold…. The Holy Gra… wait, this is getting too silly.

Seriously, I was immediately impressed with the quality and feel of the helmet. The whole helmet almost glowed with the quality of the detail and paint. I was also amazed at how light the helmet is at just over 3 pounds. The styling may not be to everyone’s taste, but to me, I thought… WOW!

One thing to note for this helmet, Icon went the length to get this helmet D.O.T. FMVSS 218 and Snell M2005 approved.

Vents:

The first thing you notice when you look at the helmet is all of the venting, from the BIG scoops on the top of the helmet, to the more subtle chin vents, and the VERY BIG exhaust vents at the back of the helmet. Also of note is the spoiler toward the back which Icon stresses is NOT to be used to carry your helmet. It is meant to help keep the helmet from rising up during riding at speed, not as a convenient carry handle.

The vents are very easy to open and close by hand and they are easily found while wearing the helmet. They will not, however, open or close by themselves from the wind while riding. The one drawback that you have initially is that unless you either look directly into the vent when you play with it, or you read the instructions, you don’t know which way is open and which way is closed. However, if you (I know this is a stretch for us GUYS…) READ the instructions… you get a very good description of what is open versus closed.

The center top vent has several positions so that you have more than just ON/ OFF and you can control some of the flow. The top side vents, however, are ON/ OFF only. I mean sure, you can play with the levers and get a partial setting, but the true settings are ON/ OFF.

Then chin vents are seen/accessed when you remove the chin curtain which is tucked very snugly between the helmet shell and the EPS liner. It is easily removed with a tug, but takes some effort to replace it; it’s not difficult, it’s just a snug fit so it won’t come off when you ride at speed. Once the chin curtain is removed, you can see the 3 chin vents. The center one is easy to recognize as it has a BIG red slider. Again like the top center vent, there are several positions marked with detents. The upper 2 vents are rotational, so they are just about infinitely adjustable.

Unfortunately, these 2 vents almost need to be adjusted while the helmet is off of your noggin so that you can actually see what you are doing. Oh, and don’t try and rotate these little things with gloves on as you won’t get your fingers anywhere CLOSE. These can only be adjusted (in my opinion… take it for what it is) with either your bare fingers or a pair of needle nose pliers (if you’ve got BIG fingers). Once you have your vents set, you can then replace the chin curtain.

In talking with some people and reading some of the reviews, people say that all of the venting makes the helmet a bit noisy, so I’ll keep you posted once I ride with the helmet.

Face Shield:

Icon uses what they call the “ProLock” system. Basically this is a small metal pin in the lower front part of the helmet that matches with a hole on the visor to keep the shield closed during riding at speed. It takes a small amount of force on the tab by the pin to open the face shield so it is snug enough that wind alone won’t open it.

The ProShield that Icon uses on the Domain and Domain 2 helmets is completely removable. The shield comes off the helmet by opening the visor completely and pushing in on the orange handles (look like small orange fingers when the visor is completely up). When I first tried to remove the shield to understand how it was done, I was initially afraid that I might break the tabs off as a fair amount of force was required to get them to release.

Once the tabs on both sides were moved to their forward positions, the shield and the side plates come off as one with little effort. Putting the shield back into place is a bit tricky. First you have to align 3 sets of tabs, 2 on the round hinge (square tabs on the orange part of the helmet), and one further tab located at the opening of the black raised part below the orange release/ locking mechanism. Once you have all of the tabs aligned (I suggest only doing one side at a time) you need to pull the orange tabs toward the back of the helmet to lock the visor in place.

Interior:

When you turn over the helmet and look at the inside, Icon’s attention to detail was not only on making the lid look good on the outside, but it really looks good and comfy on the inside as all of the pads are plush and soft.

One of the nice things about the Domain 2 Helmet is that the entire lining is removable and washable. Icon recommends that to wash it, you do so with baby shampoo and letting it air dry… don’t try and machine wash it.

The interior is covered in HydraDry which according to the Icon manual:

“…is a moisture wicking material that keeps the rider’s head drier and cooler as well as drying much faster when it does get wet.”

With the fact that the Domain 2 has two outer shell sizes (XS, SM, M) and (L, XL, XXL) and the fully removable lining, you can mix and match the liners and cheek pads to fit about any style of head. I found that I typically wear an XL in helmet (yes, I’ve got a big noggin), but since I’ve got a bit more of a round head than oval, I found that on the regular XL helmet that my cheeks were squished a good bit. When I tried on the XXL helmet, I found that it was good in the cheeks, but a bit too loose in the top of my head. So the compromise was to get the cheek pads from the XXL helmet and put them into my XL helmet.

The cheek pads are easily removed by popping the 3 snaps and then giving a tug to remove the plastic tabs from the sides of the helmet. Once the pads are removed they are easily replaced by sliding the tabs back into the slots on the side of the helmet between the shell and EPS, then lining up the snaps and popping them into place. The top liner is also removed easily by unsnapping and tugging.

The front breath deflector is also removable with a tug, and replaced by sliding it between the shell and EPS.

Spare parts for the helmet are available through most of the Icon gear dealers, and include vent structures, chin curtain, breath deflector, side plates, shields, liners, and cheek pads.

Several things to note:

The helmet is a bit pricey. List price of the Icon Domain 2 Helmets is between $390 and $410 US. This puts them into the upper range of most people.

The helmets come standard with a clear fog-free, scratch resistant face shield.

The Domain 2 helmets, unlike their predecessors, have side plates that cover up the attachment mechanism and make the helmet look more aesthetically pleasing. If you plan on having more than one visor in your arsenal, I would recommend getting a spare set of side plates to put on your spare face shield. The shields and the side plates come in many different colors; a full listing of which can be found on the Icon website.

Shields are between $25-$45, and the side plates are between $15-$35 (pair).

Final Impressions:

Before riding:

Based on first fit and first impressions, I am very anxious to wear the helmet and ride to see just how good it acts while on the road. Statically the helmet is very comfortable and stays nice and cool. If the reviews are true and the helmet is a bit noisy inside, I can always close a vent or two… or do what I am hoping to do once I can ride a bit better… install my speakers, cause what’s better than music to drown out the wind?

Update after riding with the helmet:

For any mild weather like we have had for the past few nights (50’s), you NEED to remove the chin spoiler as there is not enough air moving to keep the “Fog Free” face shield fog free. I had not only my face shield fogging, but my glasses as well, unless I had my face shield cracked open (so much for the FOG FREE claims of Icon on the face shield). The face shield stayed where I put it when cracked open, even at highway speeds, so that was a plus.

All in all, the noise of the helmet is nothing that drowns out other sounds around you, so as far as it being noisy, it isn’t. This was with all of the helmet vents open during highway speeds.

The helmet is very comfortable, and it fits me well after several weeks of wear. The fact that all of the helmet interior is customizable to fit your head aids in this.