[CombatYoga]

After picking up and holding my friends Airoh 2.2 and feeling how light it was, I decided to buy one immediately. There are no dealers anywhere near me that sell these, and neither do the big online retailers that have nice return policies (BTO, Rockymountain, etc).

I purchased a brand new helmet from a seller on ebay for approx $500.

First impressions:
- Gorgeous looking shell
- the goggle opening looks a bit smaller than other helmets
- the chin strap is a cheesy webbing material - very cheap looking
- the helmet comes with a bag of goodies including a Airoh specific GoPro mount and an extended visor attachment
- lame helmet sack (unlike a Bell Moto 9 which comes with a felt lined bag with a zipper)

Upon trying it on, the cheek pads were clearly too big. I have been wearing a Bell Moto 9 size L and it fits perfectly. I emailed Airoh from the address on their website, politely explaining that I'd be interested in trying out size Medium cheek pads.

The response I got back was "you should have tried it on first". I'm not kidding.

I'll chalk a bit of this up to the support person's not-so-strong English, as they are located in Italy, but c'mon. I amp'ed it up, told them that was a non-helpful reply, and that I would have loved to try one on but, oh yeah, there are no dealers in Texas. I told them I'd be happy to BUY replacement cheek pads, if they could just point me to an online retailer (even in Europe) that carried them. I was then informed that size M cheek pads won't fit into a size L helmet. In fact, there are 2 sizes of cheek pads S/M which fit S/M helmets, and L/XL which only fit L/XL helmets.

The fix:
I pulled the cheek pads out of the helmet. If you are familiar with a higher end Bell, their cheek pads are magnetic - awesome. The Airoh's have plastic snaps which will round out and fail the more they unsnsap/snap. They are also held in on the bottom by these little plastic pieces with a slit and a hole that slides over a plastic rod. Really poor, cheap construction for a $500 helmet.

I used an Exacto knife, cut open the back of the cheek pads, removed the foam entirely, took a layer off, put the foam back and re-installed the cheek pads. Voila! Fixed and the fit is much better.

Overall, unimpressed with the build quality of this helmet. The weight is the big selling point - it is extremely light.
I watched a review by Keft online comparing the Airoh with the Suomy. The Suomy
is apparently a knock-off, actually weighs a few grams less, and is less than half
the price. It would not take much for them to make it over the low bar set by Airoh support either.

Recommendation: Look elsewhere for a high end helmet, or give the Suomy a try.