Bicycle helmet
Safety equipment that people clean like sports kit. This register can say what harms it and cannot say what is safe, because the only body it has read is not the manufacturer.
Precautions
- Check the manufacturer's instructions
- Consider professional help
In detail
A helmet gets sweaty and people want to wash it, and the honest position here is asymmetric: the harms are evidenced and the permitted method is not. What is evidenced is that almost all foams used in bicycle helmets are damaged by PETROLEUM-BASED SOLVENTS, that solvents incompatible with a plastic shell can attack and weaken it, and that both kinds of damage may be invisible — a crazed shell hides under paint, and crushed foam hides under the shell. What is NOT evidenced here is a cleaning method. The safety institute this register has read states that it cannot say which products are compatible and refers the reader to the manufacturer of their own helmet. This catalogue will not fill that gap with the damp-cloth-and-mild-soap advice that circulates, because a positive clearance on safety equipment needs an authority this register does not yet hold. So: no solvents, no petroleum-based products, and read the manual for the helmet you own. And separately from cleaning — after one impact the helmet is replaced, whatever it looks like.
Related
- Bicycle helmet has the component Helmet foam liner
Sources for this page
Sources
Bicycle Helmet Liner Materials, and Painting a Bicycle Helmet
Bicycle Helmet Safety Institute · Credible secondary source
Relied on for: That almost all foams used in bicycle helmets are damaged by petroleum-based solvents, that incompatible solvents can attack and weaken a plastic shell which may craze without the damage being highly visible, that the institute cannot say which products are safe and refers readers to the helmet manufacturer, and that a helmet is replaced after a single impact. (states this directly)
Verification: a person has read the passage relied on.
Read on — The foam liner materials page, and the solvent section of the painting page. Supports the claim as stated.
What CleaningHQ cannot answer yet
These are recorded questions about this subject that we have not yet researched to a standard we would publish.
- A permitted cleaning product and method for a cycle helmet and its liner
Last reviewed by a person on .