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Visors misting up
Do all visors mist up? All mine have.
Thing is, if you wear spectacles then not only do you have your visor misted up on the inside, but you will also have your specs misted up on BOTH sides, making things three times as bad. Well, I don't think it's fair. Anti misting sprays seem to be of only limited use- am I really doing it wrong?? How I've survived riding almost blind for so long is a mystery to me, and I always promise myself never to do it again. I wonder if anybody else out there has the same trouble; any suggestions, please? ------------------ Johnefyn |
hello,
I've got a Nolan helmet and the visor used to be fogged all the time. I've had an extra piece of perspex inserted on to the visor, so now it's like a kind of dubbel glazing; result it will fog up for about 15 seconds on a cold day, after that it will clear up and stay clear. it was an extra accesory and costed only about 10 dollars, I hope this will help you, Mark ------------------ |
Hi Mark
Hey, that sounds good, could you tell me the make or where I could get hold of one? I wonder though if there might be a problem with the sealing of the visor on the rubber seal at the top of the visor where it closes aginst the shell of the helmet. Does it work ok in the rain? Don't know why I'm being so picky, though, can't go wrong at ten dollars. Many thanks John ------------------ Johnefyn [This message has been edited by John Roberts (edited 07 November 2004).] |
John - I've only had success with two approaches. First is Bob Heath visor spray - best liquid type I've used, but needs done for every trip. Second is the Fog City inner which glues to inside of your visor with its self adhesive rim. This is very good but scratches very easily so needs tender care, and needs to be fitted very carefully to stop it lifting off. It needs to be fitted to the curve of your visor, if you see what I mean,not stretched across the curve.It is relatively narrow so needs to be carefully lined up with your eyeline (or you will find yourself looking at the adhesive rim). As they cost around £15 it's worth deciding whether to renew your visor at same time. Sounds a bit awkward but if you do it right they are excellent and won't mist up. As for wearing 'specs, like you I have same and only solution for long wet rides seems to be contact lenses. For my short trip to work I have used an old pair with Bob Heath rubbed on - but smears on lenses are difficult if you are looking into headlamps at night.
Best of luck. |
John,
Don't know why your specs are fogging up. It hardly ever happened to me and I've had lots of different helmets. We currently use the Schuberth Concept helmet. For me it's the first helmet where the ventilation actually makes a difference. When the visor starts to fog up I can push it forward in the hinges a little, allowing air to flow over it and it usually clears. The bugger is in the rain, cause some raindrops will scatter on impact in the gap and I end up having to look through three layers of droplets. That takes quite some time to build up, though. They also make an anti-fog coated visor. I bought one of those, but it failed before I fitted it. I sent both our helmets to the factory, cause we found them too noisy. They practically reconditioned both and replaced both visors, free of charge. They even paid the courier back to France. Sadly, they are still noisy. I'm now back to a standard visor and I'm happy. I don't know what helmet you have, but see whether an anti-fog visor is available. That won't help your specs, though. ------------------ Salut from Southern France, the bikers' paradise, Peter. |
Peter,
I think the cycle goes something like this: It starts to rain. Lights turn red, or something, so I stop for a while. Without forward motion airflow the visor mists up. I open the visor just a bit. Raindrops start trickling down inside the visor now that the visor is no longer sealing at the top. After a few more stop/starts there is a curtain of rivulets on the inside of the visor, and condesation spreads. I get desperate and poke a wet gloved finger or two to try and wipe the condesation off. Rain comes in and on to my specs and soaks my beard. More condensation. My current helmet is a Vemar, it is vented and has a rubber deflector under my nose, possibly in an attempt to keep my breath off the visor. My specs are plastic, not glass, which may or may not be relevant. I've tried contact lenses, they don't work for me. They would have been really useful when I had the Montessa 250 Trials, it was murder trying to find my specs in the bracken without my specs and I seemed to spend more time groping for them than I spent on the bike. Going by bus appeals at times like these, you seldom hear a bus passenger beefing about condensation. Or Volvos. Or diesel slicks. Hmmm... Misty John ------------------ Johnefyn |
I agree with Misty John re the rain but worse still is when ice forms on the outside of the visor, and on the inside of the visor and on the specs. The conditions that cause this seem to occur a few times during the winter. The Shoei helmet visors now come with the double-glazing as standard and come the cold days I expect it to help a lot - it certainly works to obviate condensation. As mentioned by others, though, the d-g panel is exceptionally prone to scratching so should not be touched at all, ideally. Incidentally, it's taken me 14 years riding in the UK to finally understand that on no account should paper towels of any description be used to clean the outside of the visor as this creates microscopic scratching which wrecks the surface tension and prevents the water from beading and streaming off efficiently. Instead a horrible semi-opaque murk forms which when wiped away instantly forms again. Use only a mild detergent, plenty of clean water and a soft cloth. Even so, it seems hard to get more than 6 months out of a visor.
Neil. |
I fully recommend the 'Fog city' product, really is superb. The 'double glazing' for the Shoei that Neil mentions above is actually a Fog City with pins so that it can be lined up properly and located on the inside of the visor.
With regards to cleaning the visor, especially the Fog City insert, I clean mine with a very small wet sponge then dry it by dabbing it with a piece of soft cotton T-shirt. [This message has been edited by mcdarbyfeast (edited 09 November 2004).] |
Never mind all these fancy products designed to extract your money from your wallet, stick to the simple and cheap method. Make sure the inside of you visor is perfectly clean and DRY, drop a single droplet of washing up liquid on it and polish it well in. Make sure you use something very soft to polish it in to ensure it does not scratch the visor. This will last for a couple of days and can be reapplied at infinitum. It also works with spectacles as well.
------------------ The electric monk always has faith. |
Supposing that the visor was dry when you applied the washing up liquid, what if it started to rain, would it get washed off gradually once you opened the visor, and the rain started to trickle in? Is Bob Heath's stuff any more likely to stand up to the trickles?
Obviously, the greatest problem with misting is when it's raining, and once the rain starts to get in then the situation quickly deteriorates. Another source of annoyance is the fact that if you do open the visor to wipe the inside clear then the top couple of inches are inaccessible to your thick gloved finger 'cos it's been pushed up out of the way. Perhaps one day we'll end up with something resembling pilots' helmets, with radio,intercom and a supply of warm dry air. And perhaps a couple of Sidewinders. Keep dry J ------------------ Johnefyn |
My favorite is "lemon pledge" furniture polish. It fills in those fine scratches and helps water bead up. It also works on plastic lensed glasses. We also use heated visors on our snomobile helmets for those nasty cold times. Some helmet manufactures have a sno mobile helmet in their line and the shield might interchange.
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John,
Whenever I stop in the rain I open my visor. I never even thought about it, but it stops the water from running down the inside. Our Schuberth helmets have a rubber lip near the top of the visor, which seems to stop a lot of water from coming in, at least from dripping down. Neil: I have read somewhere that most paper towels contain a very fine abrasive, that's why... For cleaning I use almost never anything but running water and fingers. Our Schuberth visors have lasted about 4 years. I replaced mine only because it got scratched in Turkey, when a Turkey tried doing a U-turn in front of me. He didn't make it... ------------------ Salut from Southern France, the bikers' paradise, Peter. |
Peter
Was fascinated to read about paper towels containing abrasive material. We have a Kruger Tissue factory a few miles away and they passed me on to their mill in Bolton(?) where a very helpful gentleman told me a bit about different grades of tissue. I jotted a few notes, and learnt the following; there are two types of fibre, one, secondary fibre, containing a percentage of recycled paper and probably will contain an abrasive, and the other vigin fibre, which is all new and having no recycled content. Kitchen roll may or may not be ok depending on whether it is Luxury quality or not. Facial tissue should be ok as they do not contain abrasives, also toilet tissue, but the latter doesn't have as much wet strength because it's designed to disintegrate once it's flushed down the toilet. Apparently the wet strength can be controlled by varying the amount of Wet Strenth Resin in the mix, with each type of tissue containing amount suitable for its application. Table napkins shoul be ok too as they usually have reasonable wet strength. I asked about the possibility of the Wet Strength Resin smearing the visor, even as a microscopic layer and he said he doubted it. All clear now? (Whoops!) John ------------------ Johnefyn |
An interesting follow-up, John. I'm sure your source is right but to avoid having to decide on relative grades of paper and the risk making a mistake (which carries an instant penalty) I think I'll continue to give paper towels and tissues a miss altogether. I did try the detergent solution for a while but found it wasn't great in very wet conditions. All in all there's no perfect solution and it's a matter of "gladly my cross-eyed bear".
Neil. |
i had a Fog City insert which lasted me a year round US - south AMerica. Very good anti-fogging all the way. Advise against the photo sensitive version though as that bit didn't last long. Another downside is riding in the dark becuase it increases headlight glare.
I would wash it and the visor with water and tissues or toilet paper - and while I did get scratch build up I'm not sure this was to blame - as most of that was on the outside. Currently have a new Arai and using a spray - but am less that happy with it. I may well go back to the FOg City and perhaps have a second visor without for riding in the dark ------------------ Richb http://www.postmaster.co.uk/~richardbeaumont/60684/ |
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