Go From Hothead to Breezy Rider With The Feher Air Conditioned Helmet
Motorcycle helmets are like seat belts: No one WANTS to wear one. Both can be uncomfortable and steal some joy from your ride, but sanity (and in most cases, the law) compels us to put safety first. Long trips and rides in baking summer weather and tropical climates mean sweat dripping in your eyes and a foggy visor. And that sticky, humid feeling from a hot noggin is the least of your worries when you’re flying down the highway at top speed and literally cannot see.
Enter the brand-new Feher ACH-1 Air Conditioned Motorcycle Helmet. Invented by Steve Faher of Faher Helmets, an avid motorcycle rider and inventor, this just-launched piece of gear reduces the temperature of the air circulating around your head by 12 to 15 degrees which subsequently cools your body, according to the product’s website.
Employing technology from a patented thermoelectric cooling device originally designed and developed by Faher to cool the premium leather seats of luxury cars made by companies such as Rolls-Royce, Ferrari, and Bentley, this helmet weighs in at just slightly over three pounds — which is comparable to some late-model, high-end carbon-fiber helmets — and will set you back about $550. A small thermo-electric pump sits at the back of the helmet and dehumidifies and cools incoming air before streaming it through the helmet’s top. The cooler air then circulates slowly around the wearer’s head instead of being focused on one spot in order to prevent brain freeze, or what the website calls “an ice-cream headache.”
Engineered to be lightweight, the helmet relies on the motorcycle’s standard 12-volt battery for power hosting an internal energy source. Included in the box are a power cord and wiring harness that you can plug straight in to your bike’s battery. The device requires a negligible amount of power to operate, so lengthy trips won’t be interrupted for recharging. For those who prefer not to run the device from their bike’s battery, separate 12v battery-pack options compatible with the ACH-1 connectors are sold separately, and the approximate lengths of time that they will power the helmet in AC mode are as follows, according to Feder Helmets: a 3000mAh battery should power the helmet for around 2 hours, a 6000mAh battery should last for around 4 hours, and a 12000mAh should last for about 6 hours.
Regarding safety and protection, the Feher ACH-1 meets all DOT (Department of Transportation) FMVSS218 and ECE (Economic Commission for Europe) 22.05 safety standards. The Feher company guarantees this product with a one-year warranty that excludes damage inflicted by the purchaser.
While this cranium cradler was designed with function at the forefront, no one is likely to complain about the style aesthetic. Modern, and slightly futuristic, this lid is offered in sizes ranging from XS to 2XL and in silver, matte black, gloss black, pearl white, and gun metal gray.
The ACH-1 helmet is available for an introductory price of about $550 from Feher Helmets
