I haven't been able to get more than 3 years out af a helmet for a long time. I've had to replace 4 helmets in the last 10-12 years, the latest just last week. None of the replacements had to do with age of the helmet. Two were replaced because of crashes, and 2-3 just wore out or were abused (dropped or damaged when shipping my gear on tours). As an emergency room doc was cleaning gravel out of my ear, cleaning various patches of road rash, and sewing up my arm and knee, he asked me if I planned on replacing my helmet
Originally Posted by
Oneder
In short if it degrades over time it's useless anyway, that is mainly an issue for foam and light plastic coverings that don't do much. Foam won't save you and can cause damage when not in a hard shell. Anything with an ABS shell for example with last a thousand years in normal usage.
I can tell you from personal experiences that bike helmets do work as designed.