Took advantage of the Masuri offer pre-Christmas and picked up one of their new lids. Got round to getting it out the box today, so here's a brief first look.
It's basically a halfway house between the plastic Club (now C-line) and full cloth covered Test (T-line) helmet, where the peak is left plastic but the rest clothed. Makes a big difference to the plastic ones IMO, the club lids look ok from a distance but terrible close up, whereas this new one looks quite smart.
Inside, it's much the same as the older OS2 except... clicky wheel! I'm not sure about this yet, will have to wait to bat in it before judging it fully. On the one hand, a wheel is a well proven idea and lets you dial in the fit much more easily than faffing with padding. On the other, it's not a very nice wheel and I'm not convinced that I don't prefer the fit of my Test lid with just padding. On the bright side, the wheel assembly should be very simple to remove if I decide I don't like it and want to pad it to match my other lid.
And here's a side by side with an OS2 test titanium. Couple of interesting notes - you can definitely feel the extra stiffness from the steel grille, both shells appear the same but there's noticeably more flex to the Test. Grille is a little tighter to the face on the Test, expect that's just a little manufacturing variation though. No ear pads on the C-Line, pretty unbothered about that. Weight on my scales for these two is 800g for the Test vs 935g for the C-line. Not a huge difference in weight but the change in balance is pretty noticeable when on the head - the C-line definitely hangs on the front of your face more with the heavier grille.
An important difference - I paid nearly £100 less for the C-Line Plus. That makes it pretty good value in my book, and for my use for it should do nicely despite the weight. It took me a long time to adjust to wearing a lid and a light one is something I really value, so this probably won't see any Saturday league use for me, but it's a nice helmet at a much more friendly price point.
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Topic: New Masuri C Line Plus - first impressions (Read 5225 times)