Helmets - Pfanner vs. Kask

Mahk_Adams

Mahk_Adams

Location
Bloomington, Indiana
What are thoughts and comments on the pros, cons, and alternatives?

These days, the cutting I do is almost all volunteer work clearing fallen trees from mountain bike trails on state park, state forest, and national forest properties. It can be an easy, single 6"-8" trunk or a jumbled mass from a tornado.

Thanks!
 
than you don‘t a helmet for climbing, a regular forest type helmet will suffice and won‘t cost you as much.

with the two options i‘d go with the pfanner helmet
 
I've had a Petzl Vertex Vent for years (last 2 helmets). TreeFund had a fundraiser selling Kask helmets a couple years ago. I thought: "I want to keep supporting TreeFund and about 40% of the cool kids are wearing Kask, so I might as well". It's been on the shelf for a couple of years, but I broke it out earlier this summer.

My next helmet will be another Vertex Vent. The Kask isn't bad...just a little less comfortable, but the big thing is when my head is sweaty, the entire top pad is soaked (in addition to the front band, which is a given). With the Vertex, its just the couple straps at the top (and, of course the band. I don't recall specifically, but I had a replacement band that I put it in so they must have included that with the new helmet - cannot imagine where else that would have come from?

When I hired a couple of folks that were part time and I didn't expect to be around long, I bought $20-30 helmets off of Amazon. They have an ANSI stamp. I bent and pulled on them. I'm not sure these aren't perfectly fine for full time use...I don't see where $80 for the name brand helmets comes in. For full time use, I'll go back to what I have known, but these are pretty good for irregular use from what I can tell. Easy to add face shield (comes on the second one linked) and earmuffs if you want:
 
The kask helmet I used was nice, but non of the components were replaceable…. Had the back band toggle thingy break (in my hands) during cold weather event, couldn’t replace it…. Whole thing had to go in the trash which seems really wasteful to me. Went protos and never looked back. Having the face shield and ear muffs always right there is such a nice feature. I’ve got two new in box petzl helmets I’d let go cheap if your interested. Got them for jobs where I might need an extra body around, but they’ve never needed to come out, just taking up space now..
 
The new kask zeniths aren’t worth a damn, we’ve had lots of issues with the ear pro slots expanding out so anytime you flip them up they come out into your hand, the back adjustment dials have also been breaking quite often. It’s a shame because I loved the superplasma
 
Thanks for the replies. I've used Petzl, Stihl, Husky, PMI, et al. but I haven't yet tried Kask or Pfanner.

A friend told me that, although he uses and really likes the Pfanner, he thought they were heavy, and a web search (which I don't entirely trust) reported that the Pfanners can also be hot in the summer because the ventilation isn't very good. Right now I am leaning towards Pfanner and, other than price, no one here has had any complaints about them. I want a chin strap, so that eliminates the forestry model. Has anyone had issues or complaints about Pfanner?
 
I will say as far as ear pro is concerned I think pfanner is the gold standard, I find all helmets hot above 80 here but I find the pfanner to be far more comfortable
 
I live in one of the hottest places that trees grow, and I climb all summer in a protos. Pro tip: get it in all white if you don't like the heat. I switched to white this year after seeing a buddy get a good deal on a white one last summer, and he was raving about how it was way cooler, and I'll never buy another color, unless I switch to a winter/summer split setup.
 
ATH said:
I've had a Petzl Vertex Vent for years (last 2 helmets). TreeFund had a fundraiser selling Kask helmets a couple years ago. I thought: "I want to keep supporting TreeFund and about 40% of the cool kids are wearing Kask, so I might as well". It's been on the shelf for a couple of years, but I broke it out earlier this summer.

My next helmet will be another Vertex Vent. The Kask isn't bad...just a little less comfortable, but the big thing is when my head is sweaty, the entire top pad is soaked (in addition to the front band, which is a given). With the Vertex, its just the couple straps at the top (and, of course the band. I don't recall specifically, but I had a replacement band that I put it in so they must have included that with the new helmet - cannot imagine where else that would have come from?

When I hired a couple of folks that were part time and I didn't expect to be around long, I bought $20-30 helmets off of Amazon. They have an ANSI stamp. I bent and pulled on them. I'm not sure these aren't perfectly fine for full time use...I don't see where $80 for the name brand helmets comes in. For full time use, I'll go back to what I have known, but these are pretty good for irregular use from what I can tell. Easy to add face shield (comes on the second one linked) and earmuffs if you want:
Click to expand...
I second the jackson Amazon hats. We've used those with entry level employees. Hell I rocked one for quite a while. They're not terrible for the price.
 
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