Quick update here with some first impressions from using the Ultra on today's commute.
Those who are backers should have received an update discussing the fit issue that led to Lumos temporarily stopping production of the M/L MIPS versions in mid December. Mine seems to have been one of the early ones that went out before they identified the issue.
i can confirm that I find the fit to be poor and not comfortable, so I guess I'm among the 20-30% whose head doesn't work well with the initial design. For me that means a lot of uncomfortable pressure on my forehead and yet the helmet still feels loose laterally. Disappointing, but it appears Lumos is trying to do the right thing and hopefully the updated MIPS layer addresses the issue.
Other thoughts:
- the remote was dead when I got it out this morning. I charged it fully Monday night, and it only saw 15-20 min usage Monday and Tuesday just pairing and testing the helmet's modes. I'll need to watch more closely but it makes me worry about its standby life.
- the Ultra went from 85 to 36% battery on my ride home. That's approx 45 minutes of solid on mode.
- the app is pretty nice. You can customize both the front and rear lights however you want and it shows the battery level for the helmet and remote in the app.
- Why on earth does Lumos think anyone would want to use the Lumos helmet app to track their ride? And log in with Facebook to do it? No thanks.
- The front light is fine, but the LED quality is not great - it has the greenish hue that a lot of cheap lights have.
- the helmet looks nice and it's a pretty slick design
- The rear lights are bright and I've been told are very visible from behind. Very well implemented.
- The turn signals have audible cues -nice.
- I guess it's cool that you can activate the turn signals with an Apple watch. As a left handed Android user, I'll never know.
All in all it's a lot of functionality in a relatively slick yet simple helmet for the price. I really hope they've truly solved the fit issue.