SNELL & DOT basic requirement & its chance of failure.

To get Snell certification for a helmet, any manufacturer must sign a contract with the Snell foundation and pay for testing. The contract allows Snell to purchase up to 10% of their total helmet production at retail, test them to destruction, then be reimbursed for the retail cost of the helmets and the testing. The contract allows the helmet manufacturer to put Snell certification stickers in the helmet. If there is no numbered Snell sticker inside the helmet, it's not a Snell certified helmet. The sticker can make the helmet cost 50-100us$ more in store.

In the '80s, the US DOT got into the helmet certification business. Their standards were set in 1971, and the DOT has not substantially revised them since. Also, the DOT does not do consistent testing, so a DOT sticker does not carry the security that a Snell sticker carries. The DOT expects manufacturers to voluntarily test their own helmets and certify them themselves. If it happens that the DOT tests a helmet and the helmet fails, the DOT informs the manufacturer and expects them to voluntarily correct the problem.

In all of 2001, the DOT tested 40 helmets total, and 8 of them failed the test. Generally speaking, the DOT requirements tend to protect you at lower speeds, and the Snell requirements tend to protect you at higher speeds. Therefore, meeting both requirements is pretty tricky and results in a pretty good helmet.

However, absent the Snell sticker, you can't be certain the helmet even meets DOT requirements. In fact, some manufacturers make "beanie" helmets, popular with certain riders, and put DOT stickers on the helmets even though it's quite obvious that the helmet does not meet DOT standards at all. They do this because several court cases in several states have found that if you buy a helmet with a DOT sticker, then as a rider you're in compliance with the helmet law, even if the helmet does not actually meet DOT standards.

There has never been a fine levied against either a dealer or a manufacturer for misrepresenting a helmet as DOT compliant when it is not. Some people think the DOT standard actually offers slightly better protection than the Snell standard, and this may even be true. Unfortunately, due to the voluntary nature of DOT testing, you cannot be certain that a DOT helmet actually passes the DOT tests. The Federal Government should enforce the DOT regulation strictly as ECE and SNELL which are randamly tested in each production batch.