Apparently it doesn’t

Irid’s liquid crystal-based technology tints helmet visors to cut glare in an instant. It actually takes less than a second, and it doesn’t even require battery power to work.

The transition is automatically triggered by bright sunlight – and it returns to normal when you go through a tunnel or it gets dark outside. This means you don’t have to take your mitts off the handlebars to fiddle with a switch on your helmet, like you would with an additional drop-down visor that’s mounted on the inside of conventional models.

Convenience aside, this is a big deal because adding a drop-down visor to a helmet means it won’t pass muster with Snell’s stringent safety standards that are demanded by many racing competitions. Enhancing visibility in harsh sunlight can make things far more comfortable for riders, and potentially safer too.

Since it’s powered by sunlight, a power failure should revert it back to transparent. Maybe as the tech improves and becomes cheaper, helmets can include both options?

The powered automatic version (with a power cutting kill switch) and the drop down option for when you want it dark but it’s not bright enough for it to trigger. If the mechanism is a 3 step dial, then it should be intuitive.

• 0 = forced transparent (power killed)
• 1 = automatic
• 2 = forced dark (power killed + drop-down active)