I'm going to ask you KLR guys because most of you deal with wind noise. The Goldwing guys wouldn't have any answers! I don't want a taller windshield. I like air in the summer.

I guess as I get older I'm having more trouble wind noise. I'm not on a KLR anymore as most of you know but even with a taller windshield on the Versys I'm having a lot of wind noise. I ride with a 3/4 helmet and Scala Rider bluetooth communication so I don't want earplugs.

I've seen videos on cutting the speaker wires to the Scala Riders and using earbud speakers instead. I don't want to do that either. I don't think I'd be happy wearing earbuds all day and putting them in, getting the helmet over them would be a pain.

I did a little experiment yesterday. All I had to do to quite the wind noise was to cup my hand on the outside of the helmet just behind the visor and deflect the wind over the side of the helmet where my ear is. The wind noise is not coming up under the helmet. It's the wind rushing over the plastic shell.

I'm thinking about adding some sort of wind defector to the helmet just behind where the visor mounts. Maybe something plastic shaped like an angle iron that's about 1/2" wide and 3 inches long. I was thinking I could hot glue it to the helmet so if it doesn't do anything, no harm done. It might cause the air to swirl over the helmet. Maybe???

Thoughts?

Toney,
Purchase a thin and flimsy replacement dirt bike goggle lens, about $4.00 or go to the local MX track and rummage around the pit area for a scratched one.
Got any friends or grand kids that like to assemble model cars? Some of the 'spurs' that the parts are attached to might be heavy enough.

Hot Glue to your hearts content.

Can't help you much here sorry. I do a lot of highway so full face lid + earplugs + taller screen for me!

This is going to sound stupid.

Most of the noise in my helmet comes from air flowing between my shoulder and the bottom of the helmet. I find when I scrunch my shoulders that it gets really quiet. I use one of the NOJ things and it helps, but it doesn't make the helmet quiet.

One of my back-burner projects is to try using a neck pillow to fill in the opens spaces between me and the helmet and see what happens.

I've spent a little time trying to reduce the wind noise as I ride, mainly so that on longer journeys I can listen to music without having to turn the volume up to max.
I ended up with a combination which is far from perfect but is a lot better than where i began.
First is a windscreen extension of the 'laminar lip' variety.
Then i found a nice light, quiet helmet, an 'Aeroblade III' by Kabuto (Japanese) and
then I found some Sony 'Active Noise Reduction' ear plug type speakers that while they dont seem to do much actively, certainly block out some of the wind noise.

Result is now I can listen to music at less than full volume but I still get more wind/highway noise than I'm happy with.

I use 'Bose' brand ANR headsets for communication at work and they are truly brilliant, once you get used to them you wonder how you managed for so many years with all that noise blasting away. They are great and I can't help wondering why helmet manufacturers have not embraced the technology.

iddy

And I agree with Tom,
Most of the noise comes from below. If I wrap a scarf or neck warmer or something that fills the space between my neck and the bottom of the helmet there is a significant reduction in noise volume. Not very practical for me though as I live in the tropics and staying cool is vital. Gotta keep that air flowing over the body as much as possible..

iddy

I know you already said no to all of these but a Taller windshield (V-Stream Tall), ear plugs (Vietnam Military era plugs) and a full face helmet keeps 95% of the wind noise out. Even with ear plugs I here music from my I-Pod in my helmet mounted speakers just fine.

I found using the KLRDash.com moving the windscreen in a more upright position does the trick. I have a FJR1300 with an electric windscreen adjustment and it does almost the same thing. Think rally bike, watch the video. There are a few others out there as well that do the same thing, one my mechanic buddy did with an adjustable from another bike. Not the cheapest but a great value for those like me that prefer riding over manufacturing. I take longer trips and don't feel beat up due to wind on my body at the end of a long day of riding. YMMV but I would check this out before you spend $39 bucks on earplugs that do not block wind just make so I don't hear it as much.