In the more than 30 years we have been doing this, rarely does an NFL game used helmet from the 1960's or 1970's pop up that we haven't seen before.  It is getting to the point that most of the helmets that survived from more than 40-50 years ago have been discovered.  We have seen them in peoples collections or they keep getting "recycled" from one major auction house to the next.  Next time an older NFL helmet is offered through a major auction house, Google the helmet.  Chances are it will pop up from a previous sale through a different auction house.  Not this helmet.  This one is fresh.  This one is special.  Consigned from a collector and long-time owner of the helmet.  

Game used Houston Oilers Ed Fisher Protective Products PPI suspension helmet.  The PPI helmet was a leading edge helmet designed to reduce the number of concussions of players wearing Riddell suspension helmets in the early 1970s.  It was developed at the same time that Riddell was phasing out their TK suspension helmet for their padded Micro Fit and Pac3 models.  The PPI helmet utilized a heavily padded suspension along with front and rear padding with integrated side padding - secured to the helmet using screws similar to Wilson and Rawlings helmets of the same era.  You can see the suspension rivet as well as one of the front padding screws on the photo of Fisher holding his helmet at halftime, listening to Bum Phillips motivate his team in the photo below.  Only a handful of NFL players wore this innovative helmet including several Dallas Cowboys. 

The helmet is original, and is unaltered or modified in any way with the exception of the facemask clips - replaced by Helmet Hut reproduction clips after the originals became brittle and finally gave way - as they all do with age.  The massive 7 3/4 sized helmet has a date code on the interior of 1975.  It shows moderate to heavy wear on the exterior and moderate use on the interior of the helmet.  The helmet is complete except for the chinstrap, with the original PPI padded suspension, original jaw pads, and the original Schutt NJOP model facemask.  The mask is secured to the helmet using reproduction clips as described above, but retains it's original screws and hardware. 

The striping and side logos are original to the helmet.  They are positioned properly, and adhered to the helmet with slight lifting - as well as damage to the side logos.  Interesting to note that the center stripe pattern was created by using 3/4" red stripes along with a white stripe applied over each red stripe to represent a gap between the blue center stripe and the side red stripes.  

An extremely rare model helmet, fresh to the hobby, of a highly sought after team, in a rare XL size.  You know how rare original Oilers helmets are, and not many are finer examples than this one, and certainly none are as rare as a PPI NFL helmet.   Less knowledgeable or beginning collectors may grumble a bit that it is not a Riddell, or even incorrectly state that all of the Oilers wore Riddell, but soon they will realize their rookie mistake.  Their learning will be too late as the helmet will have sold to a savy, knowledgeable veteran helmet collector.   An Oilers PPI helmet.  We have never seen another one and you have never ever seen one until today.  As my father used to say,  "...if you like something, you better buy it, as chances are someone else also likes it and will beat you to it."   Don't tell me I didn't warn you...