Actually, I remember my head injury in the UK… Made the Daily Star. Kite Hopper, Comes a Cropper (10/8/89). Boy do they SUCK when it comes to doing research on their articles. Even the base’s paper F’d it up. I now wear a helmet when flying kites. I coined the phrase “If your kite can’t KILL you… IT’S TOO SMALL!!!” Check back issues of Kitelines magazine for the proof.
I also nearly broke a bloke’s leg with the same kite… Well, 8/9ths the same kite. I fly a 8 pack of six foot stacker FlexiFoils. We added his single kite to be the 9th, then tethered off to his bumper. It flipped him during a manoeuvre on Easter Sunday, at Blackheath in London 1990.
Wow! My pal and I flew his dad’s kite in the late 1960s. We had some poly-something string that was too strong for us to break so thought it was good enough.
The kite came from an emergency pack in WWII. It was used to take a wire high up so the fliers who had escaped their crashed plane in the sea had a good aerial to radio for help.
Upto around 20′ the kite was fun to fly and we didn’t take warning when it sometimes took both of us to hold it down A simple box made with two strips of yellow fabric around 18″ wide each, we had a 36″ sail. One windy day we went to slightly higher place and flew it. The gusts were very powerfull that day and the string broke. To this day I see him running after it. across the field, over the 6′ chainlink fence, across the A45 dual-carriageway (he was afraid of it coming down there and being run over!) and into some wasteland. So he got the kite back and didn’t have to suffer his dad’s punishment for damaging his War heirloom. I’m glad it didn’t find a different wind pattern and take off for palces distant. There was so much string it must have made a good tail to make it so stable?
Yikes, kites! We have had a yearly kite festival in the last two cities I’ve lived in. And I know there’s a big difference between the kind of kite you were flying and the kind they hand out to 3rd graders to fly, but still I’ve heard enough kite stories that I have refused on principle to attend the festival each time.
Perhaps not so incidentally, I keep a kite and string in my “bag of holding” (the bag that carries all my necessary bike accessories and the like). I haven’t found anyone who would enjoy flying it with me, though, so it’s still a virgin.
Been spending way too much time in the hospital with bleeding bowels that have decided they’re done and blood transfusions. This keeps me off my bike almost exclusively (I miss riding like you wouldn’t believe (or mayhaps you will). I’ve still made a few short rides, even though it’s much more difficult to keep me off my bike than it is to keep me in bed. Maybe if I found the right guy, this wouldn’t be an issue.
Can I blame the Dilaudid for my more-free-than-normal verbiage? I’ll do so, regardless. :p
*My bad..I suck? As of last week I have to work locally but it’s extremely physical, so in the interest of safely arriving both there and home I drive to and from work, a distance each day of less than 7 miles total round trip. I do ride to ride in the evenings for exercise and sanity’s sake, but then with my days off, like today, when I’ve had to sleep in 3 hours b/c I am so physically sore and exhausted, with joints crackling and muscles cramping, that honestly, all I wanted to do was get the shopping done and a good cup of coffee. It’s a tough line to cross, so in some way I see Yehuda now a little eccentric and more and more biased towards his own views, while possibly not fully identifying with his customer base, as maybe the person in the SUV’s a parent, caregiver, etc along those lines that might well be in the shoes I am in now.
Funny how we all sometimes forget the rule about walking in another man’s shoes once in a while.
There in the states, you never could figure out the whole spelling lark.
(I had some hilarious arguments, lasting for several miles, when I took a road-trip with an American friend. Only once did she manage to trump my “It’s our language, I win.” argument – using some very sound logic that today I’ve still not figured my way around. I will, but not yet.
There’s nothing wrong with either of those bumper stickers. I don’t care what one’s partisanship. I’m a lefty from a nontheist background and neither of those statements bother me in the least.
@velo libre: Here in NYC (as evidenced by the bumper stickers), there is many an Obama-supporting, Bush-hating, First Amendment-supporting, gun control-advocating, Starbucks latte-sipping liberal who will stick his head out of the window of the Lexus hybrid SUV he’s driving to tell a bicyclist that he ought to stick to the sidewalk and stop impeding vehicular traffic.
Actually bikes have odd tyre wear anyway because of the camber. Trikes don’t, they always sit normal to the surface. They are also good for pinging spokes to show the change in tension under load.
For Type One, yes … genetic or the result of a infection.
Most cases of Type Two Diabetes are directly related to diet (obesity) and lifestyle. It was UNHEARD of to have children with Type 2. Now it’s an epidemic:
did you read the sources you posted bikingbill ? they told me that a genetic defect leads to obesity which itself supports the diabetes.
those kids tend to get fat. they just dont know about the root of their problem and that only a vast change in their lifestyle could help. its not like doing a little workout and eat halfsized megaburger could help.
The current thinking is that obesity is epigenetic rather than genetic. Children may be predisposed to obesity as a direct consequence of how overfed their mothers are during pregnancy rather than some genetic glitch over which nobody has any control.
I did once. The answer was: “Cycle helmets are a bad idea. They discourage cycling by sending a false and misleading impression that there is something extraordinarily dangerous about this activity. I never wear a cycle helmet.”
@Kevin Love: This logic was employed by automakers regarding seat belts:
“At first, seat belts faced a storm of opposition both from automakers–who felt safety wouldn’t sell, didn’t want to evoke the vision of accidents, and disliked the added cost–and drivers, who worried about being trapped in burning cars or underwater.
“But gradually, the data prevailed. Safety experts estimate that seat belts increase your chance of surviving any collision by roughly 50 percent. Wearing a seat belt has now become mandatory in many developed countries.”<http://tinyurl.com/3xad9at>
Let’s see the numbers, both the raw data and massaged, er, analyzed results.
Kevy wroteth, “Cycle helmets are a bad idea. They discourage cycling by sending a false and misleading impression that there is something extraordinarily dangerous about this activity. I never wear a cycle helmet.”"
Yeah I hear that same argument used with sex and condoms too. Good thing that cycling and sex (not at the same time) are entirely risk free.
*sigh* I’d like to see the data at their ERs that supports their claims and ask them why they are contradictory to all national and international statistical data. Opinions mean nothing. EMTs, ER doctors and nurses all consume the same garbage propaganda as the rest of us. All that matters is data.
I think the helmet/no helmet issue really depends on the type of riding you plan to do. All you zipsters on fixies or freewheel racing bicycles are hurtling forward at advanced speeds in a position that pitches your body weight forward and therefore makes it more likely that you’ll flip over the handlebars in the event of a crash or slamming on the brakes. Likewise for many mountain bikes (especially if you’re trying to ride fast).
On the other hand, riders of upright bicycles — such as Kevin Love on his beloved Pashley — or bakfiets are generally riding much slower and have their weight distributed toward the back of the bike, so (in my reckoning) don’t really need a helmet, any more than a jogger or power walker would need one.
Does anyone wish to offer any data to support or to contradict?
Helmets make less sense the faster you go. The design specs are for 12 mph impacts. Because energy varies with the square you will be 50% out with this at 15 mph and 100% by 17 mph.
This isn’t even the forward velocity because it contains a vertical component. The 12 mph figure comes from the average speed you hit the ground if you fall over. I’ve never seen any research on what speed people are likely to hit the ground. As far as I can tell someone has just decided that 12 mph is a good number.
And no, front brakes should not pitch you over the bars. I spent years riding a two wheel drive Longstaff with no back brakes and never went over the front likewise on the fixed wheel bike I used in school back in the 80s. It didn’t happen. Jobst Brandt is of the opinion that this idea comes about from people who have been told not to use the front brake suddenly using it in an emergency and not being prepared for how effective they can be.
Have you tried Vee-Brakes yet? Much more powerful than the tiny calipers on the Brompton. My colleague has a Brompton or most race/fixies and found it almost impossible to stop one day at the seaside last year after freewheeling down a steep path. He thought he was going for swim! Together we adjusted the mechanical advantage of his brakes but he still felt they are weak and nowhere-near as strong as Vee. I bought a Trek ATB that had been donated and stopping at lights, the back wheel lifted up at around 5mph one day! Taught me to respect them…
@Capateto: Forward motion at speed on a bicycle is not required to incur a severe head injury. I recall reading somewhere that if you’re sitting upright in a chair and tip over sideways, the impact of your head on a hard floor can be severe enough to kill you. As the old joke goes, it’s not the fall that kills you, it’s the sudden stop at the end. Now let’s see, what did Sir Isaac say about this? P.E.=mgh which equals K.E.=(mv^2)/2 … F=ma … and the solution is left as an exercise for the reader.
P.S. In a previous thread, someone asserted that helmets increase the danger of injury, but declined to cite a source. I haven’t read it, but here’s one: “Understanding Head & Neck Trauma (Or, why [motorcycle] helmets increase the danger!)” <http://tinyurl.com/2vtgl7x>.
They only see part of the picture, it’s impossible to know if in a particular crash a helmet would help, unless you repeat the crash with and without one and compare injuries.
I am fairly certain that when I am struck by a cement truck, a garbage truck or an SUV being piloted by a drunk driver that my helmet is not going to save my sorry old butt. It does, however, reduce noise quite dramatically. When I have that 2-ounce piece of cheap plastic strapped onto my brain housing device, I don’t hear my wife yelling at me. That in and of itself is woth the price. ‘nuf said.
Donald Bothby’s helmet doesn’t block noise. He doesn’t hear his wife yelling when he’s wearing a helmet because she doesn’t yell when he’s wearing a helmet.
I don’t weigh in on the helmet debate but when I hear such utter BS…
Sure, if you get run over by a cement truck as two friends of mine did (Alan Kingsbury and & Jocelyn Lovell) your brain is only one part of the survival equation. Better to be protected in some manner than none. Al & Joecelyn were both “lucky” that they weren’t killed. Jocelyn is now a parapalegic from spinal cord injury, something that a helmet would not have prevented.
I was struck from behind 30 years ago by a Ford LTD doing 60+ and I was sent 150 feet throuh the air, suffered multiple compound fractures and a mild concussion. I was wearing no helmet. My survival was based on pure random luck that I didn’t have a serious head injury as well as worse injuries to the rest me. Had I the opportunity to wear a helmet then I would absolutely wanted one. My minor concussion “may” have been none at all.
Modern helmets do not affect ones hearing.
I’ve yet to find a two ounce helmet either. Personally when I choose to wear a helmet I choose the best ones I can afford. If they pass the certifications they are all more or less equal. They don’t publish actual test results so you can’t compare impact resitance. SNELL and ASTM are pass/fail tests. What you do tend to get for more money is better ventilation and less weight.
It’s your own choice, just like the crap you eat, drink, or smoke. Don’t preach to me about helmets or seat belts being inneffective with your anecdotal BS. Don’t worry, if I see you riding without a helmet I won’t care, but don’t tell lies about valid choices.
By the ’80s I’d been riding for over two decades without ever suffering a head injury or knowing anyone who had. When the helmet fad came along I thought it was silly and ignored it, and have not seen anything since to change my mind. No studies or statistics are likely to convince me to ignore my own personal experience. which is: (1) It’s very unlikely that I’ll fall off my bike (it’s happened only four or five times in almost 50 years), and (2) it’s even less likely that I’ll hit my head if I fall off (it’s never happened even once yet). Even if it does happen, I have very strong doubts that a piece of plastic and styrofoam would make any difference one way or the other.
I cracked my helmet right the way through and was not going fast at all. Shit happens when you ride new trails. Or old ones, even. And I never know from one ride to the next where I’ll feel like going. I wear a helmet for the same reason I carry spares, tool kit, cash, cell phone, dog repellant, a ulock and a knife. Better to have them and not need them.
As to driving a half mile to the store-That’s about what my grocery run is. And it’s near a hundred degrees out, plus I’ve ridden my town loop twice today. Yes, I believe I will make that short trip in air conditioned comfort.
Well of course you opt for the air-conditioned car over a bike for a half mile ride. In the amount of time it takes to gear one self up with helmets, spares, tool kit, cell phones, dog repellant and weaponry, the rest of us that just jump on a bike and go are already back home from the store. If I had to go to all that bother I’d just use a car too.
No, I keep all that stuff on the bike. All but the cash, the knife (small pocket knife; hardly a weapon) and the cell phone. They are always on my person.
Yes, I almost always have a Swiss Army knife in my pocket. If I leave it in a pocket upstairs I can guarantee I’ll need if for something within an hour or so.
A few years ago I lost it and only lasted a week or so before I got another one. Then I found the old one!
The old one fell out of my pocket last year and spent 24 hrs on an A road with heavy traffic from trucks. The wee blade was broken when I found it the next morning but the rest was OK. I decided to retire it and move to the newer one.
Mongo – A question – Does your AirCon have time to start working in a half-mile trip?
Seriously, as mine doesn’t – I get no AC-cold air for at least a mile or two.
In 100 degree heat, I would find the breeze from riding more comforting than the stuffy and hot air from the previously-parked car.
If you had been letting the car idle for half and hour to cool down first then, maybe, you might have some benefit.
2004 Honda Element. That AC could cool my house. Open the windows, fire it up and by the time I’ve gone 100 feet it’s blowin’ cold. Close windows and enjoy the cool. Yet another reason why it’s the best damned car I’ve ever driven.
Just discussing, not arguing, Mongo – so you go 100 feet and you’re cool. Aren’t you a significant part of the way to the shop by then? With all that fuel use and the damage of heating and cooling the engine, increasing the mileage etc – what exactly is the benefit of using the car?
Please don’t assume I am attacking you Mongo! I am just discussing car use via bike use – for interest/fun.
I too am guilty of going to the shop in the car after getting home from a long drive and finding low supplies – too knacked to ride and the car was still hot so off I went.
My house is near the top of a hill, if I push-off from my drive, the momentum almost takes me to the shop – might, if not for traffic/lights etc. Getting home isn’t far so the bike/foot is the usual way to shop but, like you, after a 60+hr week, the effort of having to go for milk etc seems worse than it is. It takes a real effort sometimes, mentally, to do the simplest things, so I do understand. I was just discussing the pro and cons of bike vs car.
The fact that your helmet cracked means it didn’t do it’s job. A helmet will protect you only if the foam actually compresses as it’s supposed to. If it cracks, then, at best, you only got partial protection. It seems like most of the time helmets don’t actually do their jobs. I’ve seen many many annecdotes from helmet users saying “the helmet saved my life”. But then they mention the helmet cracking and I have to explain that no, it didn’t.
FACT:
Bicycle helmets protect your head from a blunt impact (the helmet breaks not your head). A bicycle helmet will NOT protect you from a concussion. So if you fall and smack your head on a curb you wont leak your brain out but will still suffer a concussion which can be fatal and needs immediate medical attention.
errrrrr, your facts are very vague. And a bicycle helmet can help minimize the possibility of a concussion, and often do… it’s just that a helmet cannot guarantee that you will not get an concussion. Do you mean that bicycle helmets are not designed to, and rarely do, protect agianst rotational injuries? And that rotational injuries make up the overwhelming majority of fatal and disabilitating head traumas? It’s my understanding that bicycle helmets are quite helpful against concussions.
Actually, bicycle helmets are first and foremost designed to prevent skull fractures, more likely at the speed we ride and with the sort of obstacles we may hit.
A hockey helmet, on the other hand ains to prevent concussions, skull fractures being less likely although not alltogether impossible.
Bicycle helmet aren’t especially good for concussions, for the reasons weefoldingbike said. The slickier the design the better though. Mine caught once in a branch while I was decending at 50 kph and my neck and butt remembered it for quite some time after.
In order to sell helmets in the US they must pass the ASTM test. SNELL is more stringent and is an independent testing group but BOTH use a variety of impact shapes to assess the crash worthiness and protection that a helmet may offer. A spike is used by both groups to measure puncture resistance. Yes, vent holes present a challenge in this part of the test.
Additional anvil shapes are used such as flat, round, and curb shaped.
Increased rotational vector forces from an increase of spherical diameter is a load of crap. Any miniscule increase in the moment of inertia and subsequent torque is far less than the impact asorbtion that the helmet provides. That would be comparable to bitching that your shoulder got a bruise from your seatbelt in a head on collision in which you did not die.
Any whiplash or cervical strain suffered in a crash would be far less with a helmet than the injuries you would sustain from hitting your bare head on the tarmac. Basic physics.
Weefold would likeley complain if he had to escape a crashing plane, used a parachute, and twsited his ankle on impact too.
Wee, some backgound. In my previous carreer, in the development of the Paramount Design Group hardhell which was made by Vetta, the standards at the time was Snell 1980. A puncture test was part of the standard. We tested those helmets to meet our liability standards for insurance purposes before we accepted helmets from Vetta. The forthcoming “new” standard proposed by Snell (B90) dropped the puncture requirement as it was deemed to be less important in terms of the greater protection that soft shell helmets could offer in terms of padding/weight ratio, and that micro-shell/hardshell helmets offered the best of both worlds in terms of reasonable puncture resistance and superior structural integrity and energy asorbation. Blunt force protection makes more sense as the goal versus penetrative especialy considerin the need to minimize weight and maximize ventilation.
re: whiplash & impact. I’d rather suffer a little whiplash than die from a head injury. Brain injuries are much more difficult to treat.
We, our goal was to create a SNELL approved helmet. Also we wanted something that exceeded the ANSI approval. Giro was marketing foam helmets that had a weakness in breaking to bits under certain conditions. This nasty behavior left the rider helmetless (more or less) after the initial impact and therefore vulnerable to secondary impacts. The hardshell offered greater structural integrity with minimal weight. The penetration WAS part of the pre-B90 standard. We also wanted somethingthat exceeeded standards so that our insurance costs would be lower. Insurance costs are very large fixed cost. Less insurance costs = greater profit margins and also the potential for lower prices to the dealer and ultimately to the consumer.
A serious question – does anybody have evidence that normal cycle helmets actually have caused rotational injury?
I am not talking about ‘aero’ style or any oversized item, just standard helmets that actually help to reduce ’road-rash’ to the head? I am truthfully interested so that when I finish my Tandem rebuild, my wife and I can ride with a touch more safety. Thanks in advance for constructive replies
@Tencon, none that you can buy today should cause you any concern. The old hairnet style and the original generation of “foam only” helmets like the mid-80′s Giro’s and the copies that it spawned, could induce neck injuries since they could “stick” the pavement during a (sliding) crash.
All current helmets use a hard shell or a micro-shell over the foam so that they slide rather than grab, and also give the helmet more structural intergrity. Most helmets also have a skeleton or gridwork molded inside the foam to add additional integrity so the chances of the helmet disentigrating during a crash is reduced.
Neck trauma is always a potential risk in any fall with or without a helmet.
Thanks for the replies. The link was very encouraging also.
Mostly I was of the assumption that unless you add extra torque (with an ‘aero’ tail for example) the helmet would reflect the wearer’s head shape and not be turned/turn the head as the reduced leverage would not be enough to do that.
Any force great enough to cause rotational injury will, I guess, have a similar effect with or without a lid?
Generally, as I am uninjured after two m/c crashes when the fibreglass lid took a beating but left me un scratched, I trust ‘kit-mark’ lids but still cycle as if I am unprotected. It is stupid to trust in safety gear – PRIMARY safety means not having an incident at all, so I try to ride as if I am going to be killed by any road user that can kill me. By making it hard to impossible to hit me, I have only had one incident with a driver while on a bike, in 1979. My (main) road curves to the right and a road joins from (straight ahead) the left with double lines to mark a ‘STOP’ point. She WAS stationary so I trusted her – wrong choice… She began to move off and she saw me being lifted in the air by her bonnet. No injury but a bent bike and she paid.
Better to walk that distance… No helmet required.
Same for cycling it. No helmet required either, and here in the UK, the risk of head injury will be lower cycling than walking.
Actually, I remember my head injury in the UK… Made the Daily Star. Kite Hopper, Comes a Cropper (10/8/89). Boy do they SUCK when it comes to doing research on their articles. Even the base’s paper F’d it up. I now wear a helmet when flying kites. I coined the phrase “If your kite can’t KILL you… IT’S TOO SMALL!!!” Check back issues of Kitelines magazine for the proof.
I also nearly broke a bloke’s leg with the same kite… Well, 8/9ths the same kite. I fly a 8 pack of six foot stacker FlexiFoils. We added his single kite to be the 9th, then tethered off to his bumper. It flipped him during a manoeuvre on Easter Sunday, at Blackheath in London 1990.
Wow! My pal and I flew his dad’s kite in the late 1960s. We had some poly-something string that was too strong for us to break so thought it was good enough.
The kite came from an emergency pack in WWII. It was used to take a wire high up so the fliers who had escaped their crashed plane in the sea had a good aerial to radio for help.
Upto around 20′ the kite was fun to fly and we didn’t take warning when it sometimes took both of us to hold it down A simple box made with two strips of yellow fabric around 18″ wide each, we had a 36″ sail. One windy day we went to slightly higher place and flew it. The gusts were very powerfull that day and the string broke. To this day I see him running after it. across the field, over the 6′ chainlink fence, across the A45 dual-carriageway (he was afraid of it coming down there and being run over!) and into some wasteland. So he got the kite back and didn’t have to suffer his dad’s punishment for damaging his War heirloom. I’m glad it didn’t find a different wind pattern and take off for palces distant. There was so much string it must have made a good tail to make it so stable?
Yikes, kites! We have had a yearly kite festival in the last two cities I’ve lived in. And I know there’s a big difference between the kind of kite you were flying and the kind they hand out to 3rd graders to fly, but still I’ve heard enough kite stories that I have refused on principle to attend the festival each time.
Perhaps not so incidentally, I keep a kite and string in my “bag of holding” (the bag that carries all my necessary bike accessories and the like). I haven’t found anyone who would enjoy flying it with me, though, so it’s still a virgin.
Been spending way too much time in the hospital with bleeding bowels that have decided they’re done and blood transfusions. This keeps me off my bike almost exclusively (I miss riding like you wouldn’t believe (or mayhaps you will). I’ve still made a few short rides, even though it’s much more difficult to keep me off my bike than it is to keep me in bed. Maybe if I found the right guy, this wouldn’t be an issue.
Can I blame the Dilaudid for my more-free-than-normal verbiage? I’ll do so, regardless. :p
*My bad..I suck? As of last week I have to work locally but it’s extremely physical, so in the interest of safely arriving both there and home I drive to and from work, a distance each day of less than 7 miles total round trip. I do ride to ride in the evenings for exercise and sanity’s sake, but then with my days off, like today, when I’ve had to sleep in 3 hours b/c I am so physically sore and exhausted, with joints crackling and muscles cramping, that honestly, all I wanted to do was get the shopping done and a good cup of coffee. It’s a tough line to cross, so in some way I see Yehuda now a little eccentric and more and more biased towards his own views, while possibly not fully identifying with his customer base, as maybe the person in the SUV’s a parent, caregiver, etc along those lines that might well be in the shoes I am in now.
Funny how we all sometimes forget the rule about walking in another man’s shoes once in a while.
Think about it if even for a little.
I got the good example line from another member of staff once.
Only once.
The guy in the car is mistaken. He has mistaken Yehuda for someone who gives a rats arse what he thinks!
Here in the states, we spell arse, ASS !
In England the ‘r’ version is colloqial rather than ‘correct’ – Ass is normal and the R version is also more of an Irish affectation.
There in the states, you never could figure out the whole spelling lark.
(I had some hilarious arguments, lasting for several miles, when I took a road-trip with an American friend. Only once did she manage to trump my “It’s our language, I win.” argument – using some very sound logic that today I’ve still not figured my way around. I will, but not yet.
Ass = four legged animal.
Arse = backside.
touché
pointless observation: Its a sport utility vehicle… <–(very important ellipses)
…, the driver is overweight, on the rear bumper, god bless America and We support our troops…
“ god bless America and We support our troops…”
There’s nothing wrong with either of those bumper stickers. I don’t care what one’s partisanship. I’m a lefty from a nontheist background and neither of those statements bother me in the least.
… and I forgot the one from the NRA …
You’re not helping.
@velo libre: Here in NYC (as evidenced by the bumper stickers), there is many an Obama-supporting, Bush-hating, First Amendment-supporting, gun control-advocating, Starbucks latte-sipping liberal who will stick his head out of the window of the Lexus hybrid SUV he’s driving to tell a bicyclist that he ought to stick to the sidewalk and stop impeding vehicular traffic.
@sdmss: I’m not even trying.
@capateto: You’re right, no difference.
@Capateto…. and here in Texas, the majority of cyclists (yes, even including bike commuters) are right-leaning. Just sayin’.
Must lead to some odd tire wear patterns.
Actually bikes have odd tyre wear anyway because of the camber. Trikes don’t, they always sit normal to the surface. They are also good for pinging spokes to show the change in tension under load.
If the spokes ‘ping’ the wheel needs rebuilding! See Jobst Brand…
Second to Sister Heidi. Plus how do they ride in a straight line if they lean right?
Supporting troops doesn’t necessarily mean supporting the war.
I agree with you on the principle but in this case this is exactly what it meant not long ago.
Statistically the guy in the car is more likely to die from a head injury sustained in an accident…but that minor item is usually overlooked.
Or diabetes, cardio-vascular disease, stroke…
diabetes is a genetic disease. not related to sugar consumption or lifestyle. if you get it, blame your parents
For Type One, yes … genetic or the result of a infection.
Most cases of Type Two Diabetes are directly related to diet (obesity) and lifestyle. It was UNHEARD of to have children with Type 2. Now it’s an epidemic:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10333956
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM200203143461112
Maybe we should stop subsidizing HFCS and allow children to ride their bikes or walk to school.
Oh yes, there are schools in the USA that prohibit that.
And in England unfortunately!
did you read the sources you posted bikingbill ? they told me that a genetic defect leads to obesity which itself supports the diabetes.
those kids tend to get fat. they just dont know about the root of their problem and that only a vast change in their lifestyle could help. its not like doing a little workout and eat halfsized megaburger could help.
The current thinking is that obesity is epigenetic rather than genetic. Children may be predisposed to obesity as a direct consequence of how overfed their mothers are during pregnancy rather than some genetic glitch over which nobody has any control.
So when did this vast evolutionary change take place?
Look 30 years ago? UNHEARD of to have this many children with Type 2.
30 years ago they didnt have a playstation, a mcburger on every corner or the money to buy that stuff thats why they didnt get so fat and sick..
Yehuda’s protected by his Helmet of Self-Righteousness…
And the script of course (wry grin)
The righteousness is obviously on the driver side here.
Ask the opinion of any EMT, ER doctor or nurse, or nurse in a neuro rehab (closed head trauma nurse) their opinions of bicycle helmets.
I did once. The answer was: “Cycle helmets are a bad idea. They discourage cycling by sending a false and misleading impression that there is something extraordinarily dangerous about this activity. I never wear a cycle helmet.”
@Kevin Love: This logic was employed by automakers regarding seat belts:
“At first, seat belts faced a storm of opposition both from automakers–who felt safety wouldn’t sell, didn’t want to evoke the vision of accidents, and disliked the added cost–and drivers, who worried about being trapped in burning cars or underwater.
“But gradually, the data prevailed. Safety experts estimate that seat belts increase your chance of surviving any collision by roughly 50 percent. Wearing a seat belt has now become mandatory in many developed countries.”<http://tinyurl.com/3xad9at>
Let’s see the numbers, both the raw data and massaged, er, analyzed results.
Hey Kevin, in Ontario it’s illegal to ride an electric bike without a helmet.
Kevy wroteth, “Cycle helmets are a bad idea. They discourage cycling by sending a false and misleading impression that there is something extraordinarily dangerous about this activity. I never wear a cycle helmet.”"
Yeah I hear that same argument used with sex and condoms too. Good thing that cycling and sex (not at the same time) are entirely risk free.
*sigh* I’d like to see the data at their ERs that supports their claims and ask them why they are contradictory to all national and international statistical data. Opinions mean nothing. EMTs, ER doctors and nurses all consume the same garbage propaganda as the rest of us. All that matters is data.
I think the helmet/no helmet issue really depends on the type of riding you plan to do. All you zipsters on fixies or freewheel racing bicycles are hurtling forward at advanced speeds in a position that pitches your body weight forward and therefore makes it more likely that you’ll flip over the handlebars in the event of a crash or slamming on the brakes. Likewise for many mountain bikes (especially if you’re trying to ride fast).
On the other hand, riders of upright bicycles — such as Kevin Love on his beloved Pashley — or bakfiets are generally riding much slower and have their weight distributed toward the back of the bike, so (in my reckoning) don’t really need a helmet, any more than a jogger or power walker would need one.
Does anyone wish to offer any data to support or to contradict?
Helmets make less sense the faster you go. The design specs are for 12 mph impacts. Because energy varies with the square you will be 50% out with this at 15 mph and 100% by 17 mph.
This isn’t even the forward velocity because it contains a vertical component. The 12 mph figure comes from the average speed you hit the ground if you fall over. I’ve never seen any research on what speed people are likely to hit the ground. As far as I can tell someone has just decided that 12 mph is a good number.
And no, front brakes should not pitch you over the bars. I spent years riding a two wheel drive Longstaff with no back brakes and never went over the front likewise on the fixed wheel bike I used in school back in the 80s. It didn’t happen. Jobst Brandt is of the opinion that this idea comes about from people who have been told not to use the front brake suddenly using it in an emergency and not being prepared for how effective they can be.
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/brakturn.html
Front brakes certainly can launch a a rider over the bars.
You ride a tricycle.
Of course they offer less protection the faster you go, F=MA.
I hear that when riding at the speed of light headlights are of no use either.
Did you read the Brandt comments on pitching?
Why do you make a statement about my riding a tricycle?
And above 12 mph the F is bigger than they are designed to deal with. THey dissipate energy which varies with the square of speed.
Have you tried Vee-Brakes yet? Much more powerful than the tiny calipers on the Brompton. My colleague has a Brompton or most race/fixies and found it almost impossible to stop one day at the seaside last year after freewheeling down a steep path. He thought he was going for swim! Together we adjusted the mechanical advantage of his brakes but he still felt they are weak and nowhere-near as strong as Vee. I bought a Trek ATB that had been donated and stopping at lights, the back wheel lifted up at around 5mph one day! Taught me to respect them…
@Capateto: Forward motion at speed on a bicycle is not required to incur a severe head injury. I recall reading somewhere that if you’re sitting upright in a chair and tip over sideways, the impact of your head on a hard floor can be severe enough to kill you. As the old joke goes, it’s not the fall that kills you, it’s the sudden stop at the end. Now let’s see, what did Sir Isaac say about this? P.E.=mgh which equals K.E.=(mv^2)/2 … F=ma … and the solution is left as an exercise for the reader.
FYI: Wikipedia on Bicycle Helmets <http://tinyurl.com/3x7b7we>; Wikipedia on Motorcycle Helmets <http://tinyurl.com/2vtgl7x>.
P.S. In a previous thread, someone asserted that helmets increase the danger of injury, but declined to cite a source. I haven’t read it, but here’s one: “Understanding Head & Neck Trauma (Or, why [motorcycle] helmets increase the danger!)” <http://tinyurl.com/2vtgl7x>.
The Googles, available on many computers, will easily find similar things about bicycles too:
http://www.cyclehelmets.org/1182.html
An opinion pulled out of one’s a@ss means nothing. An opinion from an informed professional based on experience means somewhat more.
They only see part of the picture, it’s impossible to know if in a particular crash a helmet would help, unless you repeat the crash with and without one and compare injuries.
Aw, crap – the helmet thing again. Time to move on…
“where’s your helmet? You have to protect yourself!” said the heavy smoker to me the other day…
I am fairly certain that when I am struck by a cement truck, a garbage truck or an SUV being piloted by a drunk driver that my helmet is not going to save my sorry old butt. It does, however, reduce noise quite dramatically. When I have that 2-ounce piece of cheap plastic strapped onto my brain housing device, I don’t hear my wife yelling at me. That in and of itself is woth the price. ‘nuf said.
hahaha
Get a wife with a background in statistics and show her some data.
Weird. What are you wearing a football helmet? Even my ski helmet doesn’t block much, if any, significant sound.
Donald Bothby’s helmet doesn’t block noise. He doesn’t hear his wife yelling when he’s wearing a helmet because she doesn’t yell when he’s wearing a helmet.
I don’t weigh in on the helmet debate but when I hear such utter BS…
Sure, if you get run over by a cement truck as two friends of mine did (Alan Kingsbury and & Jocelyn Lovell) your brain is only one part of the survival equation. Better to be protected in some manner than none. Al & Joecelyn were both “lucky” that they weren’t killed. Jocelyn is now a parapalegic from spinal cord injury, something that a helmet would not have prevented.
I was struck from behind 30 years ago by a Ford LTD doing 60+ and I was sent 150 feet throuh the air, suffered multiple compound fractures and a mild concussion. I was wearing no helmet. My survival was based on pure random luck that I didn’t have a serious head injury as well as worse injuries to the rest me. Had I the opportunity to wear a helmet then I would absolutely wanted one. My minor concussion “may” have been none at all.
Modern helmets do not affect ones hearing.
I’ve yet to find a two ounce helmet either. Personally when I choose to wear a helmet I choose the best ones I can afford. If they pass the certifications they are all more or less equal. They don’t publish actual test results so you can’t compare impact resitance. SNELL and ASTM are pass/fail tests. What you do tend to get for more money is better ventilation and less weight.
It’s your own choice, just like the crap you eat, drink, or smoke. Don’t preach to me about helmets or seat belts being inneffective with your anecdotal BS. Don’t worry, if I see you riding without a helmet I won’t care, but don’t tell lies about valid choices.
Which particular lies do you have in mind?
My goodness! I have agreed with unabiker at least twice in two days. Time for therapy!
Where’s this guy’s head? Yehuda’s obviously wearing his wool helmet.
Cushion’s the impact!
It’s sad when a fine comic twice jumps the shark in a single day.
i’m a geezer. i wear a walz cap. the helmet is on any time i straddle the saddle and twirl the pedals. the discussion was over in the ’80′s.
Apparently not everyone agrees. It does seem to continue.
By the ’80s I’d been riding for over two decades without ever suffering a head injury or knowing anyone who had. When the helmet fad came along I thought it was silly and ignored it, and have not seen anything since to change my mind. No studies or statistics are likely to convince me to ignore my own personal experience. which is: (1) It’s very unlikely that I’ll fall off my bike (it’s happened only four or five times in almost 50 years), and (2) it’s even less likely that I’ll hit my head if I fall off (it’s never happened even once yet). Even if it does happen, I have very strong doubts that a piece of plastic and styrofoam would make any difference one way or the other.
I cracked my helmet right the way through and was not going fast at all. Shit happens when you ride new trails. Or old ones, even. And I never know from one ride to the next where I’ll feel like going. I wear a helmet for the same reason I carry spares, tool kit, cash, cell phone, dog repellant, a ulock and a knife. Better to have them and not need them.
As to driving a half mile to the store-That’s about what my grocery run is. And it’s near a hundred degrees out, plus I’ve ridden my town loop twice today. Yes, I believe I will make that short trip in air conditioned comfort.
You assume there is no down side to wearing a helmet. Can you demonstrate that?
I can attest that I personally have never experienced a “down side”. That’s demonstration aplenty.
No, that’s anecdote. There is data which supports a downside to wearing a helmet.
Data, shmata. I likes a lid so I wears one. ‘Nuff said.
Well I’d like Nurse Gladys Emmanuel and some chocolate sauce but just because I like it don’t make it right.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_All_Hours#Cast
Well of course you opt for the air-conditioned car over a bike for a half mile ride. In the amount of time it takes to gear one self up with helmets, spares, tool kit, cell phones, dog repellant and weaponry, the rest of us that just jump on a bike and go are already back home from the store. If I had to go to all that bother I’d just use a car too.
No, I keep all that stuff on the bike. All but the cash, the knife (small pocket knife; hardly a weapon) and the cell phone. They are always on my person.
Yes, I almost always have a Swiss Army knife in my pocket. If I leave it in a pocket upstairs I can guarantee I’ll need if for something within an hour or so.
A few years ago I lost it and only lasted a week or so before I got another one. Then I found the old one!
The old one fell out of my pocket last year and spent 24 hrs on an A road with heavy traffic from trucks. The wee blade was broken when I found it the next morning but the rest was OK. I decided to retire it and move to the newer one.
Mongo – A question – Does your AirCon have time to start working in a half-mile trip?
Seriously, as mine doesn’t – I get no AC-cold air for at least a mile or two.
In 100 degree heat, I would find the breeze from riding more comforting than the stuffy and hot air from the previously-parked car.
If you had been letting the car idle for half and hour to cool down first then, maybe, you might have some benefit.
2004 Honda Element. That AC could cool my house. Open the windows, fire it up and by the time I’ve gone 100 feet it’s blowin’ cold. Close windows and enjoy the cool. Yet another reason why it’s the best damned car I’ve ever driven.
Just discussing, not arguing, Mongo – so you go 100 feet and you’re cool. Aren’t you a significant part of the way to the shop by then? With all that fuel use and the damage of heating and cooling the engine, increasing the mileage etc – what exactly is the benefit of using the car?
The benefit is in getting there and back when I’m wore the fuck out. Jesus, you want I should draw you a map?
Yes Please
)
Please don’t assume I am attacking you Mongo! I am just discussing car use via bike use – for interest/fun.
I too am guilty of going to the shop in the car after getting home from a long drive and finding low supplies – too knacked to ride and the car was still hot so off I went.
My house is near the top of a hill, if I push-off from my drive, the momentum almost takes me to the shop – might, if not for traffic/lights etc. Getting home isn’t far so the bike/foot is the usual way to shop but, like you, after a 60+hr week, the effort of having to go for milk etc seems worse than it is. It takes a real effort sometimes, mentally, to do the simplest things, so I do understand. I was just discussing the pro and cons of bike vs car.
The fact that your helmet cracked means it didn’t do it’s job. A helmet will protect you only if the foam actually compresses as it’s supposed to. If it cracks, then, at best, you only got partial protection. It seems like most of the time helmets don’t actually do their jobs. I’ve seen many many annecdotes from helmet users saying “the helmet saved my life”. But then they mention the helmet cracking and I have to explain that no, it didn’t.
haha love it!
FACT:
Bicycle helmets protect your head from a blunt impact (the helmet breaks not your head). A bicycle helmet will NOT protect you from a concussion. So if you fall and smack your head on a curb you wont leak your brain out but will still suffer a concussion which can be fatal and needs immediate medical attention.
errrrrr, your facts are very vague. And a bicycle helmet can help minimize the possibility of a concussion, and often do… it’s just that a helmet cannot guarantee that you will not get an concussion. Do you mean that bicycle helmets are not designed to, and rarely do, protect agianst rotational injuries? And that rotational injuries make up the overwhelming majority of fatal and disabilitating head traumas? It’s my understanding that bicycle helmets are quite helpful against concussions.
Indeed by increasing the radius of the head/helmet combo they make rotational injuries more likely.
Actually, bicycle helmets are first and foremost designed to prevent skull fractures, more likely at the speed we ride and with the sort of obstacles we may hit.
A hockey helmet, on the other hand ains to prevent concussions, skull fractures being less likely although not alltogether impossible.
Bicycle helmet aren’t especially good for concussions, for the reasons weefoldingbike said. The slickier the design the better though. Mine caught once in a branch while I was decending at 50 kph and my neck and butt remembered it for quite some time after.
In order to sell helmets in the US they must pass the ASTM test. SNELL is more stringent and is an independent testing group but BOTH use a variety of impact shapes to assess the crash worthiness and protection that a helmet may offer. A spike is used by both groups to measure puncture resistance. Yes, vent holes present a challenge in this part of the test.
Additional anvil shapes are used such as flat, round, and curb shaped.
Increased rotational vector forces from an increase of spherical diameter is a load of crap. Any miniscule increase in the moment of inertia and subsequent torque is far less than the impact asorbtion that the helmet provides. That would be comparable to bitching that your shoulder got a bruise from your seatbelt in a head on collision in which you did not die.
Any whiplash or cervical strain suffered in a crash would be far less with a helmet than the injuries you would sustain from hitting your bare head on the tarmac. Basic physics.
Weefold would likeley complain if he had to escape a crashing plane, used a parachute, and twsited his ankle on impact too.
Have you a reference for that spike claim. I checked the SNELL spec and it seems they don’t use it for bicycles:
http://www.smf.org/testing.html
Similarly this SNELL page makes no reference to it:
http://www.smf.org/standards/b/b95std.html
Nor does this article on testing:
http://www.cyclehelmets.org/papers/c2023.pdf
Have you looked into the issue of rotational injury beyond dismissing with a naughty word?
http://people.aapt.net.au/~theyan/cycling/Accident%20Analysis%20Prevention%202.pdf
I’m unsure how you relate the severity of whiplash with a helmet and impact. They are different things.
Apparently your magic hat goes beyond crash test dummy powers and allows you to mind read. You seem to know what I think about planes. Remarkable.
Wee, some backgound. In my previous carreer, in the development of the Paramount Design Group hardhell which was made by Vetta, the standards at the time was Snell 1980. A puncture test was part of the standard. We tested those helmets to meet our liability standards for insurance purposes before we accepted helmets from Vetta. The forthcoming “new” standard proposed by Snell (B90) dropped the puncture requirement as it was deemed to be less important in terms of the greater protection that soft shell helmets could offer in terms of padding/weight ratio, and that micro-shell/hardshell helmets offered the best of both worlds in terms of reasonable puncture resistance and superior structural integrity and energy asorbation. Blunt force protection makes more sense as the goal versus penetrative especialy considerin the need to minimize weight and maximize ventilation.
re: whiplash & impact. I’d rather suffer a little whiplash than die from a head injury. Brain injuries are much more difficult to treat.
And serious head injuries are more likely if you wear a helmet.
Working in the area means you should really have known that there was no spike test. Why did you claim that there was?
We, our goal was to create a SNELL approved helmet. Also we wanted something that exceeded the ANSI approval. Giro was marketing foam helmets that had a weakness in breaking to bits under certain conditions. This nasty behavior left the rider helmetless (more or less) after the initial impact and therefore vulnerable to secondary impacts. The hardshell offered greater structural integrity with minimal weight. The penetration WAS part of the pre-B90 standard. We also wanted somethingthat exceeeded standards so that our insurance costs would be lower. Insurance costs are very large fixed cost. Less insurance costs = greater profit margins and also the potential for lower prices to the dealer and ultimately to the consumer.
A serious question – does anybody have evidence that normal cycle helmets actually have caused rotational injury?
I am not talking about ‘aero’ style or any oversized item, just standard helmets that actually help to reduce ’road-rash’ to the head? I am truthfully interested so that when I finish my Tandem rebuild, my wife and I can ride with a touch more safety. Thanks in advance for constructive replies
@Tencon, none that you can buy today should cause you any concern. The old hairnet style and the original generation of “foam only” helmets like the mid-80′s Giro’s and the copies that it spawned, could induce neck injuries since they could “stick” the pavement during a (sliding) crash.
All current helmets use a hard shell or a micro-shell over the foam so that they slide rather than grab, and also give the helmet more structural intergrity. Most helmets also have a skeleton or gridwork molded inside the foam to add additional integrity so the chances of the helmet disentigrating during a crash is reduced.
Neck trauma is always a potential risk in any fall with or without a helmet.
http://www.perg.bham.ac.uk/pdfs/p157_FEA_bike_helm_obl_impacts_f_web_150dpi.pdf
The friction co-efficient between the road and helmet surface isn’t as important as you suggest.
Thanks for the replies. The link was very encouraging also.
Mostly I was of the assumption that unless you add extra torque (with an ‘aero’ tail for example) the helmet would reflect the wearer’s head shape and not be turned/turn the head as the reduced leverage would not be enough to do that.
Any force great enough to cause rotational injury will, I guess, have a similar effect with or without a lid?
Generally, as I am uninjured after two m/c crashes when the fibreglass lid took a beating but left me un scratched, I trust ‘kit-mark’ lids but still cycle as if I am unprotected. It is stupid to trust in safety gear – PRIMARY safety means not having an incident at all, so I try to ride as if I am going to be killed by any road user that can kill me. By making it hard to impossible to hit me, I have only had one incident with a driver while on a bike, in 1979. My (main) road curves to the right and a road joins from (straight ahead) the left with double lines to mark a ‘STOP’ point. She WAS stationary so I trusted her – wrong choice… She began to move off and she saw me being lifted in the air by her bonnet. No injury but a bent bike and she paid.