What kind of helmet do you use?

swbluto said:
I wear a "skating" pot helmet. It was the only white helmet I could find in the bicycle store (A color reputed to be one of the best for visibility), and it also had the advantage of being seemingly more protective and cheaper. I added yellow reflective strips all around it to enhance night-time visibility.
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you'd like my and my wife's motorcycle helmets if you're out for visibility. Scorpion EXO-700 in Neon Yellow. $210 - 10% discount if you hunt for it online. yes, motorcycle helmets are much more expensive. no, i wouldn't ride one on a bike, but i would consider a lightweight 3/4 moped helmet with a faceshield... hmm, time to prowl eBay. anyway, my moto helmet:

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I wear a red Giro Indicator. Simple a I chose a color that people could see me better. Black always looks better but sometimes, it's best to be seen and not run over.

Since forever, I've been against helmets. I thought they looked stupid and are for ahem... anyways... One night while riding home from work. A car drove past me and someone threw a beer bottle in a brown paper bag and it flew right behind my head. I was SOOOO mad. There was really nothing I could've done. I couldn't see the guy's plates since it was very dark and I knew the low-life did it on purpose. The bottle made a loud *THUNK!* when it hit the grass next to me. I can only imagine the damages if I was hit. So after that incident, I decided to get a helmet. Not because I was afraid of getting run over by cars, but to keep me safe from the low-life scum that live in my city. I'm thinking about carrying some heavy rocks in my jacket pocket just in case something like that happens again. A broken windshield would make slime like that think twice next time he tries to intentionally hurt a pedestrian.
 
I use a white Giro that I adapted with a rear red flashing led and reflector when riding my bicycles and a full face when using the motorcycle. I would wear a heavier helmet riding a bike if they didn't also reduce visibility and hearing too much, not to mention turning my head into a solar powered oven when I am really pushing it on the pedals. Heat stroke can be an issue too under certain conditions but my ebike can hit some pretty high speeds on the hills in my area so this is a concern for me. However since ebikes are so quiet I value the peripheral vision, hearing, and cooling that comes with a standard helmet.

I also use a rear view helmet mirror on the Giro but frankly I have never found one that I like. Does anyone have a good suggestion for one?

Where I live in a rural area, riding bicycles has become unsafe around city SUV drivers that have moved up here and have no consideration for pedestrians, let alone cyclists, now that they have moved to the country where big SUV's are for killing deer since too many of them think hunting is not politically correct. I am actually safer on my ebike than a regular bike because it is operating closer to the speed limit than on a bicycle. The rear view mirror is definitely a geeky item but I very much want to know who is coming up behind me when I am riding with traffic and it works, albeit poorly.

BTW my wife works at the ER at our local hospital (NY), which is near the Connecticut border, where helmets are not mandatory.

You know what their nickname is for a patient who comes in without a brain bucket, I mean helmet? :roll:


They call them organ donors. :twisted:

The death toll for cyclists without helmets has been going up dramatically around the country but that stat is not often talked about. Not to mention the ones that are just turned into vegetables. I personally know two biker widows.
 

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elektrobiker,

I respect your opinion but I don't agree with your implication that helmets should be mandatory. I don't believe the state should force someone to act safe. If someone values his own life, they will take the appropriate measure to protect their own lives. Here in RI, it is not mandatory by law to wear a helmet on a motorcycle. While I do agree that it's not smart to ride a motorcycle or bike without a helmet, I still believe it's the rider's responsibility to keep himself/herself safe.
 
set said:
elektrobiker,

I respect your opinion but I don't agree with your implication that helmets should be mandatory. I don't believe the state should force someone to act safe. If someone values his own life, they will take the appropriate measure to protect their own lives. Here in RI, it is not mandatory by law to wear a helmet on a motorcycle. While I do agree that it's not smart to ride a motorcycle or bike without a helmet, I still believe it's the rider's responsibility to keep himself/herself safe.
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With that argument, the same reasoning can be extended to justify the legality of suicide. In the "individual freedom" stand-point, I would argue that it should be legal. But, there's an impact on society when a member misses especially since it's often considered that the average member "contributes to society" in some form(Otherwise, why would the average member be paid well beyond their absolute necessities?).

A motorcyclist's choice of risking suicide also has an extra dimension, as it introduces possible culpability from another driver. And that's where it begins to directly affect others which starts its direct justification for a law.
 
swbluto,

I understand your standpoint and the impact on society argument but committing suicide and riding a motorcycle are not one in the same. If someone commits suicide, they end their life and willfully choose to opt out of living. They also willingly opt out of society. Accidents are accidents. Risks increases the chance of accidents. While motorcycling in general is high risk, the rider chooses to take that risk every time he/she gets on t he motorcycle/bicycle. While helmets are a wonderful tool to reduce risks, it's still the rider's choice to take a risk and likewise, reduce a risk. One could greatly reduce the risk of an accident by being more careful or paying attention but we can't make that into a law. It's still up to the rider. I am all for safety and staying alive, but what I am against is someone, an entity such as a government body forcing you to make a decision without your consent. Whether or not a person contributes, or leeches from a society is irrelevant. Would it still be justified if the motorcyclists contributes nothing to a society? What if the rider completely leeches off society? Would it still justify passing a law requiring helmets? You are responsible for your own life. I wear a helmet not because it is required by law, but because I value my life and safety. While it's nice to think the government will take care of us, I think it's more empowering if we took care of ourselves.
 
set said:
swbluto,

I understand your standpoint and the impact on society argument but committing suicide and riding a motorcycle are not one in the same. If someone commits suicide, they end their life and willfully choose to opt out of living. They also willingly opt out of society. Accidents are accidents. Risks increases the chance of accidents. While motorcycling in general is high risk, the rider chooses to take that risk every time he/she gets on t he motorcycle/bicycle. While helmets are a wonderful tool to reduce risks, it's still the rider's choice to take a risk and likewise, reduce a risk. One could greatly reduce the risk of an accident by being more careful or paying attention but we can't make that into a law. It's still up to the rider. I am all for safety and staying alive, but what I am against is someone, an entity such as a government body forcing you to make a decision without your consent. Whether or not a person contributes, or leeches from a society is irrelevant. Would it still be justified if the motorcyclists contributes nothing to a society? What if the rider completely leeches off society? Would it still justify passing a law requiring helmets? You are responsible for your own life. I wear a helmet not because it is required by law, but because I value my life and safety. While it's nice to think the government will take care of us, I think it's more empowering if we took care of ourselves.
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I never said they were the same, but they share one similarity - the risk of dying due to choosing that alternative is considerably higher than the "standard choice", for very obvious reasons. The big difference in that one similarity is the magnitude of risk. If I attempt suicide, my death rate is somewhere around 50% depending on my resolve, attention-getting motivation, etc. - On a motorcycle, over a given time span, with a given riding style, in a given driving environment, etc., the risk of death may be 100 to 10000 times less but it is still not ignorable. If one engages in an activity with a knowingly high probability of death, and that death may be induce the culpability of another, that has societal impact that extends beyond the individual's domain. That was my only point. Whether or not that societal impact is great enough to justify a law is not something I'm going to determine and I neither support nor am against a helmet law, but I understand (some of) the justifications for one.

And, dude, when we're talking about general laws that impacts everyone, you need to talk about "the average such characterized person" and not a specific individual. That way the total societal's benefit/detriment can be determined from a law, and that's entirely what law exists for - for governing interacting members of a society.
 
http://www.engadget.com/2007/07/12/terrifying-bike-helmet-filters-bad-air-increases-fear/

A helmet that is handled in the traffic and air pollution, incorporating particulate filter, though a little expensive and gives a little afraid.
 
set said:
I'm thinking about carrying some heavy rocks in my jacket pocket just in case something like that happens again. A broken windshield would make slime like that think twice next time he tries to intentionally hurt a pedestrian.
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Then you can escalate an otherwise minor event into getting beaten or killed.

If you are going to make an attack on an unknown an un-understood target, you must be fully prepared to swiftly kill all parties you are making an attack towards. If you aren't willing to commit to that, then it's best not to make a counter attack on an unknown and un-understood target(s).
 
As far as helmets go, a full face is the only choice that offers the protection level I want when I ride.

In 10 years of riding motorcycles on the street, I've had rocks and things hit my face shield many times that I'm confident would have caused serious injury, and likely caused me to wreck. I have one rock thrown up from a truck that hit my face shield hard enough to break it's mounting from the helmet, and the impact caused me to see stars. I was going the normal speed limit when that happened. When running +100mph, it becomes very difficult to breathe normally with no face sheild, and even bugs can cause serious eye damage, as they ALWAYS manage to slide right behind close fitting sunglasses and end up smacking your eyeball.

I think motorcycle riders on the freeway with no full-face helmet are morons. I think riding at normal road speeds definately warants a full face helmet, even on a bicycle. I also think superbike gloves are critical for traveling at normal road speeds. Picking rocks out of your hands sucks, and the skin on palms takes forever to re-grow.

There is a saying for riders.

Don't dress for the ride, dress for the fall.


Here are some inspirational pics for wearing gear. Looks like most all of these were low speed. Minimal burning around the roadrash. Just because it's a scooter or a bicycle doesn't mean its going to be any different when you wreck than anything else moving you along at normal traffic speeds. Pedal bike or scooter at 35mph or GSXR1000 at 35mph, your body has the same amount of destructive energy behind it to be released.


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liveforphysics said:
I think riding at normal road speeds definately warants a full face helmet, even on a bicycle. I also think superbike gloves are critical for traveling at normal road speeds. Picking rocks out of your hands sucks, and the skin on palms takes forever to re-grow.
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Hi. You bring up a great point about gloves. I make it a point to always wear a set regardless of motorbike, scooter, or e-bike. And as you mention, it should be a good pair of gloves. I had a 10 mph fallover on my e-bike, only slid a couple of feet but my MX gloves were shredded. They are useless for road rash protection.

I do like my Gyro Remedy helmet. As a kid I hit my head a few times just farting around on grass, enough to break the skin and take stitches. Hitting the pavement would surely make a dent, and I have enough troubles.

I have another bicycle helmet, the typical type, but I don't really like it. A lot of wind noise and the strap seems pretty insecure. I prefer a motorcycle style buckle system.
 
Chris_Faherty said:
You bring up a great point about gloves. I make it a point to always wear a set regardless of motorbike, scooter, or e-bike. And as you mention, it should be a good pair of gloves. I had a 10 mph fallover on my e-bike, only slid a couple of feet but my MX gloves were shredded. They are useless for road rash protection.
I prefer a motorcycle style buckle system.
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Yep, bike gloves are designed to help avoid blisters and increase grip for your hands while riding. They offer no level of asphault crash protection. Motorcross gloves offer some protection on dirt, and shred themselves in the first foot of sliding on asphault.

Superbike gloves take hand protection to a whole new level, while still being very comfortable. My gloves have titanium, kevlar, and carbon fiber skid surfaces. They use special grain cuts of leather, and laminate many layers between kevlar fabric in the areas that normally suffer the most damage. They are pretty damn slick, and I've been very happy to not have a single hand injury since I started wearing them for all my wheeled activities. Very much worth the $100-300 that a good pair costs.

Reguarding the buckles on bike helmets, very much agree with you. The straps are generally just tucked in loosely behind a layer of brittle foam. The helmets offer zero face protection, and due to the way they slide back on your head when you strike something from the front, they offer minimal protection for front impacts. They do protect the back of the head pretty well for a single impact, upon which they crumble (or at least mine always did when I was a kid). So, you better hope you aren't doing much tumbleing if you are trusting a bike helmet for protection.
 
What kind of helmet do you use?

- Lance Armstrong style helmet , bicycle helmet
- skater helmet
- mountain bike helmet with chin guard
- DOT full face motorcycle helmet with visor
- helmets cramp my style

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My current one looks a lot like that black skater helmet, but it's white (with a handpainted DayGlo orange band around it, as you can see in pics on my blog).

Since I end up having to get all my stuff used, I am very limited in the selection of styles and colors. I keep a constant eye out at thrift stores for safety gear, and examine it all carefully for any kind of damage. If it has any, I don't buy it, instead taking it up to the front to let them know it's damaged and should not be reused because it might fail instead of helping. Sometimes the person in charge at the time actually cares, and ensures it's discarded/etc., sometimes they don't care and probably just put it back on the shelf when I'm gone, figuring I'm a crackpot (well, I probably am, but this is serious stuff with safety gear!).

If it's ok and it fits me properly, I'll get it as a spare, if I don't already have one. I'd rather have two of everything sitting unused than none of something I really need.

If I had money for *proper* protection, I'd be buying it.

So sometimes I end up with bike helmets, sometimes skater helmets. A motorcycle helmet here in Phoenix would be heatstroke asking to happen at the lower speeds I am at, with the cycling effort I'm also putting out, so I don't get those. Almost as bad with the mountain bike helmets, which I tried once. :(

Gloves I don't have any good ones that fit me anymore. They're really hard to find used. I have a set of DayGlo nylon ski gloves with removable liners that I used to wear for the obviousness of the hand signals when using them, but ever since I started using my lighting system on the bikes I don't need the hand signals, so the gloves are retired, being useless in any crash at any speed. The leather/etc motorcycle gloves I have are just a bit too tight, and I can't wear them for more than a few minutes without numb fingers. So they're not useful, either.

I do wish I could get a bunch of good leathers, gloves, and helmet all in white, rather than black, but even here in AZ it seems that black is the only color anyone cares about, and it's too hot in direct sunlight to be wearing black anything. :(


I've gone thru a few helmets and other gear over the years; the two most recent, in the last couple of years, were being hit in the back of the head by a delivery truck mirror (hard enough to crack the plastic and dent the styrofoam--glad it wasn't my head!), and being deliberately run off an otherwise deserted street by someone just around the break of dawn, and having to swerve off onto a gravel path, losing control, rolling, and smacking my head against a utility pole after the whole gravel thing. That helmet was scraped up pretty bad, but appeared otherwise undamaged, so it is now an emergency spare in case I have no others and need one to ride to get a new one. :)
 
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My favourite helmet is the ~1975 Romer kayaking hat.
I started wearing it long before helmets became mandatory here.
Kid at the bike shop yesterday liked it. It's become retro cool.
It's white and full of retro reflective tape,

The kettle gets even more comments. The chrome is highly visible too.

The newest hard-shell Nutcase bandanna print was a raffle prize and the only one I've seen other people wearing.
It's a skater type pot to replace a previous skater pot. It also draws comments because of the graphics.
Nutcase makes fun helmets.

Predator helmets are kinda cool looking too.

Bicycle helmets that are little more than shrink wrapped styrofoam are great for the majority of riders since they never need them.
A toque offers protection against most of the head injuries cited by the scare mongers, data sifters, legislators, lobbyists and manufacturers.
 
Lance style cheapo here. Thinking its time to go with MTB with chin guard style.
 
Gee, that is horrible, above.

For me, it's the Bell BMX helmet.
Won't wear a full face or moto helmet.
Won't wear a hairnet lycra-biker's helmet.

The BMX style of helmet is cool and looks like a guy's helmet.
Bell's product, primitive then, saved my brother's life back in 1970.
So I am sort of biased toward that name-brand.

Can be gotten in any of a wide choice of colours and patterns,
or, do as I did: paint the damn thing BRIGHT YELLOW, like factory quality,
if you know how to wield a spray can of Krylon Fusion (it's the best yellow and it is tough
and GLOSSY wet looking if you spray on a dry, cool, day).

Helmets. I hate them and love them. My BMX helmet has saved my scalp more than once, already.
 
I'm wearing a good quality road biker style, and wear a ski hat under it in winter. The last crash, it saved my life as my head crushed it into a curb. That crushed helmet, of course was replaced. I ride about 25 mph, or the same speed as a racer. Faster bikes should upgrade to at least the half shell motorcycle type.

Your style will not be cramped in the casket. They allways dress you nice for the funeral, if that is, you have a head left.

I oughta be using the bmx type with the chin guard, maybe this winter I'll switch. On the gas scooter, at 60 mph, the full face with a visor for sure.
 
The rounded back skater style helmet. with sun visor. Bright yellow.

I am told the rounded back rolls better in an accident, protects from neck injuries.

Not used for real high speeds. but in fair amount of traffic.
 
I have one or more of each kind. The ones I typically wear

No helmet, depending on my ride
Skater helmet, most frequently
Half shell motorcycle helmet, high speed
Full face DOT moto, generally for licensed motos.
 
I have them all too, except the hair one. Use the skate-multi more than any of the others, superbike helmet not used for EVs, motoX helmet for max-speed test teeth-protection, lance helmet (or nothing) for hot days.
 
For the people who must ride in the rode as I will. I would highly recommend this helmet. DOT approved. Its motocross style so you have full head to chin protection. Goggles to keep road bugs and grime out of your eyes and gloves to help you out in the cool weather or if you have to lay the bike down. 54$ shipped. Great value I think

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=350251214025
 
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