I missed the fact that someone posted this load of BS. The consensus among cycling newsgroups is that:
The truck tyre only went over the “tail” of the helmet, not the bit containing Mr Lipscomb’s head. (See tyre track in photo in original news story).
If he had not been wearing a helmet, the tyre would have missed his head altogether
If the tyre had passed over the part of the helmet containing his head, the efficacy of the helmet would have been zero.
Look at the helmet! It fell to pieces! They are made out of polystyrene, not frickin’ unobtainium. I could stand on my bike helmet and break it into tiny pieces. If I stood on your head, it might hurt a little but you your skull would not implode.
Interesting cite, Colophon. I must admit, having only recently taken to wearing a cycle helmet and never having handled one before, I was surprised how insubstantial they are. I also have a much more sturdy snowboarding helmet, and it seems that if I’m to go to the bother of putting a helmet on, I might as well wear that.
And this is relevant how? I think you’d be in trouble with a steel helmet and inch thick if a truck were to run over it. That’s not your normal situation.
I missed the edit window with this. A few points (btw I cycle about 80 miles a week, of which 60 is commuting, including riding across central London)
CalMeacham I am not arguing that a helmet will not prevent abrasions and minor bruising. But if your head hits a solid object hard enough to do serious damage, the helmet will fall apart in as little as one thousandth of a second.
Plus there have been studies that suggest that helmets increase the chance of neck injuries - the theory being that the larger diameter of the helmet and “grippier” surface imparts more rotational forces to the neck.
By all means wear a hemet if you want, but don’t think it will save you from serious injury. It won’t. It will save you from a lump on the head, perhaps, but the only way to avoid a serious head injury is to not have a serious accident. And the way to do that is:
Don’t ride in the gutter. Ride out in the road. If cars want to overtake, make sure they have to consciously move out and overtake, not breeze past inches from your elbow. In town you should usually be able to go fast enough to be part of the traffic stream, not segregated out to the side.
The most likely thing that is going to wipe you out is traffice turning across you (left turn in the UK, right turn in the USA). NEVER overtake on the inside near a junction, even if the car is not signalling to turn.
Be seen! Lights, reflective clothing. Use them.
Cycle in the road, not on cycle paths! In the road, you are part of the traffic and have all the priorities that traffic on the road enjoys. On a cycle path, you do not. Not only will your journey be much much slower because of having to give way at every side road and driveway, but you are four to five times more likely to be injured. Apart from anything else, cycle paths are usually littered with rubbish, broken glass, dog shit and other detritus, which gets swept off the roads by traffic.
It’s relevant because it’s exactly the sort of BS that helmet evangelists pick up on to try to bring in mandatory helmet use. The helmet was crushed flat and yet his head was fine! It’s a miracle! Hallelujah for the powers of polystyrene to withstand an 18-wheeler!
Unfortunately, helmets in the EU only have to meet EU standards (which state, paraphrased, that a bee striking your head at 5mph should not cause catastrophic helmet failure in more than 60% of cases), rather than the more stringent Snell standards. See http://www.cyclehelmets.org/papers/c2023.pdf (PDF)
(PS: I am now going to wear my helmet for the next two weeks, as the powers of cosmic irony will surely dictate that I soon topple off my bike and headbut something pointy )
:rolleyes: Nobody has said that a small foam helmet is going to protect you from being run over by a lorry moving at 50 mph. And no, it’s not a panacea against injury; like any safety device, it will only protect to the extent that it is designed to do so, i.e. impacts at typical bicycling speed of <20 mph. Even if all it does is protect against “superficial” injuries, it still provides protection. And from your cite, this line in particular (“Indeed, concern has been expressed that helmets might make some injuries worse by converting relatively harmless direct forces to rotational ones,”) makes absolutely no sense; the claim that a force sufficient to do a significant neck injury would be of no concern if it were a “direct” force is absurd.
As for “What is harder, the human skull, or an inch of polystyrene foam?”, the fact that the foam is soft and will deform is precisely the point. I’m guessing you haven’t cut apart a motorcycle helmet, but it also has a foam core, with an exterior plastic or carbon-fiber shell whicih won’t withstand significant impact. (I’ve seem them crack after falling at table height onto a concrete floor.) This is a completely inane rationalization for your assertion that bicycle helmets are worthless.
Your suggestions for safe riding (other than riding in a motor traffic lane when a bicycle lane is available and well-marked) are appropriate, but have nothing to do with the topic of whether a bicycle helmet provides protection; they’re a complete red herring.
You have a mistaken understanding of how helmets are supposed to work. This is like saying, “the front of my car got all crumpled in the crash! it sucks! it should have held its shape!” The polystyrene absorbs the shock and is destroyed in the process, much like a modern car’s crumple zones. The plastic helmet shell holds the foam mostly together during that breakdown, and provides some skid-ability (so your head doesn’t stop cold when you hit the ground, wrenching your neck).
As counterintuitive as it is at first glance, a material that falls to pieces is better than one that doesn’t.
I understand perfectly well how they are supposed to work, thanks. My point is that they fall apart too quickly, before they have a chance to deform plastically and absorb much energy. A helmet that cracks in half has not absorbed much energy. A helmet that has uniformly compressed over a large area has absorbed a lot of energy. Bicycle helmets, at least the ones on sale in the UK, overwhelmingly do the former instead of the latter.
When I ski and snowboard I always wear a helmet, because snow helmets are well designed and actually do the job. In fact I have considered wearing my snow helmet for cycling, same as Usram. It would likely be far too hot though.
If there existed decent bicycle helmets that actually did the job they are supposed to, I would wear one.
I was in the hospital for a week when I was 15 from a bike accident. I don’t think anyone had helmets back then except racers; certainly kids didn’t. I’m not sure I would have escaped injury even if I had had a helmet. I took a header, and my glasses were snapped and gouged my face. However, I can say that it’s amazing that I wasn’t killed, or severely brain-injured. With a helmet, the risk of that would have been drastically reduced.
I always wear a helmet, and I insist that my family members do the same.
I always wear a helmet and my fiancee will not ride with someone who doesn’t.
I wouldn’t wear body armour for trails unless I was flying through the air on a BMX or something. I do wear clear glasses though to protect my eyes. I can sort of understand the appeal of a full-face shield though after my buddy went on a head of me and managed to bend a springy, little tree which promptly snapped back like a whip in my mouth. Bleh!
Colophon, you’re confounding two separate issues: mandatory bicycle helmet laws and an individuals personal choice to wear a bicycle helmet.
You and your cites may have a point about the wisdom of mandatory bicycle helmet laws. Even without a helmet, injuries and deaths per distance traveled are similar for bicycles and cars, so I’m all for encouraging more people to get out on the roads with a bicycle.
However, if one is going to be out on the road on a bicycle anyway, the safety advantage in terms of serious and minor head injuries is clear. Not to take advantage of the clear risk reduction offered by helmets is simply asinine in my view.
Of course, you should ride in a riskier manner simply because you’re wearing a helmet.
From what I’ve always understood, bicycle helmets are supposed to fall to pieces. It’s supposed to work like “crumple zones” in a Volvo. That’s one of the reasons you aren’t supposed to put stickers on your helmet, you’re not supposed to interefere with the breakage.
As I said, they’re supposed to deform plastically, and absorb energy by compressing the foam. What they actually tend to do is shatter.
Threemae, my opposition to a mandatory helmet law in the UK is part of the reason I no longer wear one very often. The government has “hinted” that once a certain proportion of cyclists wear helmets, they will press to make it mandatory. Since they admitted that, many cyclists have stopped wearing them altogether!
I haven’t gone that far. I still wear mine when riding off road, as that is when I am more likely to fall off. It also gives me protection against overhanging branches, etc.
No, that’s incorrect. A bike helmet is supposed to crumble. It has manufactured fault lines (of sorts) and is supposed to crack and break apart in a certain way. Bike helmets are not supposed to “deform”, they are supposed to split.
Example: My fiancee has had a couple really bad tumbles on her road bike. The most recent one was due to streetcar tracks a couple years ago before we started dating. The helmet split sort of around her head. So her noggin was mostly fine, but she has some permanent road rash scars on her shoulder.
ETA: My rock climbing helmet on the other hand is totally different. It’s designed to absorb impact because you tend to bonk your head a bit. It will deform a bit and feels more malleable in your hands when you hold it.
Y’know, I’m pretty sure they designed bike helmets with the purpose of increasing contact time and allowing decelleration to take place less rapidly inside the helmet. I think they may have chosen the most suitable material for the job, rather than just making them out of whatever was easiest.
I think someone probably thought about it and did the necessary calculations before they were designed. But I may be wrong…
I wanted lively discussion and have not been disappointed.
Haven’t seen it mentioned, but there was recently a study done showing that you are in fact more likely to get hit by a car if you’re wearing a helmet, which rather does make it a less-desirable piece of safety gear.
This as well, though I’d phrase it differently: I don’t wear a helmet when I go out for a run outside (where I have to use the street; no sidewalks).
Also, for those telling me to just get a better helmet - still wouldn’t help. I have incredibly sensitive skin. The helmet irritates my skin for the same reason that wearing hats, or most necklaces or bracelets, and most perfumes, or really anything irritates my skin. The massive increase in sweating doesn’t help. So unless they start making helmets out of Magical Shock-Absorbing cotton, I’ll be all red and blotchy and itchy no matter what. (And as a side note, helmets are ridiculously expensive. I got the cheapest one I could find, and still ended up twenty bucks poorer. Is there pixie dust between the oh-so-expensive Styrofoam and thin plastic?)
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