helmets from Why wear black?

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Oldjohnw
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by Oldjohnw »

[XAP]Bob wrote:
fullupandslowingdown wrote:
It's said that many families share a car, but in my experience more multi driver families have a car each as it's difficult for them both to use the same car for work and school runs etc etc. Then there's the mainly men that have more tha one car to themselves, nextdoor neighbour has a banger of a merc, and a Porsche for the weekends (pompous git)


Yep - although we have been one car, two drivers for well over a decade. I can remember hiring a car once, and borrowing a friends car once, to enable combinations of journeys.

I don’t know of any (I probably do, but can’t think of them) other households with fewer cars than drivers, excluding those with no cars.


We have one car and two drivers, as do most of my circle - and indeed community. So we have fewer cars than drivers.
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Smudgerii
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by Smudgerii »

Do Motorbikes ever get considered?
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[XAP]Bob
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by [XAP]Bob »

Rarely do motorbikes get considered.. After all they are only used for leisure (and couriering), no-one would be crazy enough to actually *travel* on two wheels...
A shortcut has to be a challenge, otherwise it would just be the way. No situation is so dire that panic cannot make it worse.
There are two kinds of people in this world: those can extrapolate from incomplete data.
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[XAP]Bob
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by [XAP]Bob »

Oldjohnw wrote:
[XAP]Bob wrote:
fullupandslowingdown wrote:
It's said that many families share a car, but in my experience more multi driver families have a car each as it's difficult for them both to use the same car for work and school runs etc etc. Then there's the mainly men that have more tha one car to themselves, nextdoor neighbour has a banger of a merc, and a Porsche for the weekends (pompous git)


Yep - although we have been one car, two drivers for well over a decade. I can remember hiring a car once, and borrowing a friends car once, to enable combinations of journeys.

I don’t know of any (I probably do, but can’t think of them) other households with fewer cars than drivers, excluding those with no cars.


We have one car and two drivers, as do most of my circle - and indeed community. So we have fewer cars than drivers.


Different areas of the country show different distributions I have no doubt.
Probably different areas of individual towns as well.
A shortcut has to be a challenge, otherwise it would just be the way. No situation is so dire that panic cannot make it worse.
There are two kinds of people in this world: those can extrapolate from incomplete data.
Smudgerii
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by Smudgerii »

[XAP]Bob wrote:Rarely do motorbikes get considered.. After all they are only used for leisure (and couriering), no-one would be crazy enough to actually *travel* on two wheels...

:lol:
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by Vorpal »

[XAP]Bob wrote:
fullupandslowingdown wrote:
It's said that many families share a car, but in my experience more multi driver families have a car each as it's difficult for them both to use the same car for work and school runs etc etc. Then there's the mainly men that have more tha one car to themselves, nextdoor neighbour has a banger of a merc, and a Porsche for the weekends (pompous git)


Yep - although we have been one car, two drivers for well over a decade. I can remember hiring a car once, and borrowing a friends car once, to enable combinations of journeys.

I don’t know of any (I probably do, but can’t think of them) other households with fewer cars than drivers, excluding those with no cars.

When we lived in the UK, on our cul-de-sac, there were several families, including ours that had one car. However, about 25% of the families (60 ish households?) had more motor vehicles than drivers. Our immediate neighbours, for example, had 4 cars and 3 drivers. There was a business vehicle, a family van, and two smaller cars. The couple that lived there with their kids (the oldest of which was the 3rd driver) were a builder and a child minder, so the business vehicle and family van were 'justified' for their work. Of the other cars, one was the older son's, and the other other was used when just one or two people went somewhere & they didn't need one of the larger vehicles. Of course they only had parking (front garden) for two vehicles. On our end of the cul-de-sac, (16ish households) the street was parked up with motor vehicles, and they were all owned by 4 houses. Every single vehicle. The rest of us parked on our drives.

This was a large village with mostly working class homes, and our street was all mid 60s semi-detached 3 bedrooms (a couple of them were extended).

By contrast (and I have posted about this before) where I live in Norway, out of the 16 or 17 households on our little square, there are 2 without cars and the rest have one car each. For several of us, the car spends most of its time sitting in front of the house because people commute by other means (walking, cycling, public transport). I expect that the rate at which people have access to a car is higher than the UK average. One of the carless households has access (with planning) to a business vehicle, and one of our neighbours has his car in a car share scheme, so any of us can hire it from him using a car share app.
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krull
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Re: Why wear black?

Post by krull »

Cunobelin wrote:
BlueRider wrote:
pjclinch wrote:
So, next question is what sort of helmet do you use, particularly what standard is at rated to (Snell or EN1078, do you even know)?

And since body armour is available for cyclists can we please ascertain that you do wear that on your commute? What grade of gloves, knee and elbow pads do you wear?

And so on. By saying any reduction of injury risk is welcome and assuming PPE will do that for you (ignoring the actual chances of being in an accident, which tend to rise with PPE) put yourself in the position that any PPE you might wear should be worn. If you go down the "more is better" route rather than "enough is enough" you're signed up for an arms race you can't possibly win.

Pete.


I wear a helmet made to a EN std. I have no idea if that is good or bad, nor do i care. I don't wear a helmet to protect me from getting flattened by the #192 bus, i wear a helemt to stop cuts and lascerations to me should i fall off, and to protect my scull from puncture wounds and light impact fractures. I could get the same level of protection from a leather pudding bowl but those are a bit old hat. I don't expect it to save my life.

Body armour? Non. Below the neck, i am happy to take the risk of grazes, cuts and at worst, a fracture. Cycling isn't utterly risk free and i couldn't remove all of the risks if i tried. My PPE is about risk management rather than aversion. Above the neck, the risk of an injury being significant increases.

FOr the dark, I wear a flashing head lamp and a hi vis cycling jacket and have lights front and back.
During daytime, i avoid wearing dark or block colours and if in traffic, have my lights on flash mode.

So no, you can't remove all risk and you can't eliminate any potential for injury when cycling but you can take some very easy and simple measures when cycling to reduce either. Thats a good thing no?


But avoids the entire problem.

The entire problem is motorists not looking, not seeing, not reacting appropriately and driving carelessly

The negative is when a driver causes an accident we hand them a free "get out of jail card" to excuse their negligence




A neighbour of mine was run down by a truck while driving towards a low setting sun. The truck tried to do a runner but was chased down by a good Samaritan.

The neighbour now has extensive brain damage and needs 24hr care. Fortunately he was able to claim from the driver's insurance.

Sure, it wasn't his fault. But that is not going to help him now

However, I am sure that if he had been wearing hi-viz, he might have been seen.

If he wasn't wearing a helmet, he would have likely died.

I always wear hi-viz and a helmet, because I do not trust the majority of motorists and if anything happens, would not like have to think 'what if'.

However, I passionately believe they should not be compulsory - personal choice.

But the world is what it is and not what it should be.
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mjr
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by mjr »

Sorry to read about your neighbour but both of your claims are unlikely in general. Dressing in yellow and white doesn't normally make anyone easier to see against a low yellow sun and helmets don't normally protect against trucks.
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[XAP]Bob
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Re: Why wear black?

Post by [XAP]Bob »

krull wrote:
Cunobelin wrote:
BlueRider wrote:
I wear a helmet made to a EN std. I have no idea if that is good or bad, nor do i care. I don't wear a helmet to protect me from getting flattened by the #192 bus, i wear a helemt to stop cuts and lascerations to me should i fall off, and to protect my scull from puncture wounds and light impact fractures. I could get the same level of protection from a leather pudding bowl but those are a bit old hat. I don't expect it to save my life.

Body armour? Non. Below the neck, i am happy to take the risk of grazes, cuts and at worst, a fracture. Cycling isn't utterly risk free and i couldn't remove all of the risks if i tried. My PPE is about risk management rather than aversion. Above the neck, the risk of an injury being significant increases.

FOr the dark, I wear a flashing head lamp and a hi vis cycling jacket and have lights front and back.
During daytime, i avoid wearing dark or block colours and if in traffic, have my lights on flash mode.

So no, you can't remove all risk and you can't eliminate any potential for injury when cycling but you can take some very easy and simple measures when cycling to reduce either. Thats a good thing no?


But avoids the entire problem.

The entire problem is motorists not looking, not seeing, not reacting appropriately and driving carelessly

The negative is when a driver causes an accident we hand them a free "get out of jail card" to excuse their negligence




A neighbour of mine was run down by a truck while driving towards a low setting sun. The truck tried to do a runner but was chased down by a good Samaritan.

The neighbour now has extensive brain damage and needs 24hr care. Fortunately he was able to claim from the driver's insurance.

Sure, it wasn't his fault. But that is not going to help him now

However, I am sure that if he had been wearing hi-viz, he might have been seen.

If he wasn't wearing a helmet, he would have likely died.

I always wear hi-viz and a helmet, because I do not trust the majority of motorists and if anything happens, would not like have to think 'what if'.

However, I passionately believe they should not be compulsory - personal choice.

But the world is what it is and not what it should be.


Your evidence for either assertion?

Driving towards the sun is surely the least effective position for high vis, and I assume you’ve not recreated the incident to see what would happen, not have you inspected the actual magic hat.

It is, of course, possible that the hat absorbed some energy and reduced the severity of the injury - but it won’t have done so by much, that’s not what they are designed for.
A shortcut has to be a challenge, otherwise it would just be the way. No situation is so dire that panic cannot make it worse.
There are two kinds of people in this world: those can extrapolate from incomplete data.
tim-b
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by tim-b »

Hi
It is, of course, possible that the hat absorbed some energy and reduced the severity of the injury - but it won’t have done so by much, that’s not what they are designed for.

Reduced the severity of the injury enough to save a life will do for me
However, I passionately believe they should not be compulsory - personal choice.

+1
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tim-b
~~~~¯\(ツ)/¯~~~~
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pjclinch
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by pjclinch »

tim-b wrote:Hi
It is, of course, possible that the hat absorbed some energy and reduced the severity of the injury - but it won’t have done so by much, that’s not what they are designed for.

Reduced the severity of the injury enough to save a life will do for me
However, I passionately believe they should not be compulsory - personal choice.

+1


This is a popular notional mechanism, but there's no clear evidence it happens at a detectable level: deaths and serious injuries do not clearly change in a way that can be attributed to increased helmet wearing, which they should if there were many cases of a lid making just enough difference before they failed.

Also, bearing in mind that trips and falls kill people from head injuries, and car crashes kill people from head injuries, we again come around to why is it "obvious" to apply such a "well it might make a crucial difference!" to falls from bikes but not falls from feet and car crashes where a lid might make a similar difference? And the answer is almost certainly down to culture: people think cycle helmets are important because so many people wear them, so they wear them too. That makes them important... and so on. The logic applies to walking and driving too, but the culture doesn't. The culture trumps the logic.

Pete.
Often seen riding a bike around Dundee...
tim-b
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by tim-b »

Hi
snip...but there's no clear evidence it happens at a detectable level...

A statistically insignificant level of one life saved is an improvement
Regards
tim-b
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fastpedaller
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by fastpedaller »

tim-b wrote:Hi
snip...but there's no clear evidence it happens at a detectable level...

A statistically insignificant level of one life saved is an improvement
Regards
tim-b

Except there is none
Oldjohnw
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Re: helmets from Why wear black?

Post by Oldjohnw »

25 pages and some still think you should wear a helmet and some still think you should not.
John
irc
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Re: Why wear black?

Post by irc »

krull wrote:A neighbour of mine was run down by a truck while driving towards a low setting sun.


The problem there was the low setting sun. I doubt a bit of pastic and foam will make much difference when hit by several tons of truck.

I deal with riding into a low setting sun by avoiding it. On tour I might start early or late. On rare occassions with little choice I have been watching my mirror and been ready to ride off the road to avoid being hit.

On this day on tour I set off early into a rising sun to avoid extreme heat later. But there was little traffic, a smooth wide shoulder, and I still watched overtaking traffic in my mirror.

Surviving being hit by a truck while going into low sun is not a reason to wear a helmet.


sun.jpg
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