Is it time for a helmet?

For all discussions about this "lively" subject. All topics that are substantially about helmet usage will be moved here.
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NATURAL ANKLING
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by NATURAL ANKLING »

Hi,
Jdsk wrote:
NATURAL ANKLING wrote:We must bear in mind that any other person has no control on how you end up (assuming that no other road user is involved) when and if and how you come to injury.

How can you assume that in a discussion of cycle helmets for use on roads?

Jonathan

One minute we are discussing wearing a cycle helmet for cycling, next we are on to needing one to get out of bed with out banging your head.
Thats where these discussions always end up.

One discussion - will a helmet protect you if you fall off........just fall off.
Two, discussion - will a helmet protect you from getting steam rollered by an artic from behind................nothing will.

Then their is peer pressure......
NA Thinks Just End 2 End Return + Bivvy - Some day Soon I hope
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Jdsk
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by Jdsk »

NATURAL ANKLING wrote:One discussion - will a helmet protect you if you fall off........just fall off.
Two, discussion - will a helmet protect you from getting steam rollered by an artic from behind................nothing will.

But a major cause of falling off is the actions of other road users. That doesn't always involve being steamrollered.

Jonathan
Steady rider
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by Steady rider »

https://icycleweather.wixsite.com/iceandcycling/5-2-1-1

look like about 70% of admissions are due to falls?
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pjclinch
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by pjclinch »

NATURAL ANKLING wrote:Hi,
A jet downed today over the Lizard Cornwall.

Both crew jettisoned and are not badly hurt....alive.

This is how safety gear works. ( yes I know that you could also be killed using such).

In the end its down to the individual when and were to use equipment, its your life.


An ejector seat which is designed to prevent a certain-death impact at hundreds of miles an hour with additional bonus fireball quite likely is in a rather different frame or reference to a light item designed to mitigate minor injuries that covers some, but not all, of the head.

People do over-think cycle helmets and attribute far more to them than their track record warrants. The design is such that you can reasonably expect it to save you a nasty headache, assuming you hit a protected bit. That's arguably worth doing, but it's not the same as saving one's life.

The last time I fell off a bike and hit my head was about 2003 (Brompton small wheels partly to blame, me not paying attention mostly to blame, hit a savage speed bump while daydreaming). I was wearing a helmet but as I took it on the chin it didn't do me any good. My jaw did not shatter in to 1,000 pieces and kill me. I did go to A&E so they could decide if it needed a stitch (they decided no). Had I gone a bit further over I'd probably have been glad of the helmet and the whole episode would have hurt less, but I very, very probably wouldn't have been much worse off without it than taking it on the chin as I did. But it quite possibly would have cracked the helmet, and people would look at the crack and tell me it saved my life or at least a fractured skull etc. Confirmation bias in action.

Pete.
Often seen riding a bike around Dundee...
thirdcrank
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by thirdcrank »

Ejector seats don't seem to have much relevance here at all. Apart from anything else they are compulsory, in that RAF fighter plane aircrew don't have a choice over whether their aircraft is fitted with them. There is a personal decision about whether or not to eject. In earlier helmet debates, the fact of RAF aircrew almost universally wearing helmets has been used as evidence for the common sense case for helmets.

Incorrectly handled, ejector seats can be very dangerous. My training from long ago includes how to make an ejector seat safe. So, in the unlikely event that I am first on the scene of a crashed fighter which is not immediately destroyed by fire / explosion, I know how to rescue unconscious aircrew without blowing us both a couple of hundred feet into the air. Whether to give first aid in situ or risk causing further injury by moving them away from the risk of fire / explosion is a decision to be made at the time. FWIW, I have some basic fire-fighting training, but it involves a stirrup pump and a bucket of water.
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NATURAL ANKLING
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by NATURAL ANKLING »

Hi,
Jdsk wrote:
NATURAL ANKLING wrote:One discussion - will a helmet protect you if you fall off........just fall off.
Two, discussion - will a helmet protect you from getting steam rollered by an artic from behind................nothing will.

But a major cause of falling off is the actions of other road users. That doesn't always involve being steamrollered.

Jonathan

You are correct there in the last statement.
I'm not sure if any study has ever divided falling off/being knocked off on head injuries.
I'd be more interested in seeing the difference between wearing and not wearing a helmet in simply head injuries alone.
So all head injuries without a helmet.
Against all knocks and injuries with a helmet to the head only of course.
Forget all other injuries to the body.
There are plenty of theories on having more head knocks Wearing a helmet.
But on a personal level for me I think that with head knocks alone You will be far better off wearing a helmet, I base this on damaging two helmets in the last two years and suffering mild concussion on both occasions.

The reason I said earlier about individuals making their own decision is simply because, different individuals simply have different ways they operate and attitude plays a large part here.
some of us who have cycled with people in groups to find that one or two individuals think they're on some sort of stock car race.
Fortunately I was in the right place at the right time on one outing couple of hundred riders and someone who is renowned for being a bit reckless managed to fall off the bike, they took off several other riders and two of them had to go to hospital, the culprit of course escaped any serious damage.
This sort of thing used to happen sometimes when I was greenlining on motorcycles, fortunately neither of us ever came to grief, with exception of one Particula day someone had a good idea to play motofootball, My brother broke his wrist going over the handlebars.
NA Thinks Just End 2 End Return + Bivvy - Some day Soon I hope
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Please forgive the poor Grammar I blame it on my mobile and phat thinkers.
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pjclinch
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by pjclinch »

NATURAL ANKLING wrote:The reason I said earlier about individuals making their own decision is simply because, different individuals simply have different ways they operate and attitude plays a large part here.


There is this, and there is also that the research is sufficiently vague on actual benefit to make anything more than a personal choice something beyond what is reasonable (not that that stops the DfT...)
Tim Gill's "Cycling and Children and Young People" report for a children's charity is an interesting illustration of this. In the Annex on cycle helmets he draws a clear distinction between a personal decision and a formal policy conclusion (he said he wore a helmet himself, acknowledged it was mainly about "what if" gut feelings, but the report conclusion was that the case for requiring or recommending helmets had not been conclusively made).

Pete.
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Steady rider
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by Steady rider »

http://www.cycle-helmets.com/cyclingreport_timgill.pdf
Summary
1.10 Conclusions
There is widespread agreement about the benefits of cycling for children and
young people. There are clear drivers for action from the health, environmental,
transport, sustainability and child policy arenas. Yet the level of activity remains
modest, patchy and narrowly focused.
The formation of Cycling England is a good opportunity for NCB and others
advocating for children to start a dialogue that could lead to advances for both
the cycling movement and for children and young people’s happiness, health
and well-being. The lack of dialogue or collaboration between the cycling and
children’s sectors is a missed opportunity. There is potential for engagement
and collaboration on the following issues:
• making the built environment cycle-friendly and child-friendly
• promoting cycling for fun and as a sport, and for journeys other than the
school trip, including social and leisure destinations
• cycling in parks and open spaces
• cycling and social inclusion
• gender differences and promoting cycling for girls
• cycling as a lifetime travel mode: how childhood experience influences
adult attitudes and choices.
Safety is the only contested territory. This paper argues that cycling is
comparatively safe even for children and young people, and the annex to this
paper argues that the case has not yet been convincingly made for the
compulsory use or promotion of cycle helmets. Whether or not these
conclusions are accepted, there is clearly a need for a consensus on the wider
question of responsibility for cycle safety
.

do we agree?
IanH
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by IanH »

I wear a helmet as my wife asks me to! Simple really. I have bigger fish to fry!
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RickH
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by RickH »

An alternative to "pothole proof" your cycling, or at least make it more pothole resistant, could be something like the Big Apple Brompton conversion from Kinetics (example, albeit with Rohloff & belt drive too), giving you the possibility of 2" tyres.
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by Steady rider »

The wheel size looks to be about 13 inch, assuming the pothole is 3 inch deep, the wheel will impact the far side and pivot about the rim in most cases, lifting the front end by 3 inch, in an horizontal distance of about 8 inch? Depending on travel speed, say 12 mph or 20 km hr, high g ( relatively) forces could occur. Larger wheels lower g forces on impact. The 2 inch tyres would help a little. Wearing a helmet could add extra forces - making balance and control slightly more difficult.

I have not seen in the past 50 years, minor roads in the UK in such a poor state of repair. They are worse now than in the 1960s.
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531colin
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by 531colin »

Steady rider wrote:https://icycleweather.wixsite.com/iceandcycling/5-2-1-1

look like about 70% of admissions are due to falls?


I don't usually look at this section, but section 2.2 of this report says
"Non-collision cycling incidents (NCI's) are the leading cause of serious travel and transport related injury in England.

Thats absolute nonsense, isn't it?
Motor vehicle "accidents" are the biggest cause, surely?
Jdsk
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by Jdsk »

531colin wrote:
Steady rider wrote:https://icycleweather.wixsite.com/iceandcycling/5-2-1-1

look like about 70% of admissions are due to falls?


I don't usually look at this section, but section 2.2 of this report says
"Non-collision cycling incidents (NCI's) are the leading cause of serious travel and transport related injury in England.

Thats absolute nonsense, isn't it?
Motor vehicle "accidents" are the biggest cause, surely?

It's really hard to know what this paper is. It doesn't have any contact details beyond a name and "NHS Bristol", it's listed as "5.2.1.1" but I can't work out of what it is a part, and the link above is to a single-issue site whose contact details say "This page not yet operational". The method of literature review isn't described and the references are a mess.

Jonathan
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531colin
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by 531colin »

Just another bit of gratuitous cyclist-bashing, then.
Jdsk
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Re: Is it time for a helmet?

Post by Jdsk »

I didn't read it that way. More as advocating improved infrastructure.

Jonathan
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