The CycleChat Helmet Debate Thread

[Racing roadkill]

Sorry but I'm confused. I understand you've had a close call and didn't die or suffer serious injury - but were you wearing a helmet? Or not?

I've had plenty of incidents of debris hitting me on many occasions, some with lid, some without lid, It's particularly bad wherever the route uses a main road with heavy traffic on it, hence the reason I never ride these types of routes without a lid now.

 

[Racing roadkill]

I read McWobble's post as saying "If you're on an inherently unstable bicycle and get hit by that level of impact, it won't matter whether or not you were wearing a helmet"

Well I can vouch, from experience, that it's very different with and without a lid. The ability to see in single vision, without obstruction from lachrymation, isn't to be understated.

 

[glasgowcyclist]

I've had plenty of incidents of debris hitting me on many occasions, some with lid, some without lid, It's particularly bad wherever the route uses a main road with heavy traffic on it, hence the reason I never ride these types of routes without a lid now.

I'm surprised you're not in full body armour!

In roughly 45 years of cycling I've never been hit by flying debris (unless you count that milkshake tossed at me from a passing car a few years back). Am I just very lucky, or are you very unlucky?

 

[martint235]

Well I can vouch, from experience, that it's very different with and without a lid. The ability to see in single vision, without obstruction from lachrymation, isn't to be understated.

I'm still going to stick with @McWobble science bit though. He can be a lazy git who only gets out of bed at lunchtime but he's quite good at science. Coincidentally science is what tends to be missing from helmet threads often in favour of personal anecdotes.

 

[ianrauk]

I'm surprised you're not in full body armour!

In roughly 45 years of cycling I've never been hit by flying debris (unless you count that milkshake tossed at me from a passing car a few years back). Am I just very lucky, or are you very unlucky?

Me too.. I do find it very strange. The worse I have had was an acorn falling on to my nugget (that hurt). Apart from that, of the many thousands of miles I do in a year, over the many years, nothing.

 

[jefmcg]

If I remember correctly, the underreporting is overwhelmingly skewed towards single-vehicle and minor injuries appearing in HES but missing from STATS19. The police reports cover almost all fatalities and most serious injuries. How much do we care about the effect of helmets on minor injuries anyway? You can trap your finger in part of a bike and it'll often show up in HES as a minor cycling injury - it seems like it introduces a lot of noise and I feel I've seen HES cycling figures used to mislead more than illuminate.

(Hounslow) Police attended my single vehicle bike accident, but didn't record it as there wasn't a car involved. I much later checked the statistics and found that yes, accidents involving only bikes should be recorded.

If police don't think they have to record them, that would skew the numbers.

Note: I used "accident" above, because the only collision was my body hitting the road

 

[martint235]

Me too.. I do find it very strange. The worse I have had was an acorn falling on to my nugget (that hurt). Apart from that, of the many thousands of miles I do in a year, over the many years, nothing.

Back in the day when I wore a helmet, I did have a wasp get trapped between the helmet and my head. It very quickly became a very unhappy wasp and that hurt a lot.

 

[mjr]

Note: I used "accident" above, because the only collision was my body hitting the road

I'll let you off this time. Apologies if I should remember and hope you've recovered and hope the bike was OK but what was the severity of the injuries? I assume not killed but serious or slight?

 

[ufkacbln]

I'm still trying to figure out how something is flung forward by a vehicle coming in the opposite direction...

It is the most common event

Vehicle fenders and bonnets are fairly low.

If the cyclist (or pedestrian) is impacted, the cycle or lower limbs are pushed in the direction of the vehicle, backward compared with the direction of the cyclist

As a result the upper portion continues forward in relation to the cyclists motion

As illustrated here:



It is the reason why so many cyclists go onto or over the bonnet

 

[Wobblers]

Not really 'suppositions', I've actually found out the hard way what happens when you get a fist sized lump of debris in an unhelmeted forehead, with a truck in close vicinity. I managed to avoid going under the wheels, but it was close, I don't recommend it.

A fist sized lump of debris???

Come on, that'll weigh a good 250-500 grams. To have enough kinetic energy to hit someone on the head, it'll be travelling at 10+ m/s, if flicked up by the wheels. That has enough momentum to have you off, helmet or not. Not that anything like that is at all likely to be flicked up by the wheels. If you're now going to say it fell off the truck, well, it'll have the truck's velocity.... plus that which it's gaining through gravitational acceleration. So that's even more momentum.

I read McWobble's post as saying "If you're on an inherently unstable bicycle and get hit by that level of impact, it won't matter whether or not you were wearing a helmet"

Exactly this. A bicycle is an inherently unstable vehicle. It only stays upright through the inputs of thte rider. The momentum of a "fist sized" object alone is enough to cause an off. This of course is before we conside rthe natural instinct of anyone is to unthinkingly try to protect their head - which of course is massively destabilising too...

This doesn't make any sense from a biomechanical, dynamics or mechanics point of view.

(PS, @martint235, I work for a private company, not the government so unlike you, I actually am expected to do work. You tall nobber )

 

[jefmcg]

I'll let you off this time. Apologies if I should remember and hope you've recovered and hope the bike was OK but what was the severity of the injuries? I assume not killed but serious or slight?

I was a KSI.

Year, so not killed, obviously. A broken clavicle and head injury that didn't reach my A&E diagnostic threshold for concussion*. For recovery, not really. They treat clavicle conservatively as 90% heal themselves. I turned out to be in the 10%, but the repair surgery seemed worse than my current state (4 or 6 hours, massive risk of complication, a ton of metal inserted, second incision at hip for living bone etc etc) so I decided to leave it. The only thing I can't do is prolonged cycling over cobbles, so that rules out the Tour of Flanders for me. Phew!


*No unconsciousness, except for a second when I hit the road, and no vomiting but close. West Middlesex requires unconsciousness or vomiting for a diagnosis of concussion.

 

[glasgowcyclist]

I'm still trying to figure out how something is flung forward by a vehicle coming in the opposite direction...

To be fair, it's possible that debris can be flicked upward & outward by a vehicle travelling the opposite way and a cyclist ride into it as it flies through the air.

 

[glasgowcyclist]

And in other (welcome!) news, Bosnia has repealed its mandatory helmet law for all cyclists.

Campaigner Tihomir Dakic said: "This returns the focus from reducing the consequences of crashes, to minimising the causes of traffic crashes. Cycling has been incorrectly presented as a dangerous activity. In fact, the health benefits of the daily use of the bicycle outweigh the traffic risks by around twenty-to-one."

 

[broadway]

And in other (welcome!) news, Bosnia has repealed its mandatory helmet law for all cyclists.

Campaigner Tihomir Dakic said: "This returns the focus from reducing the consequences of crashes, to minimising the causes of traffic crashes. Cycling has been incorrectly presented as a dangerous activity. In fact, the health benefits of the daily use of the bicycle outweigh the traffic risks by around twenty-to-one."

Best comment:

I had moderately fast fall two winters ago, when my front wheel washed out on a patch of black ice - I came down fairly heavily on my left shoulder. I'm very lucky that I wasn't wearing a helmet as the extra mass and radius would definitely have made me strike my head as well, which would definitely have left me with concussion at the very least but more likely a serious brain bleed, as well as a serious, possibly fatal, neck injury[*].

I don't think they should be banned but I don't understand anyone riding a bike on the road while wearing a helmet[*].

[*: Warning: Post may contain hyperbole and unsubstantiated assumptions presented as fact. Not to be used in a rational argument. Suitable for internet use.]

 

[Bollo]

Cycle Helmets have just made it back into the basket of goods used by the ONS to measure inflation. So has gin.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/mar/14/uk-inflation-ons-basket-goods-gin-cycling-helmets