http://www.bhsi.org/stdcomp.htm#CERTIFICATION seems pretty comprehensive and objective.

Also note that according to http://www.standards.org.au/ "Standards Australia is a not-for-profit organization..." which is comforting.

Thanks Allister. After perusing the standards, it looks like Snell is still the one to beat. I did not realize it but some of these standards are met through "self testing" and all it takes to leagally stick a sticker on the helmet is for the company to certify they did the testing or had it done for them. Hardly reassuring.

Well, I also realized that if you don't wear a helmet and you hit yourself on the side, your head might cock somewhere extremely quickly, and could result in a neck injury. With a full face, not only will the helmet reduce the impact (saw a demonstration, this guy used a hammer, on a guy with a cusion on his stomach then a board on top of it and because of the hard-soft combo, the force wasn't too much. Same with helmets: fibreglass with foam) but it might also stop the head earlier before hitting the ground, thus suffering a less accelerated whiplash.

Quite honestly, that's what I don't get. Which part of: in 23 years I've managed to hit my head exactly ONCE off the bike. But in the past year alone, I've managed to hit my head twice when I endo'ed. So why do you keep assuming that I see this as a phantom risk? Don't you get? I'm not making an assesment of YOUR overall risk, which is why I'd prefer it if you didn't wear a helmet, since you feel you don't need one. I'm making an accessment of MY overall risk.

So 23 years of everything else: 1
A single year of riding: 2

If you don't see that as a sign that a) I would've been brain dead twice and b) I need a helmet, then you're missing some really really obvious clues there.

And you're making the assumption that you're just as likely to injure your head in a car and on a bike. But in a car, you're surrounded by a metal cage, the deceleration is much smaller than that if you fell off your bike and on your head. And that's the other thing I don't understand, why can't you make an overall assessment of your situation and decide for yourself? I feel that any force generally great enough to damage my head after the structure of the car fails would generally kill me through internal organ/neck/or spine failure. But I also feel that on a bike, that failure would go straight to my head in a lot more situations, which is why I make the decision for myself to wear a helmet.

I don't hear a lot of "if i had a helmet when I crashed in my car, it would've saved my head", "if i had a helmet when i slipped in the shower, it would've saved my head", etc etc stories. Do you? But I do hear a helluva lot of people saying, "I crash twice every single year and would've been a braindead ****** reborn 4-5 times" stories. I went through that just as everyone else did, so I choose to wear a helmet. Why are you asking us to provide you with motivation to raise your own risk assessment so you can wear one? Obviously you're so lucky and have such great cat like reflexes on your bike that a head injury isn't of concern to you, so why do you want us to tell you to wear a helmet? I'm telling you, don't wear a helmet, it's less weight on your head, it doesn't ruin your hair, and it's not as sweaty.

It's kind of like this, if someone comes up to me and says, why should I wear a condom if I know all the girls and I probably won't catch anything? I'd say, "you're right, you shouldn't wear a condom."

I don't know if a viscoelastic material can absorb that much energy. It's the expanding back portion that's a problem.

slvoid,

nothing personal means I'm not asking about your or my individuals experience. I'm looking for many more experiences (like all the hospital records for a 1000 admissions, say) and how many times everyone hit their head while they were doing whatever activity so we can make an objective judgement about relative risk. Something like, 10% of motorists were admitted to hospital with head injuries and 10% of cyclists were admitted admitted to hospital with head injuries.

If we don't hear something like, If i had a helmet when I slipped on the stairs, it would've saved my head, it's because we feel walking up the stairs is a relatively risk free thing to do, which is what I'm looking for to prove that cycling is full of enough risk that I'm going to fall on my head.

If you're falling on your head with frequency, I certainly understand your point of view, but that doesn't mean that everybody does the same. After all, I've often used the example of areas in the world were there are the lowest levels of head injuries foe cyclists, yet almost no one wears a helmet. I'm old enough to remember that no one here ever wore a helmet here either and there was no difference in head injuries amongst cyclists.

If there is no eveidence of elevation or head hitting to cyclists I believe this fear of hitting the head on a bike is a manafactured fear not based in reality.

so in other words you're not interested in facts or statistics, just that "you don't think it happens that often"... Good basis for opinion. Sounds kinda anecdotal.

CL

are you asking me? if you are can't you see I'm asking for verifiable information and not anecdotal information? I see lots of anecdotal info here and no verifiable studies that show cyclists have more head injuries than any one else.

Can anyone show me cyclists eat more pie than anyone else?

why do we put whicream on pie when so many more eat their pies when they are not on bikes?

are crust breakages to others any less severe that they need not take precautions and use pie tins?

If one puts on a pie tin in a car, why do they not box the pie as well?


ok...back to seriousness...

It's a 2-wheeled vehicle....motorcyclists also have to worry about helmets.

why do motorcyclists wear helmets, answer that.

context is needed for tis question.

because they are inside a giant steel cage, where the chance of hard impact to the cranium is extremely minimal...if you have to ask this, then I have to say stop trolling. You are now comparing pup-tents to skyscrapers....if anything cmopare it to a similar vehicle...a motorcycle or moped...both of which the riders, as a norm, WEAR HELMETS.

Depending on how/where you ride, a helmet can be anything from "useful protection" to "cool looking ornament". Let's face it, in a direct hit to the head at 25 mph a bike helmet will do very little.

Skiers also have these arguments all the time. Skiers helmets are more robust, yet direct impacts at high speeds can be fatal just the same.

I don't wear a ski helmet, but I do wear a bike helmet. The bike helmet is there for protection against minor accidents. Anything beyond that is a risk I have to manage and take responsibility for.

Snell gave manufacturers a choice of seeking several levels of certification, sort of like "acceptable", "good", and "excellent", but the "stickers" were not easy to decode. If Trek wants a Snell sticker in its Vapor II helmet, Trek must pay Snell to test the helmet, and Snell will also being buying Vapor II helmets randomly in stores to make sure the delivered models are as good as the proto-types.

Then, if Trek modifies the Vapor II, Trek must pay Snell to go through the whole process again. The bike industry loves to introduce slightly modified new models every year, making Snell very expensive.

The CPSC deal is more of an "honor" system. Consumers must trust Trek will make sure that each helmet delivered to the stores is within "spec" as set out by the CPSC standard. I personally have a lot of confidence in Trek, and Bell, and some other major companies. But, I would hesitate to buy an "off-brand" helmet trusting only in its CPSC sticker - that sticker by itself does not mean much.

Yeah, that is what I got out of the link. But it does seem that since Snell does follow up to insure their standards, their stamp would carry the most weight. Expensive, probably. Should we rely on manufacturers to self-police. I wonder. The only thing I can do is sell helmets with a history of reliability. That is one reason, I strongly advise people to spend more for a helmet than less. The cheap ones I have brought in (under $20), I would not put on my dog. So, they sit and gather dust. I do use them to sell folks up to a better helmet. But usually it is a matter of style and then fit that are the deciding factors.

context is needed because just as many motorists have head injuries as cyclists (prove me wrong) despite the steel cage and if trolling means putting risks into context, I guess I'm guilty.

Is this on a per mile basis? per rider? per sheer mass? (Prove you right?)
That's kind of like saying, 50 tons of plutonium is dangerous. Sure it's dangerous when you're encased in it. 50 tons spread through the solar system in similar concentration is probably safer than the snapple I'm having.

[QUOTE=slvoid]Is this on a per mile basis? per rider? per sheer mass? (Prove you right?)

like I said before, an objective judgement about relative risk. Something like, 10% of motorists were admitted to hospital with head injuries and 10% of cyclists were admitted admitted to hospital with head injuries.

Look it up. I found most activities have a similar rate, just under 10% with small variations. I could be wrong.

All these head trama stories are terrible, but head trama happens to everyone and not just on bikes or more often on bikes. Wear a helmet if you want, fine, just don't say you're not going to have a head injury that could have been prevented by a helmet when you get off the bike.

Goes to show how much you understand about what you read. Besides, how can you comment on what I post when you have me on your ignore list? And I still don't see how you can understand an issue if you block any arguments that differ from your own.

So I can't state a fact that I've only hit my head once in 23 years and yet endo'ed twice in 1 year on the bike and would be a vegetable if I didn't wear a helmet? I never said I'm not going to have a head injury when I'm off the bike did I?
Why do you keep choosing to distort my life as I live it?
What if I say, you were born with severely deformed genitals? Would that be true? What if I say you've never had a paper cut, is that true?
I keep telling you, and that's the point that you don't get, is go ahead a bike without a helmet, afterall, you don't drive with a helmet. You keep asking people to convince you to wear a helmet and I keep telling you not to wear one, I can't see where the confusion is if I'm agreeing with you.

I wear a helmet 24/7, just incase you know ;)

It seems to me a lot of people are jealous of my ability to decide for myself that I want to wear a helmet while I'm on my bike.
It also seems to me that these people are also jealous of my ability to talk to people about my experiences in life.

Can someone explain the "convince me to wear a helmet" arguments?

sure you can


no you didn't


I haven't

How did you know?



you could ask



no, I got that


no, I asked for eveidence of elevated risk. That's not the same thing.


why would you do that?


the confusion comes from you not understanding a simple point of questioning

A helmet is an expensive fashion accessory. Many cyclists believe helmets lend prestige to them, as a sign of the dangerous things they do. That's why there's such hostility directed at people who wonder what the big deal is about helmets. It's as if you're telling the other cyclists that they're not really daredevils after all.

As to all the stories about lives saved with helmets, well, what can you say? The internet is a strange place. It's where fifty-year old men cruise comfortably on their recumbents at 30 mph. It's where guys add 3mph to their riding speeds with aero wheels. And it's where every other poster has his life saved by a helmet once a year.

Road riders don't wear body armor (well, other than helmets, that is). So, where are all the postings about the broken bones, skin grafts, infections, and what not, that should inevitably result from so much unprotected skin? I mean, these people have what would have been fatal collisions with their heads all the time. There must be utter devastation wrought on the other, unprotected parts of their bodies, with all of this spectacular crashing.

I was looking at another non-cycling board, one that is peopled mostly by people in the U.K. The topic of large, wild cats came up. (For those who don't know, it's a common claim in Britain that there are large, wild cats roaming about here and there, undetected by the authorities.) Guess what? About every other person didn't just know about these cats, they had *seen* them-- or, at least, had seen "very unusual" happenings that seemed explicable only by assuming there were panthers about. And a lot of them were in London or Manchester, not just up in Scotland somewhere.

So, if the power of suggestion is strong enough to conjure tigers from the urban darkness of London, it's certainly strong enough for people to imagine their lives were saved by helmets in ordinary spills, spills that statistics tell us couldn't be fatal in anything like the numbers claimed here.

In the U.S., 900 people a year die in cycling collisions. Most of them are children, riding dangerously. A disproportionate number of the rest are riders at night without lights. So, out of fifty million or so adult cyclists riding in daytime, a few hundred every year are killed on their bikes. Compare that to this board, on which the death rate would be 25% or so every few years if we take the helmet scare stories on their face. And this is a board filled with a disproportionate number of expert, fit, experienced adult cyclists with proper equipment.

Helmets are fine. Wear one if you want to. But there's not much more call to do so on a bike than in a car, walking on the sidewalk, in your garage, or in the shower. It's certainly not necessary to do so to ride a bike on a paved road.

Exactly.

I think the confusion is that you can't understand anyone else's point of view other than yours.
You keep saying that for people (which implies me too since i'm a person) who are not on the bike and on the bike, there is NO elevated risk. Meaning the probability of a head injury is the SAME. Which you are implying. If there is no evidence of an elevated risk, would you agree that the probability is the same?
So let's say there's no evidence of an elevated risk, then how do you explain the fact that so many people here have hit their head significantly more on the bike than anywhere else? If we are in fact so accident prone, then perhaps the rest of us should continue wearing helmets and those of you who have never experienced these freak shifts in probability (since you imply that there's no evidence of elevated risk) should just go out without wearing a helmet. Problem solved, your crusade is completed.

Uh.. you don't know how to use the search function do you. There are a LOT of posts about injuries, especially on the mtb thread. So you asked where all the postings are, and they're right here, you just don't bother to read them. So then you'll say, but this is just bikeforums, and that doesn't constitute enough of the population so that doesn't apply. Then we'll drag up evidence that a lot of non-bikeforums people who bike also have lots of injuries and you'll find another excuse to say "so where are all those <insert subject here> now." And the dance continues.
I got scars all over my legs, arms, but curiously not on my hands or head. If you don't think anyone has any injuries like that, you're dreaming.

I see no point in continuing this, tell you what, if any of you have kids, don't get angry if someone tells them not to wear seat belts, not to use a helmet, and not to use a condom, as long as they're careful, nothing would happen to them.