...

I would think the tunnel vision effect would be reason enough not to use them
and the resolution of the display is marginal for trail trash and holes. You would be blinded by
any head or street lights and bloom would be a problem in the city. Maybe useful
on completely dead country roads or wide urban trails that are paved? Steve

forget functionality... I'm getting a neckache just thinking about wearing 'em for a couple of hours.

Aren't they a great deal heavier than a helmet lamp?

I don't think night vision goggles are fast enough plus you the perspective's all messed up.

NVG's totally throw off your depth perception riding with them would be a really bad idea. Along with being blinded by any lights that you may pass as mentioned earlier. Then again if you like sliding on your face at night, sounds like a plan.

just get a bright headlight....

P---T does it again with the simple solution. Yay!

He's right. Do a search of these forums. There are several useful links, but you should do the work rather than me. The English seem to have a good handle on lighting on trails.

With my 12W HID with a 4 hour run time for under 300 bucks...I don't think you're going to find a better, cheaper solution. A good set of goggles can run well over the 1k mark.

U.S. Army helicopter pilots fly with them at night, nap of the earth. Like looking through a couple of paper towel tubes. Just get a bright light.

I suppose you could use IR lights in conjunction with NV, but it isn't going to save you from flaring whenever you see another directional (or even a significant omni) light source. For riding, I wouldn't want anything less than Gen 2 because even Gen 1+ can miss you some serious detail that I just wouldn't want to miss off-road. Of course you'd need a conventional visible-spectrum light in case either of your devices failed; very likely one would fail if you fell (and guess which one).

So unless you already have an AN-PVS 7D kickin around and wanna use em more often, I'd suggest going with HID or something like that.

Helicopters also fly relatively far from the terrain even though it's along the contour. When you're mountain biking, you need to judge distances down to inches where your perspective changes at hundreds of degrees per second. Helicopters fly far enough above the ground that 2 inches over to the left means flying off the log.
Avionics systems also take care of a lot of the details for the pilot since the images are coming off optics the size of my head to a display on my head rather than some entire system that rests on my head.
I've tried night vision when playing paintball at night and if I turned my head too fast, the response time plus the perspective made me want to puke.

[Avionics systems also take care of a lot of the details for the pilot since the images are coming off optics the size of my head to a display on my head rather than some entire system that rests on my head.]

You are partially right, but mostly wrong. I am former Apache pilot withover 3000 hours in helicopters. The Apache uses an Infrared system that is built into the heilcopter. It basically has an IR television camera on the nose that displays it's image onto a small TV screen in front of your right eye. This system is totally different from NVGs in that it doesn't rely on ambient light, but uses the diffeences in heat of the objects you are viewing. That can be good or bad depending on conditions.

All other helicopters rely on NVGs for seeing through the night. I won't argue which is more critical: flying 140 knots at 20-50 feet above the desert or riding your bike through the woods. At least if you crash and burn on the bike you won't have 15000 pounds of burning metal and fuel on you arse.

Sorry for the long post.

Actually, that's what I said. The optics are on the plane and displayed on a unit on your head vs. the stand alone units these guys are talking about. Flying is one thing, optical physics is another. There is no physical way that you're going to get the same response and resolution from an 6+ inch lens (which is what I'm assuming is on the optics on your apache) vs. a 1/2" lens mounted on your head.

You must be a pretty good pilot flying 140 knots at 30ft above the ground. Unless you mean water? Cause my friends in the airforce (not army, maybe you guys do things differently) say helicoptor or not, the only time when they fly 30ft at 70-80% of their aircraft's max speed is either over flat ground or open waters, anytime they saw forest, they go up to 3-400ft, anything lower would be suicidal. But believe me, anything that this guy could afford to wear on his bike would probably not be able to respond to changes like a quick look to the right and left (180 degrees/sec or so). The apache's FLIR and tracking eletronics that display images to your HUD can't even respond that fast. Though I'm no apache pilot, simple physics says bombing down single trails at speed in the dark requires faster changes in direction than a couple thousand pounds of apache that rely on aerodynamics.

Anyway, point being, I seriously wouldn't recommend night vision on a bike unless you're going to be going down a paved road.

Hmm... he said desert, which if it's really sandy would probably be nice smooth dunes, and not much in the way of vegitation.

Unless it's one of those weird deserts with lots of trees...

Mmmm... smoooooth... You could probably fly low enough to scoop up sand.

Can you imagine biking with one of THESE strapped to your helmet?


Have you considered your image:

Helos do things differently than fixed wing aircraft. Tactical jet pilots use NVGs also. Stand alone systems mounted on their helmets. Not attached to the jet in any way. They're used to fly in low level flight; 500' above the ground at 500 MPH sometimes.

Riding a bike with them? I wouldn't want to. I've used them and besides being heavy, they are 2D. They have no depth. You have to be trained to try to learn how to pick out clues to get some perception and even then, those clues aren't always even there. Also, they don't turn night into day. They amplify existing light, so if it's pitch dark - say, a moonless night in thick woods - you're not going to get anything out of the goggles.

Finally, at least on the ones I used, bright lights won't blind you. That's a Hollywoodism. They'll either shut down or the screen will turn bright green. Remember, you're not looking directly at the light, you're looking at an image of what the collecter sees and is projecting to your display. So - brigh lights won't blind you. But, if you're looking through the goggles and they shut down, same basic effect, I guess.

I'd say, get a light.

Hmm... Get me some leather motorcycle gear and some blinky lights and computer pieces and tubes sticking out of me head and I could be a borg biker!

And since I'd be riding at night, I'd look more like this. Except that I'd be on a track bike. I'd be a lot more worried about being seen looking like that guy, with or without the goggles.

Being in the army reserve, I've had the opportunity to run around the forest with NVG's and must say that it was damn hard not to fall on my butt. Riding a bike through the forest I would imagine to be a bit more difficult.

Yeah, a bit more difficult:

Don't forget to wrap yourself in bubble wrap first.