Invisible Helmet Deploys Like an Airbag on Impact

CommanderFrank

Cat Can't Scratch It
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May 9, 2000
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A new concept in biking helmets has hit the markets in Sweden, but it’s really hard to pick them out on the street; they’re invisible. Technically they aren't really invisible, just not seen when not deployed, just like an automobile airbag.
 
the most interesting thing about the video is how much light is needed for a high speed camera to work
 
Or people that ride bikes could just you know....not ride them around cars.......
 
Or people that ride bikes could just you know....not ride them around cars.......

Or just wear a normal helmet instead of one that only pops out after they have been hit. I would think a normal helmet would be more comfortable than some device around your neck.




What I would like to see if what is the impact like around the neck from this device. Also when looking at the this vs a normal helmet which are actually safer.
 
Or people that ride bikes could just you know....not ride them around cars.......

Or assholes whole drive cars could recognize that bikes are a vehicle that have just as much right to be on the road as a car and treat them as another vehicle as is required by law...
 
Or assholes whole drive cars could recognize that bikes are a vehicle that have just as much right to be on the road as a car and treat them as another vehicle as is required by law...

I don't mind treating them like other vehicles, but so many of them suck at following the damn rules them selves. Where I work we have a ton of them, and they are such a pain sometimes :/
 
Interesting that it just protects the head and neck. I'd have thought that covering the back too would be a good idea.
 
Interesting that it just protects the head and neck. I'd have thought that covering the back too would be a good idea.

Crash bike, inflatable street sled is deployed?

Crash bike, inflatable super man cape is deployed?

Crash bike, inflatable teddy bear hugging you from behind?

Start filming the infomercial.
 
Yeah they're "invisible" except for that 4 inch thick black neck brace that the dummy is wearing.

The bulkiness of that probably would cause a greater danger to a bike rider by not being able to turn his head much more so than an airbag helmet will help.
 
I don't mind treating them like other vehicles, but so many of them suck at following the damn rules them selves. Where I work we have a ton of them, and they are such a pain sometimes :/

I'll concede you that one... it really irks me when a doucebag on a bike rides through traffic like they are still an 8 year old riding their BMX on the playground, and I do love it when I (far too rarely) see a cop pull *them* over...

But it still irks me even more when some dumb redneck fails to yield for someone on a bike when they would and should yield to a car in the same situation.

I've run into cars twice because of that... and twice I've forced the drivers to stay until the cops showed up so *they* could get ticketed and also so I could make a claim against their insurance for my $1000+ bike.
 
This thing does look pretty bulky but it's a step in the right direction. It can only get smaller/lighter/better from here.
 
Today, more car drivers die from head injuries than any other blow.

This is why racers wear helmets.

Will car drivers?? No. It makes using a cellphone or putting on makeup too difficult.
 
PS - With no exaggeration, I've put 250,000 miles on motorcycles.

Motorcycles are safe. Car drivers aren't.
 
But it still irks me even more when some dumb redneck fails to yield for someone on a bike when they would and should yield to a car in the same situation.

I've run into cars twice because of that... and twice I've forced the drivers to stay until the cops showed up so *they* could get ticketed and also so I could make a claim against their insurance for my $1000+ bike.

When I'm pedaling in traffic I just assume people never see me. Of course it means that I can never expect the right-of-way, even when I lawfully have it. I often use crosswalk signals - and drivers still ignore that as well.

The problem isn't that drivers aren't courteous to cyclists, its that most drivers aren't courteous to anyone. Here in southern cali at least, people have to fight tooth-and-nail just to merge in traffic sometimes - no one lets you in so you use your vehicle as an obstruction to make room. Drivers are in such a hurry to get places that its everyone for themselves, fuck you get out of my way. I'd say to tighten the requirements to get a license but I think that would only serve to increase the number of unlicensed drivers on the road, in addition to all the ones without any insurance.

I'd like to see dedicated bike trails around here but I think I need to move somewhere less "red."
 
For every idiot on a bike that weaves in and out of traffic there's an idiot in a car not paying attention to the road. Hell, I'm driving a car and I'm scared of those freaking idiots.
People in cars are too busy texting, checking email, playing games or yapping on the phone all too often while people on bikes like to forget about blind spots and frequently stay in them.
I honestly don't see this helping out those crotchrocket assholes who wipe out while doing wheelies at 110mph, the bag is going to pop from friction.
Then again, last time I saw one of those idiots wipe out he left a skid mark over half a mile long and maybe half a corpse after being ground down from friction, a normal helmet doesn't help that either.
Want to fix the problems?
Start passing out murder charges instead of manslaughter to drunks and distracted drivers. Treat people that are caught using their cellphones without hands free units like drunks as far as points go. You get caught texting while driving? You lose your license.
If a phone call is that damn important, use a Bluetooth, it's $20 and it might save a life.
And those idiots doing stunts on bikes?
Same thing. Charge them, take their licenses, take their bikes, refuse medical attention. A couple of people are going to die, but more will learn.
Driving in a car or on a bike is a PRIVILEGE not a RIGHT. That privilege makes your life easier, respect it.
A helmet that doubles as a neckbrace between crashes doesn't fix the problems, people need to get their heads out of their asses, that'll fix the problems.
 
PS - With no exaggeration, I've put 250,000 miles on motorcycles.

Motorcycles are safe. Car drivers aren't.

That isn't how it goes for all cases. I have seen people on motorcycles blow red lights, blow stop signs, cut in and out of traffic, pull out in front of people... There was one guy that was killed in my area 3 years ago because he tried to pass (on the left) a tractor that was turning left. he thought he could get around it faster than it could turn, ended up hitting something sticking off the side and took his head right off.

In some cases they are safer, in others people on them think they are king of the road and should have to obey no laws.

My supervisor teaches classes on motorcycle safety. He has road lots of miles, but he has told me stories of people that he has refused to ride with due to them not being safe riders and thinking they have right of way no matter what.
 
If you've read the novel "Snow Crash", you've already heard about this - it's a novel that takes place in the future, and the main character (the ultra-creatively named "Hero Protagonist"...) rides a motorcycle and in the novel, inflate-during-crash 'helmets' like this are the standard.

Personally, I just wonder about the slow speeds. 20 km/h from the rear? That's only a 12.5 MPH speed difference. I ride on some roads where my speed difference between the cars and me are more like 30-40 MPH. (45 MPH zone, with cars often speeding to 55-60, me going 10-15 MPH because it's uphill.) And the "riding and crashing" with no car involved is only 10 MPH... When going downhill on certain stretches of my commute, I'm going 30 MPH, with 20 MPH common on level ground. (A little over a month ago, I crashed while going "slow" for me, at 15 MPH. Hit a covered-by-new-rain pothole - the crash was remarkably like the first 'no car' crash in the video. Thankfully cars were stopped due to traffic, and while I fell into the car lane right in front of a car, he didn't hit me because he was stopped.)

As for 'cars vs. bikes' - BOTH sides need to treat the other with respect. BOTH sides need to assume the other is going to be good, and maybe be a little annoyed if they're bad - rather than ASSUMING they're going to be bad and treating them like an idiot.

As a daily bicycle commuter, seeing other bike riders ignore traffic laws pisses me off just as much as seeing cars cut me off. MOST bicycle commuters are good, sane, safe riders. You just notice the idiots.

Just as bike commuters have to deal with many cars, but only really notice the idiots.
 
I'd rather have a helmet. Doesn't fail to deploy. This tech is better suited to things that are impractical to wear, like a vest.
 
Or assholes whole drive cars could recognize that bikes are a vehicle that have just as much right to be on the road as a car and treat them as another vehicle as is required by law...

Ahhhh. The good ol' bike terrorist. How about this - stay in the shoulder and off the road? Just cause you spent $300 on ridiculous spandex doesn't make it ok to do your Tour De France training at 20 mph in a 55 mph zone.

I love to ride. Have a nice road bike. Did a 150 mile ride for charity last year. But how about us riding enthusiasts do a better job of not being complete dbags eh?
 
I love to ride. Have a nice road bike. Did a 150 mile ride for charity last year. But how about us riding enthusiasts do a better job of not being complete dbags eh?

He did not come off that way to me.
He made a valid point I think...
 
This thing does look pretty bulky but it's a step in the right direction. It can only get smaller/lighter/better from here.

I can't tell from the video, but can you just sew this into your biker jacket? They already come in thick leather with built in elbow pads, what's keeping them from sewing this into the collar as well?
 
Ahhhh. The good ol' bike terrorist. How about this - stay in the shoulder and off the road? Just cause you spent $300 on ridiculous spandex doesn't make it ok to do your Tour De France training at 20 mph in a 55 mph zone.

I have a carbureted motorcycle. Once I had some of those Tour De Douchebags riding side by side blocking the road in front of me, smugly content that I couldn't do anything about it. But they didn't count that I would sneak past their pack and open the choke a couple feet in front of them. Just stayed there, right in front of their huffing and puffing, sharing the joys of an unregulated emissions system. Not so healthy anymore huh?
 
PS - With no exaggeration, I've put 250,000 miles on motorcycles.

Motorcycles are safe. Car drivers aren't.

So, I've driven cars over a million miles, what's your point?
Both are dangerous, depending on how much of a idiot the driver is. One thing is for certain, car or bike, you either already had an accident, or you are going to.
 
I can't tell from the video, but can you just sew this into your biker jacket? They already come in thick leather with built in elbow pads, what's keeping them from sewing this into the collar as well?

I cam just imagine the thing going off when it's not needed or desired.
 
I have a carbureted motorcycle. Once I had some of those Tour De Douchebags riding side by side blocking the road in front of me, smugly content that I couldn't do anything about it. But they didn't count that I would sneak past their pack and open the choke a couple feet in front of them. Just stayed there, right in front of their huffing and puffing, sharing the joys of an unregulated emissions system. Not so healthy anymore huh?

lol....

I had the same thing happen to me... holier than thou spandex wearing crew was going four deep on a single lane road at maybe 10 mph pace.

After signalling and waving them to let us through, our group "sneaked" between them (two on each side)... Before that, I downshifted and engine braked at around 11k RPM while going through them.... That's about 95 dBA with my exhaust :D


If bikers are nice to me, I'm nice to them... if they are dbags... I'm not going to be so nice.
 
I cam just imagine the thing going off when it's not needed or desired.

As to be expected for a new tech, but they can probably get this to become reliable and compact, it'll be convenient to have your protective gear in your jacket instead of carrying your helmet into the building with you :p
 
Post incident report:

The dummy's head survived the impact with no recordable injury impact to the brain. The lower collar section successfully protected the brain stem from the 14 shattered chunks of spine that would otherwise have pierced the cranium.
 
PS - With no exaggeration, I've put 250,000 miles on motorcycles.

Motorcycles are safe. Car drivers aren't.

I see you left Motorcycle Drivers out of the equation. Probably a good idea. I've been to southern CA.
 
Or people that ride bikes could just you know....not ride them around cars.......
They're a legitimate form of road transportation, though. Sidewalks, well, are for foot traffic, if that's where you're headed.
I don't mind treating them like other vehicles, but so many of them suck at following the damn rules them selves. Where I work we have a ton of them, and they are such a pain sometimes :/
Some cyclists do, absolutely. On Saturday I soloed a 62 miler and for the first 10-15 kept catching up to a guy that ran each red light and stop sign he encountered, around traffic. He couldn't hear me cautioning, either, because he was wearing headphones. The groups I ride with never run lights, signs, etc.
Ahhhh. The good ol' bike terrorist. How about this - stay in the shoulder and off the road? Just cause you spent $300 on ridiculous spandex doesn't make it ok to do your Tour De France training at 20 mph in a 55 mph zone. I love to ride. Have a nice road bike. Did a 150 mile ride for charity last year. But how about us riding enthusiasts do a better job of not being complete dbags eh?
lol @ spandex attack. Firstly, it's Lycra and not $300. Secondly, there's often little to no shoulder, and when riding in it, drivers are encouraged and confident in passing without moving slightly over, buzzing cyclists and causing accidents. Riding in lane places a cyclist directly in a driver's line of sight.
I have a carbureted motorcycle. Once I had some of those Tour De Douchebags riding side by side blocking the road in front of me, smugly content that I couldn't do anything about it. But they didn't count that I would sneak past their pack and open the choke a couple feet in front of them. Just stayed there, right in front of their huffing and puffing, sharing the joys of an unregulated emissions system. Not so healthy anymore huh?
Oh the irony.

Depending on the state's laws where this occurred and the number of lanes available, riding abreast is legal.
lol....

I had the same thing happen to me... holier than thou spandex wearing crew was going four deep on a single lane road at maybe 10 mph pace.

After signalling and waving them to let us through, our group "sneaked" between them (two on each side)... Before that, I downshifted and engine braked at around 11k RPM while going through them.... That's about 95 dBA with my exhaust :D

If bikers are nice to me, I'm nice to them... if they are dbags... I'm not going to be so nice.
"Signaling and waving to let us through" accomplishes nothing. Wait until a safe opportunity to pass, then do so. Unbeknownst to yourself, doing what you claim to have done could panic an inexperienced rider and cause a crash.
 
Back on topic, I'd stick with a helmet. It's fitted, sturdy, and predictable. I can also attach a small light to the back for greater visibility.
 
the most interesting thing about the video is how much light is needed for a high speed camera to work
no kidding. There was a video a while back that was showing an explosion at 10,000,000 frames per second. They showed normal 30fps, then something like 10,000 fps, then 10,000,000 fps. You could see from the first two framerates how much light they were using in preparation for 10,000,000 fps. :eek:
 
Ahhhh. The good ol' bike terrorist. How about this - stay in the shoulder and off the road? Just cause you spent $300 on ridiculous spandex doesn't make it ok to do your Tour De France training at 20 mph in a 55 mph zone.

I think the difference lies in the roads.

I bike commute on "one lane residential" roads with a speed limit of 20 (that I *CAN* keep up with the speed limit on,) on "low-volume urban border" two-lane roads with a speed limit of 35-45 MPH (with a bike lane,) and one "high-volume urban highway" four-lane roads with a speed limit of 45-50 MPH, with bike lanes in some areas, and none in others (in a couple places there are really old bridges over ravines that have *ZERO* shoulder - a bike *HAS* to ride in the traffic lane - and of course the lane is skinnier there, too.) Finally, I ride in downtown roads that vary from 25 MPH grid-pattern roads, some with, some without bike lanes; and on downtown-edge roads without bike lanes that are SUPPOSED to be 25 MPH, but that people often go faster - without a bike lane, nor a shoulder.

On the roads with bike lanes, I ride in the bike lanes, and pretty much ignore any idiocy I see cars do unless they directly affect me (make a right turn immediately after passing me, for example.) On the slower roads without bike lanes, I ride as traffic, as I can keep up with traffic just fine.

On the faster, no-lane roads (which to me includes the bridges over ravines where the bike lane disappears as well as the downtown-edge road with no shoulder that *SHOULD* be slow but isn't,) I try to ride as close to the curb as I can to allow cars to pass - but if that feels unsafe, I absolutely use the full lane - for as short a time as possible. That's not arrogance, that's safety. Not all roads have shoulders.

Where am I supposed to ride here?
https://www.google.com/maps?ll=45.4..._fVUyT4f_UA&cbll=45.47642,-122.67961&t=m&z=12
(There's another identical one a quarter mile back on that road, too.)

or here?
https://www.google.com/maps?ll=45.5...D1IIgwg8A&cbll=45.508616,-122.677395&t=m&z=17
(That one has out-of-date street view: It USED to be possible to ride on the dirt/gravel path next to the road, although that was a NASTY path for a road bike - that is now closed off completely due to construction. In theory there will be a nice wide paved bike/pedestrian path there when they're done, but there isn't now.)

For both those stretches of road, there are alternative routes I COULD take, but they would add 10 minutes (or more) to my 30 minute commute.
 
My issue, having spent the past five years in school, is that college students make the worst bike riders.
 
I love these discussions!

I agree with the guy above me though. Just because you have a nice bike and spandex doesn't mean you're the only thing that matters. I have a car that will destroy your existence if you or I fuck up. I always yield to pedestrians, and bike riders even though sometimes they are douche bags. I don't want to kill anyone, but sometimes it really seems like they want to get hit. I mean, if I were a bike rider, I would ride as close to the edge of the road as possible, not on the while line. I don't care if it's legal for me to do so. I'd rather ride another day than risk accidentally moving into the lane that the car behind me going 45 MPH in.
 
Air bag helmets don't do shit when you get nailed at road speeds by a vehicle that is a magnitude or two beyond you and your bike in weight. Wow, so your head and brain are intact, so much for the rest of you.
 
why not wear a fuckin regular helmet ffs?
whats the problem with a helmet.
 
This system lacks a rigid shell structure, which is part of what makes a helmet work. In the demo, it's using the cars windshield as this structure, which seems to be effective. Try it against the A pillar or a lightpost, and I suspect the results won't be so impressive.
 
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