A question for non-helmet wearers

Page may contain affiliate links. Please see terms for details.

beatlejuice

Gently does it...
Location
Mid Hampshire
I am not a great fan on cycle helmets. Typically if I am doing my day to day cycling just has commuting, shopping etc I do without a helmet. Sometime when it dark I will wear one so I can mount a light on it. Also if I am riding with others I will wear one.

However as my lorry was being unloaded on a building site about a month ago I large heavy timber frame structure landed on my head. i was wearing the correct PPE, high impact boots, gloves, hi viz, and a helmet. Thanks to the later taking a lot of the impact my skull was saved, however one of neck vertebra was fractured, plus my upper left arm. I have been incredibly lucky and should much pretty much a full recovery.

So when I am allowed to cycle again, I am going to wear a helmet all the time. My skull took quite a knock and I don’t know if been weakened. However the nature of the risk of town cycling and being on a building site are quite different.

So I ask those of you who not normally wear one your opinion on my choice. Namely if you had looked death in a face and gotten away with it would still not put one on when you pop into town etc?
 
OP
OP
beatlejuice

beatlejuice

Gently does it...
Location
Mid Hampshire
IMG_1163.jpg
 

tom73

Guru
Location
Yorkshire
That’s one impressive knock. Can’t really say as I do wear one it’s not open to discussion. Mrs 73 has seen to many smashed heads to let me out without it.
 

Heltor Chasca

Out-riding the Black Dog
I do not wear a helmet whilst cycling (commuting and Audax) MTBing is the exception and I do. That is my preference.

At work I wear a forestry helmet similar to yours but with a metal visor. A few years back I had a similar injury to my neck from standing up under a limb that was lower than I thought. I lose all sense of spatial awareness when I wear my lid and I have done this in a minor way several times. It hurts your neck horribly. The visor has protected me in a much more positive way. On almost ALL the occasions I have been hurt, it has been BECAUSE of my helmet. Your case would have been an entirely different outcome I am convinced.

I am glad you are ok, but I don’t think cycling helmets and hard hats can be compared as they are designed to act in an entirely different way and for different reasons.
 

Drago

Legendary Member
I'm not going to pick sides, I'm manpinly a helmet wearer, but not exclusively so. But let me tell you a story which is much the opposite of the OPs I the interests of balance.

Some years back I was teaching a course, and I instructed the delegates to inbox their new helmets. They all unboxed their sipping new Spesh loss and I was taking about the 'born on date, correct fitting, and generally waffling on in a dull dirge when one young lasses lid rolled from her lap onto the carpeted floor.

She was only diddy, may be 5'3" tall, so her legs weren't long and it didn't have far to fall. Nevertheless, it must have landed just right (or wrong, depending on your persepedtive) and it cracked right through for about 1/3 of the length of its diameter. Clearly that helmet, on that day, falling at that angle, wouldnt have performed terribly well.

So I vowed that day not to rely on safety aids, but to engage brain it it's maximum capacity as my best chance of staying alive. To then I practiced my skills and went from L4 instructor to L5 A/B advanced skills instructor. Old pilots, bold pilots, and people who place their faith j something that may or may not work when you need it to.
 

deptfordmarmoset

Full time tea drinker
Location
Armonmy Way
I am not a great fan on cycle helmets. Typically if I am doing my day to day cycling just has commuting, shopping etc I do without a helmet. Sometime when it dark I will wear one so I can mount a light on it. Also if I am riding with others I will wear one.

However as my lorry was being unloaded on a building site about a month ago I large heavy timber frame structure landed on my head. i was wearing the correct PPE, high impact boots, gloves, hi viz, and a helmet. Thanks to the later taking a lot of the impact my skull was saved, however one of neck vertebra was fractured, plus my upper left arm. I have been incredibly lucky and should much pretty much a full recovery.

So when I am allowed to cycle again, I am going to wear a helmet all the time. My skull took quite a knock and I don’t know if been weakened. However the nature of the risk of town cycling and being on a building site are quite different.

So I ask those of you who not normally wear one your opinion on my choice. Namely if you had looked death in a face and gotten away with it would still not put one on when you pop into town etc?
I doubt a cycling helmet would offer you the same degree of protection from falling timber on your bike
 

raleighnut

Legendary Member
I'm not going to pick sides, I'm manpinly a helmet wearer, but not exclusively so. But let me tell you a story which is much the opposite of the OPs I the interests of balance.

Some years back I was teaching a course, and I instructed the delegates to inbox their new helmets. They all unboxed their sipping new Spesh loss and I was taking about the 'born on date, correct fitting, and generally waffling on in a dull dirge when one young lasses lid rolled from her lap onto the carpeted floor.

She was only diddy, may be 5'3" tall, so her legs weren't long and it didn't have far to fall. Nevertheless, it must have landed just right (or wrong, depending on your persepedtive) and it cracked right through for about 1/3 of the length of its diameter. Clearly that helmet, on that day, falling at that angle, wouldnt have performed terribly well.

So I vowed that day not to rely on safety aids, but to engage brain it it's maximum capacity as my best chance of staying alive. To then I practiced my skills and went from L4 instructor to L5 A/B advanced skills instructor. Old pilots, bold pilots, and people who place their faith j something that may or may not work when you need it to.

It didn't have a head inside to keep it from breaking.
 

Drago

Legendary Member
It didn't have a head inside to keep it from breaking.

It gets to something when a helmet needs a head to reinforce it!

In all seriousness, they may work, the may not work - rather than waiting until it is too late to find out either way, I prefer to place my faith in my own skills and abilities to keep me alive.

This is the opposite of many cyclists, who behave as if they are invincible, ride like twots, never deviate their vision from dead ahead, but think they're ok because they have a bonce potty on. To me it seems silly to do one thing in the name of safety, yet not bother doing anything else to that end, particularly as the other tactics may prove more effective. Fitting a smoke detector to a house that's already on fire may not help as much as you hope.
 
Top Bottom