Getting Paranoid!!

[Kell]

Regarding hi-vis colour, I noticed (in the UK) the police wear yellow, whereas the railways and post office favour orange. Following the deaths of some youths hit by a train while grafitti-ing, I saw pictures of the scene on the news with police and railway workers close together which convined me to switch from yellow to orange. Particularly in sunlight and against greenery (I cycle mostly in rural lanes) I think orange is higher-vis than yellow. At night it is the reflective bits that are hi-vis.

And keep it clean! high-vis is lo-vis when dirty. I favour a light vi-vis over-top to put over whatever I am wearing partly because it is easy to pop in the washing machine and partly because I don't want to walk around in hi-vis once I get to my destination.

It's weird because of all the Hi-VIz jackets I've seen out on the road, I still think yellow is the most visible.

It might be a bit of a psychological trick though as whenever I see yellow, I think cyclist, so maybe I'm more aware of them because of that.

However, Altura Night Vision jackets have, over the years, come in multiple colours including yellow, lime green, red, blue, black (weird choice) and maybe not orange. I do have a cheaper orange one I bought and I have seen orange ones, but I don't think in practice they're as noticeable. Possibly because there are more orange things in the background than luminous yellow...?

 

[Kell]

Possibly the Hövding airbag may be a good compromise for some if they are willing to pay the steep price. It has gotten surprisingly popular here in Germany.

I meant to respond to this point in particular as I remember my partner at work telling me he was following someone wearing one of those air collars before.

It went off for no reason and the shock knocked the rider off his bike.

I can't comment on make or model, but it certainly put me off them.

 

[shingwell]

I still think yellow is the most visible.

Well it clearly depends on the background. It could be that yellow is better in built-up areas (lots of orangy brickwork etc) which is why the police choose yellow, but orange is better among greenery whch is why the railway choose orange. I live among greenery so I'll stick with orange . But I've just bought my dauighter a pink one, that is highly visible too, so maybe it doesn't actually make any difference!

 

[Kell]

Well it clearly depends on the background. It could be that yellow is better in built-up areas (lots of orangy brickwork etc) which is why the police choose yellow, but orange is better among greenery whch is why the railway choose orange. I live among greenery so I'll stick with orange . But I've just bought my dauighter a pink one, that is highly visible too, so maybe it doesn't actually make any difference!

Definitely in your pics the orange stands out way more.

 

[berlinonaut]

I meant to respond to this point in particular as I remember my partner at work telling me he was following someone wearing one of those air collars before.

It went off for no reason and the shock knocked the rider off his bike.

I can't comment on make or model, but it certainly put me off them.

Hmm, hard to tell. I know personally four people that are using the Hövding on a daily basis, all for more than a year. They are until now all happy with it though on hot days there is obviously some sweating, but the affected area is very tiny. No accidents so far, so no evidence in terms of real world protection. Once one of the Hövdings went off when the rider got stuck in tram rails with the front wheel and brought her to a very sudden stop that almost sent her over the handlebars. She made a nice selfie afterwards with the Hövding around her head. She did however manage to avoid falling on the ground but just so and the decrease in speed was very harsh and so the going off of the Hövding seemed totally appropriate to her. As said before I do see a surprising amount of people wearing one here in Berlin, especially given the price and the fact that it is a bit of a niche product. I've never heard anything negative about it, but no real crash reports eihter apart from some clips in TV formats where it was "tested" by unqualified journalists (and behaved as it should). Thus I am absolutely unable to judge on the usefulness of it.

So your story is very interesting and too bad that there is not more factual information about what happened, under which circumstances and with wich equipment involved. As told it seems mainly anectotical to me - someone saw something somewhere under completely unclear circumstances but everything is very uncroncrete (and a one time event anyway), it is not even clear if a Hövding was involved at all - and thus I'd consider it unfair to judge on the Hövding on that basis.

 

[mitchibob]

Wearing h-viz or a helmet makes very little difference to your chances of being killed or seriously injured on the road when it comes to collisions with motor vehicles. Giro recently even said that none their helmets are designed to protect you against a crash with a motor vehicle. It's all very well being seen, but if the person about to kill you with their motor vehicle is going fast enough that they're enable to react quickly enough, even if they see you, then no amount of hi-viz will help.

Having the legally required lighting and reflective details, while maintaining comfort during your ride should be enough to be seen.

 

[Kell]

Wearing h-viz or a helmet makes very little difference to your chances of being killed or seriously injured on the road when it comes to collisions with motor vehicles. Giro recently even said that none their helmets are not designed to protect you against a crash with a motor vehicle. It's all very well being seen, but if the person about to kill you with their motor vehicle is going fast enough that they're enable to react quickly enough, even if they see you, then no amount of hi-viz will help.

Having the legally required lighting and reflective details, while maintaining comfort during your ride should be enough to be seen.

All true - and I don't want to get into the helmet/no-helmet debate but my last two or three offs have been two with pedestrians that just stepped into the bike lane without looking* and one where I came round a corner and hit a patch of diesel and lost the front end. Only in one of those did the helmet make contact with the ground, but I'm pleased I had it. As @berlinonaut will (quite rightly) say, this is anecdotal and doesn't constitute proof. I don't for one minute think it saved my life, but it probably saved a big headache and some grazing. Though, I've also read that if not wearing a helmet, it's possible that your head wouldn't have contacted the ground as natural instinct makes you lift it away, and the extra size of the helmet is sometimes what causes the contact. (All too many variables.)

From what I've read in the past, helmets will protect you in collisions where impact speed is up to 20mph. Anything more than that and they 'might'. Some reports have said they might even make it worse - depending on the crash, the angle, rotational forces etc.

*On a side note, it's part of the reason that I object to many cycle lanes because pedestrians do not give them the same respect as they would a road.