Is there a stigma to only wear a cap?

[classic33]

On the contrary. That's exactly how helmets work.

Regardless of what may, or may not, be on your head at the time of impact. It's the speed at which your movement is halted that causes the damage. And your brain to "bounce" around inside your skull, in a fluid filled area*. Unlike the external parts of your body, it doesn't come to an immediate stop. Instead the movement will slow down over time, up to six months to stop moving is normal.

I'm no expert on the matter, just relaying what I've been told over the years. By people who have no interest in what I wear whilst cycling. Climbing, caving or canoeing for that matter.

The fluid dampens the movement, slowly, not suddenly.

 

[faster]

Your last 2 statements are wrong.

Err, yeah. If you say so Fab Foodie.

 

[boydj]

I think you're being a bit hard on yourself there. I certainly never said you were a bit slow. It's human nature to attempt to see patterns and draw conclusions where there are non to be drawn, particularly when they justify your own choices and reinforce your own prejudices.

Whilst the statistics themselves may well be correct, comparing head injuries in the UK/USA vs Netherlands/Denmark tells us very little about the efficacy of cycle helmets - there are just too many factors at play. You could easily argue that these are the worst countries to compare, them being at completely opposite ends of the cycling spectrum.

The cycling culture is completely different - much of UK/USA cycling is for sport/fitness purposes and done by inexperienced occasional cyclists, whilst in the Netherlands/Denmark most of it is for utility purposes by cyclists for whom the bike is their main form of transport - literally carrying out many trips per day from childhood for most of their lives.

Netherlands/Denmark have world class cycling infrastructure and town/city planning have been bike friendly for decades. The less said about our cycling infrastructure the better.

The stats themselves will be questionable - comparisons between countries are notoriously difficult. The definition of a head injury in Netherlands/Denmark is unlikely to be the same as in UK/USA. If you've been reading the news lately, many have commented that comparing Covid death stats between countries is tricky, as they are classified in different ways.

Are their head injury stats lower due to these things, or is it because they don't wear helmets? The truth is nobody knows, but it is irresponsible to present these stats as an argument against cycle helmet use.

You're not slow, but you may well have been misled.

This is a perfectly good reason not to wear a helmet and impossible to argue with, as long as you appreciate that the risk would almost certainly be reduced further by wearing a helmet.

On the contrary. That's exactly how helmets work.

Many years ago now I read as much of the research as I could find on cycle helmets and how they worked. Good at preventing minor cuts and bruises, not much use in the event of a heavy blow. They may minimally reduce the rate of deceleration of the brain inside the skull, but not significantly - they are, after all, only rated for a stationary fall from a relatively low height.

I'm old enough to have come off my bike long before helmets were available and I've even ended up in hospital with concussion when my schoolbag had a coming together with my front wheel at speed.

According to Human Factors Ltd, I'm in the 95th percentile of critical thinkers (top of my class that week), so I think I'm capable of understanding the arguments for and against the wearing of helmets. Your argument seems to be based on American cyclists falling off their bikes more often than Dutch cyclists. For me it's not really about cycling culture, it's about how I cycle.

When I see maw, paw and the weans pootling down our local cycle track, all wearing helmets, I despair at the way the helmet industry and the 'it's only common sense brigade' have convinced the a significant number of people that cycling is dangerous, when the reality is that cycling is no more dangerous than walking. Though I have to say that in recent weeks there's been a huge increase in the number of cyclists on our local tracks and there is a significant number of unhelmeted cyclists among them.

 

[matticus]

According to Human Factors Ltd, I'm in the 95th percentile of critical thinkers (top of my class that week), so I think I'm capable of understanding the arguments for and against the wearing of helmets

Wow! That's a credential I've never seen before in a cycling debate. Chapeau

 

[faster]

Regardless of what may, or may not, be on your head at the time of impact. It's the speed at which your movement is halted that causes the damage.

Exactly that - it is the speed at which the movement is halted that causes the damage. I'm glad you've posted this, because it is exactly how helmets work.

In simplified terms, if your head hits the road hard, it comes to a very abrupt stop. Say, for instance, your head might go from whatever speed you are travelling at to zero over the course of 1mm (made up number - probably not far off tbh).

If you are wearing a helmet it comes to a less abrupt stop, as your head hits and deforms the polystyrene inner of the helmet. If you're lucky, your head might come to a stop over the course of 2mm (hopefully more), which will half the deceleration/force your brain experiences.

 

[classic33]

Exactly that - it is the speed at which the movement is halted that causes the damage. I'm glad you've posted this, because it is exactly how helmets work.

In simplified terms, if your head hits the road hard, it comes to a very abrupt stop. Say, for instance, your head might go from whatever speed you are travelling at to zero over the course of 1mm (made up number - probably not far off tbh).

If you are wearing a helmet it comes to a less abrupt stop, as your head hits and deforms the polystyrene inner of the helmet. If you're lucky, your head might come to a stop over the course of 2mm (hopefully more), which will half the deceleration/force your brain experiences.

Either way, your head has come to a sudden stop. The result is that the brain is left "bouncing" around inside the skull in a fluid filled environment. This "bouncing" movement never stops as quick as it starts. An invisible injury, caused by the head coming to a sudden halt.

 

[wafter]

It seems to me that the helmet argument can be boiled down to three criteria:

- How likely you are to have an accident
- How likely you are to sustain cranial impact in that accident
- How effective the the helmet is at protecting the head in that cranial impact

My personal perception is that my accident risk is low (over 20yrs and about 9k miles maybe 4-5 offs, thankfully all low speed), I'm a fairly defensive and conservative rider.

From experience it seems the liklihood of sustaining a blow to the head is low (which was not experienced in any of the above accidents).

My impression is that a helmet would potentially offer a large amount of protection in the event of an impact; echoeing faster's post above about distance available for deceleration - no helmet and it's 2-3mm of skin and fat separating your skull and the ground (or whatever) while a helmet might offer 10 or 20mm of deformable material to slow your head during impact.


I choose not to wear a helmet as I consider the perceived level of risk a legitimate tradeoff for the freedom and enjoyment I get from having the wind in my hair. My risk assessment may or may not be accurate, but it's my decision to make.


In other news I've just bought a cap

 

[matticus]

If you are wearing a helmet it comes to a less abrupt stop, as your head hits and deforms the polystyrene inner of the helmet. If you're lucky, your head might come to a stop over the course of 2mm (hopefully more), which will half the deceleration/force your brain skull experiences.

FTFY! Helmets do reduce skull damage a fair bit - luckily, skulls are robust, self-healing things. (did I mention I had 12 stithces in mine recently? I'd rather NOT have needed them, but my brain and me are both fine! )

 

[faster]

Either way, your head has come to a sudden stop. The result is that the brain is left "bouncing" around inside the skull in a fluid filled environment. This "bouncing" movement never stops as quick as it starts. An invisible injury, caused by the head coming to a sudden halt.

With a helmet, it will come to a less sudden stop and thus reduce the chances of brain injury.

Even on the anti helmet side, very few choose to argue that a helmet doesn't help protect against brain injury if your head hits the ground hard, as there isn't really any argument to be had. You may as well argue that the world is flat.

Most of them choose other spurious arguments, like a helmet will make you fall off more, cars will be more likely to hit you, causes less of a critical mass of cyclists, it's not that dangerous anyway etc. All backed up by poorly interpreted statistics.

 

[faster]

FTFY! Helmets do reduce skull damage a fair bit - luckily, skulls are robust, self-healing things. (did I mention I had 12 stithces in mine recently? I'd rather NOT have needed them, but my brain and me are both fine! )

You've changed my quote in a completely nonsensical way.

If, in this instance a helmet would half the deceleration/force your skull experiences, how would it not also half the deceleration/force your brain experiences?

Please don't misquote me.

Ta

 

[matticus]

You've changed my quote in a completely nonsensical way.

If, in this instance a helmet would half the deceleration/force your skull experiences, how would it not also half the deceleration/force your brain experiences?

Please don't misquote me.

Ta

Because they're not rigidly connected.

[ I didn't mean any offence by changing your quote - it's a common forum technique, often the neatest/quickest way to illustrate some point or facet of the discussion. I hope you see that to me, it's not nonsensical - it's very sensical! ]

 

[Drago]

These injuries caused by helmets - I can well believe that some injuries are actually caused by wearing of a cycle helmet, but how prevalent are these? Are helmets causing injuries in most crashes, or is this situation extremely rare?

Prevalent enough that they may entire negate the benefit of wearing them. It's difficult to quantify, because it has never been reasonably and reproducably (new wor, (c) Drago Enterprises 2020) demonstrated that expanded polystyrene cycle helmets save lives or reduce the likelihood of serious injury among cyclists. Nevertheless, rotational and tortional injuries are sufficiently widespread that it has been noted internationally.

 

[Drago]

Sorry, was going to do this all as one post but I forgot we can't edit in this thread.

With a helmet, it will come to a less sudden stop and thus reduce the chances of brain injury.

That is the theory. The practice is different. There are 3 matters to consider:

1) Cycle helmets are only designed to protect against impacts up to 12MPH. It is unlikely impacts at sub 12MPH velocities would cause brain impact injury or structural skull injuries anyway.

2) If this is the case, why is there no reduction in death by and serious head injuries among cyclists in countries and states where compulsory wearing has been introduced? The correlation is the opposite - the countries with some of the lowest rates of this type of death and injury among cyclists also have some of the lowest helmet wearing rates.

3) Motorcycle helmets work by a difference mechanism. The hard outer shell spreads the mechanical load, and thus gives a genuine and useful reduction and progression or deceleration as that also spreads the area of internal deformation. Cycle helmets give only a localised deformation, and do not reduce the deceleration curve in any where the same manner. Squeeze 1 inch cube of polystyrene in your fingers and you'll feel it give easily - now squeeze a 6 inch square that is 1 inch thick and you'll feel the energy required to deform is much greater. They also provide zero penetrating and virtually no direct trauma protection as they lack the outer hard shell of motorcycle helmets. Because they also lack the hard, featureless, slippery outer shell it has been discovered that they can cause rotational brain injury and torsional spinal injuries, injuries that can themselves be fatal, yet a couple of years ago before this was discovered you were still preaching that helmets save lives. MIPS mitigates this somewhat, but does not eliminate it, particularly the tortional spinal injury, but the majority of helmets do not have this type of construction anyway, yet still you blindly claim helmets will save us.

People thoughtlesly believe cycle helmets save lives. Well, they surely must, right? They're helmets, safety devices after all. OK, then show us the clear and reproduceable evidence of this instead of make claims that are not founded on actual evidence. There have been some fantastic, ultra large scale real life experiments out there with entire countries that have made helmet wearing compulsory, populations of tens of millions, yet you have failed to explain why they are universally seeing no reduction in death or serious injury among cyclists in these countries if the helmets they are now forced to wear are the life savers you claim, despite the much lower number of cyclists that the legislation universally leads to.

In fact, the reduced cycling numbers of cyclists in these countries is very relevant to the helmet issue, as death through physical inactivity is many times more likely than death by cycling. Hell, death by walking is more likely than death by cycling.

 

[classic33]

With a helmet, it will come to a less sudden stop and thus reduce the chances of brain injury.

Even on the anti helmet side, very few choose to argue that a helmet doesn't help protect against brain injury if your head hits the ground hard, as there isn't really any argument to be had. You may as well argue that the world is flat.

Most of them choose other spurious arguments, like a helmet will make you fall off more, cars will be more likely to hit you, causes less of a critical mass of cyclists, it's not that dangerous anyway etc. All backed up by poorly interpreted statistics.

Either way, a sudden stop from even a low speed, will leave your brain "bouncing" around inside your skull. Something that doesn't stop straight away.

By the way have you noticed that the UN flag looks a lot like the flat earth society's depiction of what the earth looks like!

 

[boydj]

................................................
Even on the anti helmet side, very few choose to argue that a helmet doesn't help protect against brain injury if your head hits the ground hard, as there isn't really any argument to be had. You may as well argue that the world is flat.
..........................................................

But a helmet makes your head bigger and heavier and therefore more likely to hit the ground, and hit it harder if you do come off.