Do You Wear Full Face Helmet?

[e-bike]

I see in the US ebike owners wear full face helmets while in the UK they don’t possibly it may make them look silly.

Do you wear full face helmet and what do you think about this?

 

[amigafan2003]

I see in the US ebike owners wear full face helmets while in the UK they don’t possibly it may make them look silly.

Do you wear full face helmet and what do you think about this?

I don't wear any helmet.

I would if I was downhill mtb'ing again (in fact, I have a ff under the stairs somewhere) but those days are long gone!

 

[Yamdude]

I don't wear any helmet.

Nor me..... my head, my life, my choice. Just thought i'd add that for the health & safety dictators.

 

[peerjay56]

Nor me..... my head, my life, my choice. Just thought i'd add that for the health & safety dictators.

Your head and your life indeed. What choice though for your family if you suffered a preventable severe head injury, and they are left with the job of caring for you? Not dictating, nor pushing my view on to you. I just think it is something to be considered. I've worked all my life in careers where head protection was either mandatory or common sense. For me a cycle helmet is a literal no-brainer But not full face

 

[Streethawk]

I have a full face DH helmet i used to use when i was doing a lot of downhill mountain biking. This is because the risk of falling off when doing something stupid like downhilling is exponentially higher than just riding along normally. I do wear a helmet most of the time, but i'm aware of studies that show they're next to useless when hit by a motor vehicle, only being designed for head-to-ground accidents. Also, quite counter-intuitively, various studies have shown car drivers tend to drive closer to a cyclist with a helmet on than without. Given the result in Australia, i completely disagree with legislating for helmets.

 

[Yamdude]

I don't tell people what not to wear, so I don't accept people telling me what I should wear, unless its law.
I see these posters on motorcycle forums, banging on about 'all the gear all the time'. No one is stupid enough not to realise if you come of its going to hurt, but if I want to wear shorts, t shirt and flip flops then its my choice to do so.
In this health & safety obsessed society we now live in, luckily there is still a few freedoms left.

 

[Gringo]

Helmets Pah, not me

 

[john h]

For years i did not wear a helmet 2 years back i started, just as well i did; in may this year i came of my bike at 12 mph i landed on my shoulder breaking my collar bone, did not even notice my helmet was smashed till i got home, that would have been my skull, i am not telling anyone to wear one , but i al.ways will .not full faced

 

[Croxden]

When I had to wear a hard hat at work, I was always banging by head. But it didn't effect me effect me effect me.

 

[flecc]

Nor me, never wore helmets for my first 23 years of motorcycling either, for some of that there weren't even any on the market. A lifetime of motorcycling and cycling and I've never banged my head, so I'm certainly not going to bother now I'm on the home straight.

 

[timidtom]

Nor me, never wore helmets for my first 23 years of motorcycling either, for some of that there weren't even any on the market. A lifetime of motorcycling and cycling and I've never banged my head, so I'm certainly not going to bother now I'm on the home straight.

When I started motor biking there were no helmets. I eventually bought one which was fashioned to resemble a pith helmet - it was either that or the Sherlock Holmes' deerstalker.

 

[los monty]

Interesting views on helmet wearing and a good Kindle buy at £1.53 Real-World user guide for e-bikes. Well written and a few lol moments

Kindle has done for books what e-bikes have done for cycling, it's just taking a bit longer to catch on.

The Real World User Guide for ebikes - ebike book 2010 eBook: Tim Sutton: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store

 

[D C]

I don't use a helmet of any sort though I'm getting to the age when I should probably wear one around the house and garden and whilst driving.
One advantage of being older, possibly the only one, is you can't die young.
Each to his own.

 

[Gringo]

One advantage of being older, possibly the only one, is you can't die young.

Well that's where your wrong I died young(ish) in a motorbike accident in 1994 and some smart **** in an ambulance got my heart started again
I had a helmet on back then only because of the law.
These days I cycle on back roads, cycle paths & bridal ways so if I come off its probably my own fault and if I want to bash my head without a helmet, I will

 

[103Alex1]

These days I cycle on back roads, cycle paths & bridal ways so if I come off its probably my own fault and if I want to bash my head without a helmet, I will

That was pretty much exactly where I low-sided my Trek (at low speed coming out of a huge pothole I didn't really see coming properly) before re-jigging it to balance the bike weight, having unhelmeted head thrown against a brick wall in March. Exercising my right to bash my head without a helmet .

Unconscious, ambulance, 7hrs in ER, CAT scans, broken nose, whiplash, a load of pain and most importantly somehow got a load of haemorrage round eye and wound up looking like I'd been punched in a pub brawl... doesn't do the image any good in Waitrose or at client meetings ! Took best part of 2 months to get over it properly. Pretty sure I'd have come away with mainly just a nasty bump if I'd been wearing even a regular helmet. So even low speed crashes can be painful - though I'm still not entirely convinced in many crashes how much good a helmet would really do.

Will confess to riding all Summer with a cap rather than a helmet, downhilling in the dry on good roads up to nearly 50mph - but I'd consider wearing a full face helmet and even a bit of knee/elbow padding (especially for higher speed riding) on wet roads or in Winter when ice is about. Also if riding a bike >1200-1500W max input.

 

[flecc]

wound up looking like I'd been punched in a pub brawl... doesn't do the image any good in Waitrose or at client meetings !

Switch to Lidl, Aldi or Iceland and go into client meetings on crutches! The first is fitting in, the second changes the perception of the injury.

 

[peerjay56]

Nor me, never wore helmets for my first 23 years of motorcycling either, for some of that there weren't even any on the market. A lifetime of motorcycling and cycling and I've never banged my head, so I'm certainly not going to bother now I'm on the home straight.

So the odds are getting shorter and shorterer

 

[tillson]

I wear a helmet in the full knowledge that it is going to offer my brain negligible protection from an impact, and that it may actually make any potential neck injury worse than it would have been had I not been wearing one.

I started wearing a bike helmet when I first took up mountain biking and they are great for protecting your head from grazing and superficial scalp damage caused by overhanging twigs and branches when passing through undergrowth. Anything more than that and they offer nothing at all.

I wouldn't bother with a helmet when cycling on the roads to work were it not for the fact that I feel naked without one. The years of wearing a helmet for mountain biking make it feel very strange to get on a bike helmet less. The only time that I will cycle without wearing a helmet is when someone tells me that I need to wear one.

I would imagine that the only lycra clad middle aged men who wear a full face helmet are the ones cruising the streets, late at night, in an anonymous white panel van armed with a roll of duct tape.

 

[Clockwise]

Your head and your life indeed. What choice though for your family if you suffered a preventable severe head injury, and they are left with the job of caring for you? Not dictating, nor pushing my view on to you. I just think it is something to be considered. I've worked all my life in careers where head protection was either mandatory or common sense. For me a cycle helmet is a literal no-brainer But not full face

Most bicycle helmets are only tested for a 12mph impact on the crown of the head. While this might be enough if you come off and go over the handlebars and then land crown first it won't be anything if you have a car hook you from the side as helmets just aren't tested or designed for that impact. Here is a video that shows the 2 tests done on helmets.

[video=youtube;bhIxgcPRfXw]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhIxgcPRfXw[/video]

Sorry to be a naysayer but I made a decision not to buy a helmet after I looked into what it was designed to do and how exactly it did it, my family support the decision as I had shown them the tests and while they would prefer me to have a helmet it is no longer a bicycle helmet but nothing less than a motorbike tested helmet as they are tested far far more and protect much more of the head(even with open face helmets).

As you might have guessed I cycle without a helmet, I have been considering a MET crossover recently but more as it has a light mounted on the back of it than anything other than that. Prevention is greater than a cure after all.

 

[bazwaldo]

I thought about a full face helmet for winter riding but never found one that was light weight and looked ok.
The few I found seemed to have awful styling and to be aimed at young off road hooligans.
Even something with a built-in visor for the eyes would have been nice.
Maybe there is a market opening for someone?
Barry.