Riding gear

Bamboo helmets: try not to knock on wood

February 14th, 2008

I’m not sure how I feel about this one - French manufacturer Roof displayed their Bamboo helmet in Paris. It meets all the relevant Euro safety standards, and it’s entirely made from bamboo wood. And if you keep using the word “bamboo” enough, you start to realise what a silly sounding word it is.

It’s meant to appeal to the environmentally conscious biker. Looks kind of cool, I guess. They also had some nice chunky looking flip-top lids on display with two parts road lid, one part motocross lid and a jetfighter-style visor, which looked interesting:

Scorpion Airfit: Reebok Pumps for your noggin

February 7th, 2008

Remember when Reebok released their first set of pump-up runners? Kids in my school lost their freakin’ minds. Of course, this was back in the day when a hundred bucks for a pair of shoes was absolutely ludicrous money. How things have changed…

If anything, the pump-up concept is even more appropriate for motorcycle helmets; a good, snug-fitting lid can be quite tough to put on, and the foam cheekpads in a new helmet can quickly soften and compress to the point where it sits loose on your head.

So here it is; Scorpion’s Airfit system now comes standard on its EXO-1000 series helmets, allowing you to pump up your cheekpads for a nice snug fit every ride, and deflate them to make the helmet easier to take off and put on. Nice one! They’re not expensive lids either, the top-of-the-line Apollo selling for US$330.

Still, the Reeboks never made me jump higher, so it remains to be seen whether the EXO can make you ride faster… (more…)

Dainese testing race leathers with electronically-operated airbags

January 24th, 2008

We’ve seen airbags sneaking into the world of motorcycles a bit recently, what with Honda’s airbag-equipped Goldwing and ripcord-operated inflating jackets from Motoair and Hit-Air, which are triggered by a sudden unplanned separation of bike and rider. But Dainese have gone one step further, recognising that in racing, riders often hit the ground while still on their bikes in lowside crashes.

The Dainese D-Air system is mounted in the upper back aero hump of the leather racing suit, and uses a series of accelerometers and electronically operated rate gyros to determine when things have gone skewiff on the racetrack. It then deploys in 40 milliseconds, providing neck, shoulder and collarbone cushioning to the falling rider before they hit the deck.

It’s strictly a racing system at the moment, under trial by Dainese-sponsored 125GP riders Simone Giorgi, Michael Ranseder and Marco Simoncelli (pictured above at Valencia), all of whom have taken the opportunity to put the airbag through its paces in race and practice crashes.

A road version will likely be investigated once Dainese are happy with the system’s performance on track. It won’t be cheap, but having seen a lot of friends deal with nasty collarbone and shoulder injuries, I’d rate it as a serious safety tool. After the jump, take a look at a video of the D-Air system in action thanks to a Dainese test rider… And you thought your job was a drag!

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