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Motorcyclists To Get Wearable Airbags
jonerik writes "For the past hundred years or so motorcycle accidents have had an unfortunate potential for particularly horrific injuries, or worse. Improvements in safety gear have certainly been made in the past few decades, but in some ways those improvements have been balanced out by the tremendous speeds that modern bikes are capable of. According to this article from ABC News, though, Dainese, a protective sports clothing maker in Vicenza, Italy has developed a wearable airbag vest - called the D-Air - designed to cushion riders in the event of an accident. The D-Air vest features a tiny electronic computer referred to as the STM (which stands for Sensing, Triggering, and Memory), which was developed by an Israeli company called Merhav APP. According to the article, the STM contains sensors that monitor the bike's physical motion. 'The sensors onboard the STM will watch for telltale signs -- such as a sudden deceleration force of about ten times that of gravity -- that precede a collision. Once the computer determines an impending accident, the STM blasts the data to receiver in the vest to start the inflation process.'
This site also features some pictures of the D-Air vest in action. Dainese plans to begin selling the D-Air vest in Europe in the spring, though American sales will have to wait since the U.S. Department of Transportation has yet to set standards for such a device."
The head is already pretty well protected when you're on a motorocycle. It's the spine you have to worry about mostly.
However it wouldn't have stopped my thigh bone being broken when I was "helped" off my bike at a junction by a kindly lady pulling across my path.
What you probably need is a version of the michelin man suit !
Anything that adds to the protection of motorbike pilots has to be a good thing, but I would suggest that a lot of the problem is from two areas, pilots riding too fast for the conditions, and car drivers / other road users not being aware of bikes.
I was wearing a jacket with armour in it, and a 400ukp crash helmet, without the full face lid I would be dead as the lower part of it seemed to have been the first point of contact I had with the ground as I performed a face plant on my way to going 30-0 mph in a few feet. When on a bike assume all other road users are idiots, and spend as mcuh money as you can (and more) on your personal protection, it *will* save your life!
If you have an accident on your bike the next important bit is the speed you get taken to somewhere that can put you back together... luckily I crashed a 2 minute ambulance ride away from the local hospital (and you have to hope that as you lie there in the road a "helpful" stranger doesn't remove your crash helmet unless they know what they are doing)
A monkey in every office....
This article in Wired from 1999 describes an airbag vest developed by Japanese construction giant Kajima to protect construction workers from falls.
Stop worrying about the risks of nuclear power and start worrying about the risks of not using nuclear power.
There are threee collisions in an accident:
1) bike with object (or road)
2) rider with object
3) riders organs with his/her skeleton
The second two collisions are what kills. The rapid decelleration of the first collision will precede the other two - triggering the device.
Who said anything about brakes?
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
I live in Sweden where seat belts are compulsory too, just as in the UK. This rule is the biggest life saver of them all, no airbag in the world saves you in a roll-over situation (which is quite common).
As for the force, I work at a company producing the inflators used in passenger side airbags and they are really powerful (the company name is Autoflator, a part of the Autoliv group). I have also smashed a car (aquaplaning... scary stuff) and I got hit pretty good by the airbag.
At least we agree on not wearing them!
Anyone that rides a motorcycle hopefully already knows this.. use LEATHER!!
It's not just a Harley thing or a status symbol, it is for safety. Leather boots, pants and gloves with hard sole boots or shoes. In a motorcycle ejection or fall off, it is better to gradually slide to a stop then to stick to the ground and tumble around. Leather will allow you to slide while protecting the skin and provide a decent stopping friction. It does not help much when slamming into something where conservation of momentum is tested but for most motorcycle dumps and mishaps it can save your life.
Bad boys rape our young girls but Violet gives willingly.
Not wearing a helmet on a bike is /insane/.
/stationary/ if you're not wearing a helmet. (ie you fall sideways and your head happens to be the one to break the fall).
It doesnt take much of a knock to the head to kill, you can kill yourself when the bike is
I use Friend/Foe + mod-point modifiers as a karma/reputation system.
In the US they are designed to try and save people who refuse to wear seat belts. Over here most people wear them
I'm always a little curious about broad statements, especially when comparing the habits of different societies.
I live in California, which is the most populous state, and has by far the most cars of any state, as well as the most stringent emissions laws. It turns out that, at least as of 1999, it also had the highest rate of seat belt use, nearly 90%. (Buckle up America Report, 2001)
At a national level, that 90% is considered a target number for 2005. As of 2002, national usage is at 75%, which was a sad surprise to me. Of course, each state has its own laws.
It isn't surprising to me that less than half of North Dakotans wear a seat belt, considering the rural environment and culture, but I would have thought the national average would be higher by now.
Interestingly, all the states that border California are also very high.
Machines take me by surprise with great frequency. -A. Turing
Someone I used to work with once rear-ended someone hard enough to deploy the steering wheel airbag - he had his hands in the 11 and 2 o'clock positions when he hit the car, and the force at which the airbag came out gave him burns on his forearms from his wrists to his elbows.
:)
I think I'd rather take my chance on the leather armor when I finally get my motorcycle. Thousands of moto-racers can't be wrong
Support bacteria! It's the only culture most people seem to get.
Hi,
Just having a flick around the front page of Slashdot and saw this post and thought I'd add my two pence! (This is my first Slashdot post...)
Just thought it may be of interest that in the UK you can already get stuff like this. My colleague has a similar system but cruder in operation. It simply attaches him to the bike via a short, fine cable. Get on the bike, plug yourself in, "arm" the system and you're off. If you have an accident, the cable comes out of it's socket, breaks a circuit and the jacket fires its internal airbag.
G
OMG, what an arrogant comment. Do you work for the IIHS, NHTSA, or a major insurance carrier?
In this case, I picked the first reference from your google search and read the second paragraph that contained this line:
A skilled driver can stop better without ABS brakes (particularly on dry pavement) using a technique called threshold braking. Essentially, threshold braking is when a driver applies the maximum amount force on the brakes to slow the car without locking the wheels. If executed properly, the wheels will not lock, but actually move slower than the rotational speed required to maintain speed on the pavement. It tends to work best in an open-wheeled race car, but the technique also applies to roadgoing cars. Anti-lock brakes will hinder this technique. Check racing literature -- using this technique yields shorter stopping distances then punching the brake on an ABS-equiped vehicle.
ABS brakes also tend to limit the ability of a driver to use another technique called trail-braking (and left-foot braking). These are braking techniques used to offset the balance of the vehicle in a corner and tighten up the line through a corner. This is used in both racing situations and emergency avoidance manuvers.
Additionally, having ABS tends to make drivers over-confident -- many tend to steer during heavy braking, which unloads the rear tires of a car and can easily cause a vehicle to spin out of control...or cause a sport-ute to roll.
Many drivers prefer ABS brakes -- which is fine. Its their choice. In fact, for most drivers, ABS is better...but the absolute mentality you have is just wrong.
-Turkey
Do you understand how ABS works? It alternatively locks and unlocks the wheel, which gives a pulse pattern, which means you stop for a second, roll for a second, etc. (Not actually 'a second', but short, pre-determined time intervals)
What, like;
I think you get the point. The comonality between all of thesee pages looks like this;
The problem with light cars (a very large number of consumer purchased vehicles lately) is that they don't have the weight to keep the skipping wheels on the ground, thus dramatically reducing the efectiveness in both stopping distance and steering control, hence the reason for removing them from the likes of the Cavalier and Sunfire.
Especially in snow, gravel, and sand (loose pack) ABS will drastically increase your stopping distance (by about 200% in some cases, depending on speed and density of the material you're driving in). The plow effect by your car's tires slows the trajectory of your vehicle.
ABS isn't designed to reduce stopping distance, it is designed to give steering control. These are two VERY different things. Incidentally, locking your tires and knowing how to change directions can/will significantly reduce your stopping distance with the same amount of control, as anyone who's ever taken or instructed a crash course will tell you.
I've conducted 80KM/h tests myself, in snow (loose and hard packed), gravel, sand, and wet and dry asphalt and under many of the conditions, especially the non-ideal driving conditions, my stopping distance was increased. I will grant you that my tires did suffer more on the locking tests, but if I'm making an emergency stop, I'd much sooner replace some tires than find myself face-first in the side of an SUV/Minivan/truck/etc.
BTW, speaking of ideal conditions; This study hilights another problem with ABS - Driver reaction time and leg strength. Many (most?) women and smaller men have great difficulty in putting 100lbs pressure on their brake pedals in a real hurry, which the NHTSA has discovered increases stopping distance (150-200lbs is the desired pressure, which was difficult to attain, except by the TRC (professional) test driver).
BD Phone Home!
Shameless plug. Like you weren't expecting it.
In MA, the seatbelt usage rate is around 60%. One of the worst in the nation, apparently, but the recent 'click it or ticket' campaign, even though it has no legal standing, has driven usage up by six points. Which is good.
On a related point, my wife was talking to the head of the NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) just yesterday about airbags. US airbags are a big pet peeve of his, because if you're a passenger using a seatbelt in a US airbag-equipped car, you're *MORE LIKELY* to be injured than your European seatbelted compatriot, because of the more powerful airbag. Congress deliberately set them more powerful to give (statistically-unproven) better protection to folks not wearing belts. While it *has* been statistically proven that belts plus low-velocity airbags reduces injury. I'm not making this up : this is what Dr. Runge said, and I assume he knows what he's talking about.
In fact, I know a doc in one of our local hospitals who is pissed because his wife is permanently disabled, directly because of the US high-powered airbags.
So, to conclude : US airbags are more powerful to provide an *unproven* amount of protection to non-seatbelted occupants, at the *direct* expense of seatbelted occupants. Gah.
Doesn't protect your back? Did you look at the link? This suit has BIGGER airbag protecting your back than ribcage! Anyone riding a bike without a helmet deserves what they get IMHO.
Having spoken with a biker (sitting in the next room from me. ;) ) he agrees that this vest is highly impractical. When you're launched from your bike, you keep your appendages close to your body and roll, similar to how paratroopers roll on landing to reduce the stress on your body. Also, they have to be able (barring physical injury) to get up and walk away, so as to prevent them from being flattened by passing cars (who tend to pay so much attention to the wreck they'd hit the broad side of a barn if it were planted in front of them).
This is obviously written by someone who has never ridden a motorcycle for any length of time and who's getting advice from someone who thinks he's a better rider than he is (which is scary). As a former editor at Motorcycle Online (http://www.motorcycle.com),
I can tell you that when you're tossed off a bike at 70 miles per hour, the first thing that goes through your mind isn't, "Ah, now I'll tuck my legs and roll!" That's just ridiculous. You hit the ground so quickly (if you're lucky and don't highside which involves you being tossed through the air and is definitely the most dangerous way to wad) that about all you have time for is "OHSHIT!!", which is, interestingly, what anyone who claims otherwise is full of.
As far as the vest is concerned, well, if it works, great. Many would refuse to wear it just like many refuse to wear helmets, citing rights and freedoms and fashion and whatever. But research into this kind of technology is nice to see because, at the very least, it keeps a dialog open and fresh about motorcycle safety.