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Heads-Up Displays for Motorcyclists
An anonymous reader writes "An NYT article describes a new invention by a former racing driver to incorporate displays in the visors of helmets used by motorcyclists. A GPS receiver in the helmet is used to calculate position and speed of the wearer, and presumably in displaying route guidance. I'll bet some horrifying data could be gathered on the speed with which riders' heads impact the pavement after an accident."
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I'll bet some horrifying data could be gathered on the speed with which riders' heads impact the pavement after an accident.
Umm... Wouldn't it be aproximately the same speed that the motercycle was going when it crashed?
If this just attaches to the outside of a helmet, it probably won't catch on. No way I want more windnoise or extra vibration on my head. If it was integrated in a helmet it would be sorta nice. On the track it would be rather usefull to keep a eye on the rpms easier. A gear readout to go with that would cover most/all of my needs while riding.
Motion Research - SportVue
Quite the morbid commentary posted beside the article there, but the Chevy Corvette Z06 already possesses HUD-capabilities - speed, current gear, etc. Helmets would be a nice next step, but incorporating it into more cars would be nicer.
I've had some experience with motorcycles, and it sounds to me like this would just be a distraction. It may be real neato and stuff, but in a practical sense it may be a safety concern. Putting the display in the driver's helmet reduces the field of peripheral vision available (when focusing on the display). How about designing a display mounted on the motorcycle instead? We're familiar and comfortable with gauges already. This would reduce distraction, and increase safety.
Hi there
I am waiting for the prices to go down in the glasses version of this type of technology. That would allow me to not only added data wile I am riding but when I am walking down the street. Imagine you can pull up your date file an impress her with all the stuff you remember about her. Also you can have that poem there for you to recite that will rock.
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Motorcyclists already have to pay closer attention things on the road -- and the conditions of the road itself -- wet leaves, potholes, puddles -- than those on four wheels. Is putting more -- continually -- in their visual frame a good idea from the standpoint of safety? (and yes, all the cracks about why-are-you-on-a-motorcycle in the first place stand, but there's a difference between risking death and egging it on)
You know the way an interior light in a car is distracting at night because the reflection of things within the car obscure your perception of those outside? I'd feel safer sparing a glance to an instrument on my bike than having it in my face at all times. The helmet already narrows my visual field as it is.
You ride your bike! "Officer, I wasn't going over the speed limit, but I was reading a reply, and this guy linked me to the Goat man!!!"
This would probably increase the usage of Helmets, if only for the coolness factor of a HUD.
;)
;)
Other ideas:
- The helmet should also play mp3 and display the song at the bottom or top each time it changes (tho this could be distracting, and the RIAA would oppose it
- 0 Lux camera to superpose picture at night to improve visibility on highways and blacktops. But with enough intelligence to supress the flaring of incoming vehicle
- SMS !! So you can get localized spam from nearby stops and restaurants (joke)
BTW: no bikers i know would even want to know/care the speed and deceleration of their heads hitting pavement. I believe the whole point of riding a bike is not to crash
Isn't that what makes it a HUD, that you don't look down? Indeed, isn't that why the term "heads-up display" was coined, to contrast it to instrument panels that you had to look down to read?
That being said, I agree with the sentiment expressed in your post. Having information displayed on a helmet overlay seems like a great idea, it means the motorcyclist won't have to look down to get information, and more space is available to display a greater variety of data.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
With witty lines like that, I can't believe the poster refrained from making reference to 'murdercycles'. Helmets are largely a nonissue WRT motorcycle safety these days. They are 'safe enough', provided they are worn. (I'd like to ride in a state with helmet choice, but I'd always choose a lid.)
There are three issues that overwhelmingly appear in motorcycle fatalities. The first is alcohol. Alcohol use BY THE MOTORCYCLIST is the number one rider controllable factor in fatalities. Eliminate alcohol, and you eliminate 25% or more of motorcycle fatalities and accidents. That is why Harley does its customers a disservice by providing beer tents at events. Because of the number of factors a rider must juggle, the effects of alcohol are more readily apparant on bikes than cars.
The next issue is ignorance by other road users, primarily passenger vehicle operators. Nope, bikers aren't getting squashed by semis, they're getting squashed by SUVs and minivans. I've long been a proponent of tougher licensing standards in the US.
And the final issue is rider skill. Riders who are self taught or taught by friends and family are over six times as likely to be involved in an accident. That's why the MSF came into being. Yes, I'm an instructor, no, I don't speak on their behalf.
The value of HUDs, particularly WRT driver/rider safety at highway speeds found in the US (where this inventor is located) is of questionable. Lack of access to engine and/or vehicle statistics doesn't even appear in any accident statistics. Sure, this is a neat toy, but judging by the writing by the AC submitter, I think he's just pissed at having been passed by even the most mundane of motorcycles.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
I know on my Intruder 1500LC, I'd like this on my windshield. My speedo is on the tank, and it's a good glance down to check speed & fuel level (no tach on my V-Twin yet). On my old FZR600, this would have been sweetness indeed in my helmet - mid-corner, close to apex, check RPM/gear/speed - without looking down. IF you could make it unobtrusive yet visible. IF, if, if. Motorcyclists don't need distractions - I'm using 100% of my senses to look ahead, beside, and behind to watch for cagers when I'm riding.
If you've never ridden before, don't condemn or judge or pretend you know anything about motorcycling. Until you've tagged your favorite twisty road on two wheels, just ridden 150+ miles to have breakfast with your buds, or just ridden to be out... I can't explain it to you. You have to experience it.
If you ride, keep the shiny side up! Winter won't last forever...
"If there's hope, it lies in the proles..."
If you've ever driven a car and instead of focusing on the road in front of you, tried looking at the windsheild, you'd realize just how hard it is to change focus quickly from the glass to the road. Now try driving with glasses on and focusing on the lenses of your glasses, while staying in your lane.
Further, when I go riding I spend most of the time with my visor up, to feel the wind on my face and enjoy the ride. Why would I want to keep my visor down, just so that it can tell me I'm speeding when I already know?
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Sorry, but I have enough to worry about on my bike, here is a short list.
(1) drivers who are conditioned to not notice anything on the road smaller than an excursion, and will pull out in front of me while seemingly staring at me.
(2) Those same drivers making a left turn at a light, not noticing I'm in the oncoming lane
(3) wet leaves
(4) oil, antifreeze, pretty much any liquid
(5) deer (PA, nuff said)
(6) Other bikers. Don't get me wrong, it can be very safe if you just take precautions, unfortunately sometimes it seems like I'm the only one on two wheels who is sober, wearing safety equipment, and not trying for the sound barrier.
(7) People. They won't walk out in front of a car but for some reason will dart out in front of a motorcycle. Mutually assured destruction I guess.
So no thanks, I don't need any more visual distractions. I wouldn't say no to a device that spoke my current speed into my ear at the touch of a button (preferably on the handlebars).
Finkployd
I would say more, since (1) GPS speed, in my experience, is very accurate, and (2) because motorcycle speedometers are notoriously inaccurate.
Finkployd
Instrument panels technically are HDD's. Heads Down Displays. I could see the benefit of a HUD on a vehicle, it would make it much easier to target objects (and people)with your remote controlled roof-mounted machine gun. Dont have a remote controlled roof-mounted machine gun? That's not my problem.
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Best thing I have ever heard them called, (at least, in regards to smaller faster [usually japanese] motorcycles) was:
Darwinian Accelerators.
Still laugh at that one.
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most of the dangers to motorcycle riders isn't them getting distracted themselves but by people in cars not paying attention.
"Tread softly because you tread on my dreams"
Actually the most common danger to motorcyclists is alcohol. The majority of bike accidents do not involve cars, read the Hurt Report.
Don't get me wrong, moron cagers are a danger, but this whole 'down a few beers and ride into the sunset' thing my fellow bikers have such a fixation with has to stop.
Finkployd
You are absolutely correct in your underlying statements about bikers having a lot to pay attention to, yet you don't draw the conclusions. I take it from your comments about bikes being dangerous that you don't drive one yourself?
I drive a Suzuki Hayabusa. For those of you who aren't familiar with it, it's a bike basically built for insane speeding. It starts to accelerate seriously around 80 mph, from where it kicks you up to 180-190 mph while leaving your guts behind.
(As a side note here, speeding is not seen as a particularly serious crime where I live. It's regarded more like a sport. A friend of mine referred to speeding tickets as "fun tax".)
Anyway. When you're cruising down the highway at 140-150 mph or so, there's just no looking down at the instrument panel. The concept of looking down does not exist on this planet. Your focus is ahead, on the road, on the traffic. And sharply so.
Therefore, this is something that will actually make you READ the speedometer. Read the speedometer AT ALL. As it currently stands, the only speed indication you have as a sportbiker is the pitch of your engine, because you sure as hell aren't taking your eyes off the road.
In these conditions, the "spare of your glance" which you are talking about, means you are unaware of the road and the traffic for a minimum of 100 yards travelled (about one second to look down, refocus, and interpret what you are seeing).
So, bring on any and all information you can onto my visor. Anything that rests in my field of view is good, if it means I don't need to take the eyes off the road.
Speaking as a motorcyclist, I don't think this will be much use for me. When I am riding hard, the thing I might possibly be able to use in a head-up display would be a tachometer, not a speedometer. On straight roads, I can spare the glance down. If I cannot glance down because I am in traffic, or heading down streets with blind driveways, etcetera, I am going too fast for conditions, and my life expectancy will reflect that.
If I am on a twisty road, and going very hard (I am thinking of the fabulous Duffy Lake road, a very remote and senic one, famous within the sport rider community in BC, on which I have never seen any scenery), there is no way I am going to use a speedometer at all. In that case, one doesn't use the tach either. Though it is true that a rider at the limit is not easily able to use gauges (a very athletic activity that invloves moving your body aggresively forward, back, and to the sides to change the weight distribution of the bike), the pace of events is too fast for them to be of any use anyway. Race bikes don't have speedometers, and the tack is usually oriented such that at redline the needle is pointing straight up. With experience, you do not need to look directly at it.
An important skill for fast road riding (even more so than on the track) is a zen-like ability to scan your visual field without fixating on anything. Particularly when you 'see' something you must avoid. Looking at an obstacle will often result you riding right into it! Anything that adds distraction in that visual field is not useful. I hold that a rider at the edge needs less information (just the important stuff), not more.
Spare me the head up display. I can see it now, mounted on the helmets of Gold Wing riders everywhere, helping them know the speed at which they are adjusting their radio pre-sets.
That said, how about making that GPS provide you some route data? Arrows that flash left or right, according to a pre-planned route, with a heading? I think that might be more useful and safer than a tank bag map...
Remember: always ride with two fingers over the front brake. Unless your hobby is rock climbing, and you are on a CBR 900. Then use one. DOH!
You know what? A few minutes after I made the post I changed my mind completely and decided this was a bad idea, mostly for the reasons you now write about. :-)
:-) Like you say, the cool factor does not cut it.
When going with the flow of traffic, looking at the speedometer is not important. When ignoring speed limits altogether, looking at the speedometer is not important, either. And like you say, you get the rpm info from the engine pitch, which is plenty.
So I swiftly turn 180 degrees to "get that crap outta my eyesight, I don't need it".
I guess what triggered my post was your reflection that it's much safer to look down. That I still don't agree with, but that's another story.
You are right that I haven't had a deer wander into my peripheral vision, vectoring towards where I'm going to be driving in a split second. That's mostly because they're not so common here, though. Pedestrians happen. Cars definitely happen. The guy who taught me to ride always told me to drive like I was wearing fluorescent clothes, and the first car driver to hit me would win the $1 million jackpot. I still think he has a point.
So, mea culpa, you're right, get this crap off my gear.
(and just for the record, I always wear protective gear: full helmet, bulletproof vest against sharp metal, impact protection jacket, and full-body sliding protection.)
Only those who haven't ridden call them 'donorcycles' or wonder about the speed at which a rider's helmet touches ground during a wreck. Seriously, that was the lamest comment I've seen yet at ./ ... and that's saying something. I wish I had mod points today. Do me a favor -- if you even thought about making a comment like that, go take a motorcycle class. The MSF (Motorcycle Safety Foundation) or your local equivalent (i.e. TeamOregon in, uh, Oregon) offers them in every state. Taking that class is guaranteed to make you a better cage driver, and you could walk out of it with a motorcycle endorsement and an appreciation for the lifestyle and risks that motorcyclists accept in exchange for being able to bomb down that perfect canyon.
As for the HUD ... I don't need any other distractions. Riding a motorcycle, by itself, requires 3 times the concentration that driving a car does. Add in the fact that everybody else on the road is quite literally trying to kill us ... and then add in some serious distractions from a HUD, and you've got a recipe for disaster.
HUDs in cars are a good idea, but motorcyclists are already at their information saturation limit.
--
Vote for your hopes, not for your fears - Vote Third Party
While it sounds cool and all... nifty gadgets and all that. There's no F'ing way I'd want something like that in my field of vision.
I like my guages where they are, and putting something like that in my helmet is just a recipe for disaster as my eyes try to focus in and out between the display and the road and the horizon. It would lead to a lot of eye strain, which directly translates to extreme danger for a motorcycle.
Thanks... but no. The only time a motorcyclist could safely view data like that is when he or she doesn't need it.
If I could get the job of writing this software for this thing it would be the sweetest deal ever. The software would be sooo easy:
while(true) {
if( isGoldWing() ) {
print "Speed: Too slow";
} else {
print "Speed: TOO FAST!");
}
if( rider.age() < 23 ) {
print "Reminder: You suck for wearing a tank top, shorts and sandals.";
} else if( rider.age() > 50 ) {
print "Reminder: You bought a Harley for the vibration, there are cheaper and more portable alternatives";
}
if( speed < mph(60) ) {
waste_of_bike++;
}
excitement_factor += random() + radar(CONST_SUV, 42.0);
if( stoppie_detected() ) {
dumpRider( "You cocky fool" );
}
}
As for people trashing the idea of riding a bike, while you have the possibility of getting in an accident because another driver is not paying attention (or in my case was too old to be on the road) if you drive within the law, stay off the damn sport bikes that have no business anywhere but a track, pay attention to what you're doing, and wear a helmet, you can ride with relative safety.
I'm 21, drove nothing but motorcycles since I've been able to have a permit @ 15.5 years, and loved getting between 60 and 70 Mpg. Believe me, you don't ride a 250 nighthawk to try to look cool or race people, and if that's why you ride a motorcycle, you might as well give up your keys.
For those interested, this was my first accident. I t-boned a chrysler at 40mph, with no helmet on. I was lucky and limped out of the ER 2 hours later with only some staples in my knee and an interesting circular wound to my abdomen from my handlebars. My head didn't touch anything until I came to a rest on the side of the road after getting bounced off her windshield. Had my head impacted anything a helmet would have been more than adaquate to prevent damage.
Even people that believe in pre-destiny look both ways before crossing the street.
My instructor -- very careful rider, showed up to my road test in a neck brace and a back brace. Could it have happened in a car? Sure. Would it likely have happened being rear-ended at a stop-light from a little old lady from Portage la Prairie? Only if she was going a hell of a lot faster than she was.
Two autumns later he dove off his bike to avoid being crushed by a half-ton when he heard it's brakes lock on a bridge downtown. The man is super-experienced on a bike, and he's dangling for dear life on a friggin guard rail.
Yeah, motorcycles are dangerous if you do stupid things on them. Motorcycles are dangerous if you are Mr. Safety, too, because there's always the other half of the equation -- the idiot who comes out of nowhere.
Saying that, I still ride, but I don't pretend there's no danger.
Gauges, bah! - back in my day sonny we just listened to the hum of the engine and we knew approximately how fast we were going - some drivers increased the accuracy by having an experienced Harley Ho on the back telling the driver their exact speed - we also cooked our grub on the exhaust pipe!
and...we liked it.
PS. I'll bet your one of those sissy geeks that actually use the temperature gauge on your mobo instead of using the old finger lick test...
From excellent karma to terible karma with a single +5 funny post...
I've responded to a handfull of motorcycle collisions in my area and only one of the drivers survived. He was bruised all over and had a broken radius and ulna.
Everyone else died instantly when they slammed into another vehicle, guardrail, divider, or embankment.
It's strange though--even after responding to all these, I still want to get a bike...
There's no place like
Actually, here in the UK the biggest problem is "born-agains", who are men in their late 40s to late 50s, taking early retirement, and go buy themselves a nice big bike with that fat wodge of cash they've just been handed.
Sadly, what they fail to realise is that the VFR750 they've just bought is a hell of a lot more bike than the CB750 Honda they had back in '75. Well, *initally* they don't realise this. Shortly after getting to a quiet back road, they find this out, usually a little before they realise that hedges aren't very comfortable.
"I'll bet some horrifying data could be gathered on the speed with which riders' heads impact the pavement after an accident."
CowboyNeal, you are a fuckwit of the highest order.
Motorcyclists are half as likely to be involved in an accident as other road users. You want to know why? Because we're fucking careful on the roads, we actually *observe* what's going on around us despite the fact that when you look up from doing the crossword, driking your latte and putting your fucking contacts in you think we're going too fast when we pass.
So go on, you sit stationary in your cage in that traffic jam for 3 hours of your life every day.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
Yet another "invention" by some idiot who doesn't ride, like airbags for bikers etc etc etc.... A biker does not need ANY instruments to ride, you judge you speed to the road conditions, the actual mph doesn't matter, just "safe" and "smooth" and "controlled" is all that matters. You don't need a bloody revcounter, fuel gauge, selected gear indicator, tyre pressure indicator, inclinometer or any other crap, you can hear and feel everything you need to know, this is the WHOLE POINT of being a biker.... In the real world a speedo has one use and one use only, to make sure you don't get a ticket, particularly here in the UK where councils use speed cameras set at arbitrarily low speeds on good roads and revenue generators, for everything else your brain and your experience tell you everything you need to know about speed. Another thing about this thread, people writing about their local experience and making it sound as though that applies worldwide, it doesn't, alcohol certainly is NOT the major cause of death amongst motorcyclists in the UK... in my own opinion that would be "born again" bikers who sold a 500cc bike years ago when the kids came along and now in later years with increased purchasing powers buy a 1300cc 200mph penis extension, and only discover that they lack sufficient training and experience going into that 60 mph corner at 120..... Similarly helmets, ride here (UK) in winter on motorways and (full face) helmets are beautiful things, they stop your brain from being chilled down to the processing power of a chimpanzee on mogadon... ride in southern europe in summer and no helmet is the only sensible choice, assuming the law allows you to make a sensible choice, which it doesn't. Then we have riders who wear bulletproof kevlar everything and ride around like assholes thinking they are superman, and others who ride around wearing shorts and a tee shirt and sneakers... stupidity, no more and no less. Bikers do not need or want more crap getting on the bike with us, bikers need LESS crap, less distractions, less gizmos, and MORE bonding and feedback between rider and bike in the seat of your pants area. As for me, I'm mid 40's and I've ridden just about everything one time or another, in a lot of places around the world, currently running a 23 year old xs11 special that does everything I ask of it, don't own a car and don't posess a car licence, winter / summer, rain / shine, year in year out and more miles than I can shake a stick at. In all of that time and experience there is ONLY ONE THING that I can think of that is any use, and that is training, not the sort of training that you forget 2 minutes after you pass the exam, but the sort of training that sticks with you and changes how you do things... you just can't have too much of it, and it would be nice is some of the car drivers had some compulsory (2 wheel) training too... ride safe, and don't forget what makes biking fun. freedom. not reading instruments.
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