Posts
Beginner’s riding gear
Published May 27, 2011 | 
So, you want to ride a motorcycle, but you don’t know what riding gear to wear with your new scooter? Well, look no further. Motorcycle.Com is ready to help.
21st Century Protection
Published October 18, 2010 | Compared to the way the world was when I was a kid, when helmets were optional, and leather vests & blue jeans constituted protective gear, we really do have a wide option of riding garments, protectors, armor, and helmets. The thing is, aside from the invention of some tough new fabrics like Cordura and Kevlar, protective gear remains mired in the mid-20th century. Helmets are still essentially a fiberglass shell with a styrofoam backing, while crash protection is some padding–even if the padding is gel–behind a hard plastic cover.
But in the past several months, that’s really started to change, and some new products are about to appear that constitute a real step forward in applying 21st century materials science to protective gear.
Del Rosario Helmet
This helmet, designed by Del Rosario, is a completely new breakthrough that incorporates a radically new approach in helmet design.
The first layer of protection are gel inserts intended to to eliminate vibrations and other small forces that current helmet technology utterly ignores. While these kinds of forces are unlikely to cause injury, they do cause fatigue and discomfort.
The second layer of protection is a multi-layered laminate liner. Capable of flexing, crushing and delaminating, this liner can deal with a wider range of forces than a traditional styrofoam liner, which can only crush. Through the controlled destruction of this layer, a lower level of force reaches the helmet’s main level of impact absorption.
A carbon frame of arched members composes the Del Rosario helmet’s main safety mechanism. Through the magical power of science, theses arches can be precisely tailored to flex or break in a predictable manner, coping with both high and low energy loads.
Also notice the non-traditional, extremely aerodynamic lines.
Knox Kinesis Armor
Knox Labs has created the Kinesis line of armor, which incorporates a floating shell instead of the fixed shell in current armor offerings.
Kinesis is a revolutionary technology that mimics one of the most successful and natural safety systems which occurs in the human head. When the head is subjected to an oblique impact, the brain can slide along a membrane on the inner surface of the skull, which reduces the forces transmitted to the brain.
Similarly, Knox has created the Kinesis protector which has a ‘floating’ shell. When this is subjected to an oblique impact the shell moves relative to the core protector, creating an alternate load path for the energy. This significantly reduces the force transmitted to the body part in question.
But, that’s just the outer shell. There’s new goodness on the way from d3O labs for the gel backing, as well, in somewthing called “shear thickening gel.
d3o Armor
Shear Thickening gel is soft and pliable as can be, right up to the point it is subjected to a sharp impact, at which point, the bonds between the molecules harden, instantly stiffening the material to distribute the impact. FirstGear is already implementing a line of motorcycle clothing that incorporates 3dO armor.
It’s nice to see such progress on all fronts after 50 years of stagnation in protection design.
Speaking of tires…
Published July 31, 2010 | 
The rear tire on my FJR1300, well scrubbed, but with an adequate safety margin
…I’ve noticed something odd when I go to the shop with my FJR. That’s my rear tire over there. Now, that’s not an extreme-to-the-edge wear pattern, although it does reflect some peg scraping. But I have a 650-pound touring bike, and, while I’m nowhere near the poster-boy for conservative riding, I’m not willing to sacrifice my life to Mr. Inertia.
But every time I go to the shop, I see a number of literbikes and super sports that are worn all the way down to the cords in the center of the tire, and with three untouched inches of tire on either side of the center.
So, I guess I’m just curious.
What, exactly, is it that you sportbike guys are doing when you ride?
Are you just doing burnouts in the parking lot, wasting 100+ bucks per tire in a few days? Or do you just never turn, and ride in endlessly straight lines? How on earth does someone burn through a tire, while leaving the outer two or three inches untouched on either side? And, by the way, you do realize that if you can see steel cords on the surface of your tire, then riding it–even to the shop–is a gamble, right?
I just have this image in my mind of someone who hauls his ZX600 from 0 to 60 in 3 seconds at every stoplight, and then slows to 5 MPH every time he approaches a corner.
Seriously, I’m not trying to be an ass. I really do wonder how you can actually ride a sportbike for any distance at all, and have pristine, untouched, 3-inch chicken strips. You simply have to be doing something stunty, and not using the bike as a daily ride.
And while we’re on the subject of weird riding habits, what’s with the shorts and tennis shoes? I realize that we live in a desert here in far southern California. It’s hot. I get it. But I constantly see guys tooling around in shorts and tennis shoes. And I’m not talking about squids on super sports. It’s almost universal. I see guys on Gold Wings, Harleys, sportbikes, and BMW GSs wearing shorts and Reeboks, tooling around town, and on the highway. And I’m not talking about dumb young kids. I’m talking about guys my age (mid-40s) riding 800 lb tourers.
I mean, granted, I’m a paranoid old woman who wears a full Olympia Motosports suit and full-face helmet to ride 2 blocks to the 7-11, but seriously, why on earth would you hit I-15 on a bike, wearing a T-shirt, shorts, and a ratty old pair of Air Jordans? Even if you’re a super-skilled rider, the roads are full of cager morons who’ll run you over without even seeing you.
You are aware that we are involved in a rather dangerous sport, aren’t you?