Greg Crane
Interesting info. The only problem I have with it is;
a "sexy Euro helmet" might be the only way to make
some local team kits look less CMGish. Not that there
is anything wrong with the way CMG kits look. I like
the CMG kits. I can spot them a mile away, which just
happens to be how far up the road most CMG riders are
from me.
Greg
--- Candi Murray wrote:
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Les Earnest [mailto:les@cs.stanford.edu]
> Sent: Friday, May 04, 2007 3:00 PM
> To: ncnca@ncnca.org
> Cc: Farrell, Shawn
> Subject: USA Cycling invites you to break your
> noggin
>
> Last year, USA Cycling announced a helmet rule
> change, allowing
> helmets meeting a European standard called CEN to be
> used -- see
>
http://www.usacycling.org/news/user/story.php?id=2109.
> The Chair and
> Vice Chair of the Headgear Subcommittee (F08.53) of
> ASTM
> International promptly contacted the USA Cycling
> staff to recommend
> that they reconsider this change, pointing out that
> even though some
> helmets meeting that standard also meet U.S.
> requirements, which are
> set by the U.S. Consumer Products Safety Commission
> (CPSC), many such
> helmets do not. The key issue is that the CEN
> testing procedures can
> be fiddled so as to get helmets to pass that are
> actually unsafe.
> Specifics on the inadequacy of the CEN standard in
> the opinion of
> Dave Halstead, F08.53 Chair, are given at the end of
> this note.
>
> Halstead invited USA Cycling staff members to come
> to his testing lab
> to witness comparative tests of helmets meeting the
> CEN and the CPSC
> standards. When I returned from a trip to Alaska
> last September I
> joined the discussion and also urged that USA
> Cycling reconsider its
> helmet rule change. I received friendly responses
> indicating a
> willingness to reconsider but the invitation to
> witness comparative
> texts was not accepted and nothing further happened.
>
> Having tried and failed to get this matter resolved
> off-line, I am
> now going public. Fortunately, Helmets meeting just
> the CEN standard
> cannot legally be sold in the U.S. but you or your
> friends can get
> them overseas and bring them back. Please do not
> succumb to the urge
> to buy a sexy Euro helmet that might put you in a
> coma for awhile or
> that might leave you with impaired speech for the
> rest of your life.
>
> If you would like to know what happened the last
> time we had really
> stupid helmet rules, go to the Cyclops USA web site
> at
> http://www.stanford.edu/~learnest/cyclops/, scroll
> down to September
> 1989 and read "The brain bucket bash."
>
> -Les Earnest, Speaking for myself and not for any
> of the
> organizations with which I'm affiliated
>
> -----------------------------------
>
> As pointed out in September 2006 by Dave Halstead:
> "The issue is that the helmeted head form is
> unrestrained, it is not
> riding a rail. As such, by playing with the
> geometry of the
> shell/helmet you can get the helmet to spin on
> impact. The spinning
> action attenuates or more correctly redirects the
> energy from a
> linear motion to a rotational motion. The linear
> only accelerometers
> in the head form record the low g's and everyone is
> happy. Here then
> is the problem , if you do not get the spin, then
> you get the high
> linear g's. If you do get the spin, the linear g's
> are in fact low,
> but the rotational forces are high. It is a stupid
> test
> system. These helmets will result in increased
> injury."
>
> Dave also remarked:
> "I do think that the error is in an attempt to make
> a direct
> comparison. If the CEN standard required a
> restrained, direct impact
> then the difference is not that much, but it does
> not require a
> restrained direct impact. We tested two CEN
> compliant models here
> last week to the CPSC standard. This was a case of
> the manufacturer
> stating `We will test to the CPSC just to be sure
> but as it passes
> CEN we know they are fine, except maybe for the
> label'. The best
> number we got was a 338 [g] and the worst a 420.
> This is not a
> surprise to us and happens in almost every case of a
> CEN helmet
> submitted to us for CPSC."
>
>
>
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