Childs bicycle helmet....

i've seriously got to get my son a bike helmet.

so, anything to look for?
i havent bought a helmet for about 10years (not needed to replace mine yet - *touch wood*.

is there much of a muchness? i.e. BMX style, traditional Bell style, or the flashier streamlined ones..?? adjustability etc...??

He's 3 years old, head is quite large - his mother can testify to that :twisted:
all i know is that it should compliment his red fire chief bike....

Dennis the menace!

twain":30e5o8nh said:

i've seriously got to get my son a bike helmet.


i havent bought a helmet for about 10years (not needed to replace mine yet - *touch wood*.

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you do know they have a usable service life though? should be replaced after 5 years of use due to general degredation and wear.

Chute55uk":3ijp0sjy said:

you do know they have a usable service life though? should be replaced after 5 years of use due to general degredation and wear.

Click to expand...

I think there is some debate on that ?

http://www.helmets.org/replace.htm

there is also some stuff on kids helmets but not read it yet

Personally I wouldn't spend more on a child's helmet than would guarantee it's passed safety standards, reason being that it's unlikely to last very long (either he'll have a growth spurt, he'll validate the reason for getting the lid in the first place and hit it on something or it'll get damaged in some other way).

I completely agree that children should wear helmets though, their balance skills aren't as developed and their heads are heavier in relation to the rest of their bodies so a helmet will protect them when they fall off.

To my mind have two options.

1/If you want to protect against bruising grazes and skull fractures then buy an inexpensive helmet. All helmets have to pass current safety testing and paying over the odds will not get you a safer helmet.

2/ /If you want to protect against bruising grazes skull fractures concussion and brain injury then buy a MIPS helmet (Multidirectional Impact Protection System) helmet. These still have to pass standard impact tests but also "rotational acceleration" testing. As most brain injuries and concussions are caused by sudden rotations of the brain and not direct impacts.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8W5X0s2AhU
http://www.bicycling.com/sites/default/ ... Helmet.pdf
Or enter MIPS helmet into Google Shopping.

Slight disagreement there Graham. All helmets have to meet a very, very basic minimum standard. That is very different from saying that they all meet that standard, but none will exceed it so just buy the cheapest.

And then there are factors which aren't measured but are still very important, such as fit, standard of ventilation, efficiency and and comfort of the fastening system, General durability etc, and the cheap ones tend not to do very well in these areas.

Aldi/lidl. Good child helmets and not expensive.

My son's been using his for years and is now passed down to my youngest

There was a test were they took a range of helmets from bargain basement to very expensive and but them through the standard drop test from 6ft onto a metal plate. They all passed. This is not surprising as helmets are not really designed to protect you, but to simply to pass this test.

Surprisingly, if they were to drop them from 3ft they would all fail. This is because at 3ft the foam is too dense to compress and so absorb any energy. Soften the foam to pass the 3ft test and it would compress too easily on the higher test. Using denser foam on an expensive helmet may make it pass an 8ft test but it would then do even worse on a 3ft test.

The solution would be to use multiple foam layers of different densities. But until the tests also specify that a helmet must pass both a 3ft and 6ft drop, the helmet manufacturers will continue to fob us off with substandard designs. Be they expensive or cheap.

So ride a BIG bike!