Well... I've personally tested multiple helmets - Don't ask how many as it's all getting a bit foggy[sm=icon_beat.gif] -all at well over 20mph. I can say for certian I WOULD be dead or at a minium at least fubr'ed in at least 3 of them, no question.
Here's the last couple...afterwards

 

[quote]The Deadly Zone: 12 Motorcycle Safety Myths & Misconceptions
THE DEADLY DOZEN: 12 MOTORCYCLE SAFETY MYTHS AND MISCONCEPTIONS

When science meets urban legend and imperfect logic, some of the "facts" motorcyclists think they "know" about motorcycle safety, crashes, and riding turn out to be dangerous myths and misconceptions.

From the February 2006 issue of Motorcycle Cruiser magazine -- by Art Friedman.

Get a group of motorcyclists talking about crashes and safety, and you will almost certainly hear some popular misconceptions, incorrect assumptions, urban legends and intuitive explanations about motorcycle safety that turn out to be wrong when you actually check out the facts. The problem is that believing these misconceptions can increase your chances of being involved in an accident or getting hurt when you do crash.

Maybe you know BS when you hear it, but maybe you have heard some myths repeated so often or by people whose expertise you respect that you think they are actually true. Unfortunately, there are a lot of motorcyclists who do believe them. We thought that some of these fallacies should be brought out into the light of day so that riders have the right information upon which to make informed riding-safety decisions. We also hope it will keep more motorcyclists from repeating such misconceptions to riders who turn to them for advice.

These are the Deadly Dozen, the motorcycle safety myths and urban legends ones that we hear most frequently.


Myth 1: Other Drivers Don't Care About Motorcyclists

It may seem hard to believe at times, but other drivers almost never actually want to hit you. Most of those near-misses come about because they don't always know you are there, even when you are right in front of them, seemingly in plain view. You can be obscured or completely hidden by glare, by other things on or along the road, by the cars roof pillars, the handicap hangtag, or by other traffic. Of course, not all drivers "think motorcycles" and make the effort to look that extra bit harder to see if there might be a motorcyclist hidden by that obscuration or in their blind spot.

Instead of assuming that they will ignore you even when they see you, you should help make it easier for drivers to spot you, especially as the population ages and more drivers have greater difficulty in picking you out. To overcome the fact that you might be hard to see and harder to notice, wear bright colors, especially on your helmet and jacket. Run your high beam during the day. Think about things that can hide you and your bike from other drivers, things that can be as common as the sun behind you, the car ahead in the next lane, or a couple of roadside poles that line up on the driver's line of sight toward you. Make an effort to ride in or move to a location where drivers with potentially conflicting courses can see you before they stray your way.


Myth 2: Loud Pipes Save Lives

Yeah, there are a few situations—like where you are right next to a driver with his window down who is about the to change lanes—where full-time noise-makers might help a driver notice you, but all that noise directed rearward doesn't do much in the most common and much more dangerous conflict where a car turns in front of you. Maybe it's the fatigue caused by the noise, maybe it's the attitudes of riders who insist on making annoying noise, or perhaps loud bikes annoy enough drivers to make them aggressive. Whatever the reason, the research shows that bikes with modified exhaust systems crash more frequently than those with stock pipes. If you really want to save lives, turn to a loud jacket or a bright helmet color, which have been proven to do the job. Or install a louder horn. Otherwise, just shut up.


Myth 3: Motorcycle Helmets Break Necks

It seems logical—you put more weight out there on the end of your neck and when you get thrown off

 

Years a go, it was not compulsary here to wear a bike helmet, even if you did, they where all open face & with no standards, where crap anyway.
So like everyone else I rode without a helmet & can honestly say that even without touching on the safety aspect from having an "off", Just being able to ride without, bugs, rocks, lit cigarette butts, bird **** & pelting rain etc, being blasted into your face at 60 mph, is more than enough reason by itself to wear a helmet. As for statistics, you can get them to say wot ever you want them to. For someone to say that wearing a helmet isn't safer than not, they must have been dropped on their heads when they where babies, (& if they where wearing a helmet, probably never have mattered)

 

Sorry, your roommate is retarded. Let me guess, he rides a Harley?

 

lol no he rides a 97' zx6r and he does where his helmet most of the time for wind and noise reasons he says and also temperature cause its kinda chilly out right now. But he holds to his statement.

 

^^ He's still f**king retarded. You tell him I said that too. Show him this thread, and show him what I wrote below..........

JERBEAR'S ROOMMATE IS RETARDED!

 

That quote is out of context - you have to read the whole letter:

Translating helmet standards into head-on/barrier type impacts is depressing.

Our standards call for impacts with a velocity of about 17.3 mph followed by a second impact at the same point on the helmet at about 14.8 mph. A helmet that can take one of our headforms through these two impacts unscathed could probably handle a single impact somewhat greater than 17.3 mph but certainly no more than 23 MPH.

DOT tests apply two impacts as well, both at around 13.4 MPH implying a single impact capacity greater than 13.4 mph but certainly no more than 19 mph. These numbers all seem pretty dismal compared with even normal traffic speeds but, fortunately, few motorcyclists ever go head-on into a wall.

Most head strikes are glancing blows. The most common accident is the biker is thrown from the bike, falls to the road surface and scrubs off his cruising speed sliding along the roadway. The impact velocity is not his cruising speed but just the downward component picked up in his fall. A fall of two meters (we're metric here) will result in a DOT level impact. If the biker is thrown higher, say up to three meters, it will be a Snell level impact. Of course, with no helmet, a fall of one or two feet can produce death or permanent disability.

What's important is that almost any level of head protection will produce benefits. There are accidents in which even a thick toupee might save someone's life. However, a motorcyclist could not lift, let alone wear, all the helmet he might reasonably be expected to need to survive any reasonably foreseeable accident. For that reason, our standards look to identify all the helmet a rider could reasonably be expected to wear.

This is about the best I can do for an accident description and it requires that you accept our headform and shock measures as a suitable model of human head tolerance. Since motorcycle helmets have been in widespread use since the sixties, it's possible to get a statistical confirmation of their utility. A couple of researchers looked at 14 years worth of data from the Fatal Accident Recovery System and examined accidents involving a motorcyclist and passenger in which one or both were killed. There were a certain amount of these in which one was helmeted and the other was not. When they made allowances for all the other variables, they found that helmet use yields a fifty percent reduction in fatalities for the most serious accidents. They also found that this reduction had been improving steadily over the time of their study. Many interpretations are possible but it seems inescapable that helmets save lives and, reaching only a little further, better helmets save more lives.

Thanks for your interest.

Ed Becker
Snell

 

Found where he got his information. http://www.bikersrights.com/statisti...neck%20injury1 from what i read they say helmets riders and non helmeted riders expierence the same risk for serious injury.

He also won't agree that a helmet absorbs impact he claims " a helemt when you hit a wall or whatever will cause ur head to snap back harder than if just you head hit the wall resulting in much more neck injury. I argue that helmet will actually reduce neck injury because the helmet itself is absorbing the impact.

Please correct me if i am wrong.

 

I agree with Fox. Your roomate is a total tard. Hey if he don't like his face-that's fine, but I like mine so I will ride with my helmet.

 

Like someone said, it has to do w/ the SNELL standards.
http://www.suomyusa.com/ssafetya.htm

Summary- Snell doesn't have the same stringent test standards that BSI does. Thisresults withharderSNELL certified helmets (meaning the shell is tougher and less giving on impact). So that's only thing I could possibly try and see your roomates perspetive.

I do agree that testing should be done by running into a wall by your roomate.