The Future Is Now: New Helmet Tech
With only a handful of notable exceptions, helmet technology over the past few decades has remained largely the same. However, within the last few years, Bell Helmets and 6D Helmets in particular have introduced several new helmets that feature safety technology unlike anything else currently available. The future of helmets, at least in part, has arrived.
What Bell and 6D have done with their newest offerings is provide riders with helmets that can protect against a variety of different impacts and crash scenarios where normal helmets might fall short.
Similar technology has been around for a number of years in mountain bike, downhill skiing and off-road applications, with the 6D ATR-1 and Bell Moto 9 Flex being great examples of the latter.Traditionally, street helmets are hard shells with a single layer of Expanded Polystyrene (EPS) which works well for absorbing large amounts of energy from high speed/high impact crashes.
Bell Helmets recently launched their revised Star Series helmets and two of the models, the Race Star and Pro star, feature the company’s new safety technology which it calls the Flex Impact Liner. This innovative system incorporates three different liners to manage high, medium, and low speed impacts.
Each liner is made from different materials that work in conjunction with each other to provide a wider range of impact protection than what EPS alone can offer. Additionally, the Flex Impact Liner is designed to protect a rider’s head against the damaging rotational forces that are created when a helmet is impacted at an angle. Unlike traditional helmets, the innermost liner of the Pro/Race Star can act as a slip plane and shift in relation to the other two liners to help reduce the potency of those rotational forces. Bell has also recently launched its Qualifier DLX MIPS street helmet that utilizes the popular MIPS (Multi-Directional Impact Protection System) technology.
6D’s solution differs from Bell, but it’s equally as exciting and unique. The company’s Omni Directional Suspension (ODS) system is the magic behind their ATS-1 street helmet. Put simply, the ODS system is made up of two dozen or so small hourglass shaped pieces – what 6D calls Elastometric Isolation Dampers – that essentially act as shock absorbers for your head.
Inside the helmet is an inner EPS liner that fits on the rider’s head and another layer of EPS that is attached to the shell of the helmet. The two liners are connected by the dampers and as an impact occurs, the dampers can compress vertically, twist, or shear from side-to-side. Like Bell’s Flex Impact Liner, this reduces the energy from low, mid, and high speed impacts, and helps counter the effect of rotational forces on a rider’s head.
Another element that both systems introduce into an impact scenario is time. If we dust off a little high school physics, we know that the more time a transfer of energy (impact) takes the less force it has. Because both the Flex Impact Liner and ODS are dynamic safety systems and contain “moving” parts, they can prolong the amount of time that the helmet is dispersing the energy from a crash and ultimately protecting the rider.
It’s always been a wise choice to wear a helmet when hitting the road and this new technology makes it even wiser.
Article By: Doran Dal Pra @RideNowPowersports