Sea Kayaking Helmet

WRSI
Has worked well so far. It doesn’t rotate off my head, and I have no problem wearing it all day.

hey smart guy slowcoach
testing indicates the WRSI to be the safest helmet on the market. it also has the best fit for me, based on trying many helmets. the Gath helmets are $230 by special order only in Canada, that’s bloody expensive, maybe not for you rich guy. what the hell are you on about, goth/glitter/grunge, and other diarrhea coming out your finger tips…

well
i’ve tried one on - good fit. but, i’ve only seen 2 helmets fail in person, and they were both WRSI, and i know of a third that failed as well. a helmet that fits well but doesn’t protect is just a hat.

my fave
I too go practical. Why get a helmet for biking, hockey, and white water, and surf? One helmet works just fine.



http://www.delvalhockey.com/bauerhelmets_facial.htm





Only problem is, that after Detroit wins the Stanley Cup, I may have to get a Wings helmet to show my colors.

Try Murray’s.com
Gedi is about $120 with shipping. Skip the visor.

See Sean Moreley, Inquisitor and
others looking silly in Gath helmets …





http://www.dlphotopets.com/KSurfing-Sean/index.html

Touch a nerve?
No offence intended, just celebrating the fact that kayakers are such an accepting bunch that we can accept different tastes and styles in head gear. Was I wrong or is it just spacemen that are excluded. JBV. Did I meet you on that course? Maybe you could reread your own post before accusations of digit diarrhea.



I’m curious what testing you are refering to? For the record I believe WRSI are doing a good job but all research is limited. There has been Millions of $$ and decades of time spent testing Motor Cycle helmets and they still cannot agree what makes a safe helmet except maybe there is no such thing for every situation. Real life experience does seems to contraindicate WRSI but they are setting them selves up for criticism. I’m sure there are plenty of failures with other brands of helmets but they are less fun to talk about. Of course helmet failure is very different to and often protects from head/neck injury.



Are you really being quoted that much for a Gath? Even I’m not that rich. Is there money to be made in the illegal cross boarder trade in crash helmets? Murray’s is the place to go unless you visit Oz on a regular basis.


ha!
You even got my long swim! Nice shots, it kills

me how much Sean was ripping . . . some day, some

day.



I’m hoping the best for your shoulder, gentle,

full range-of-motion exercise, and time. You’ll

be back ripping, up and down the faces, again soon.



BTW, someday I hope to become a really lousy

swimmer ; - )

Those are Dom’s Photos …
He’s getting a few of the phtos of Sean published this summmer in various sporting magazines. Dom is the guy with the slightly French accent paddling the red storm.



Shoulder is much better already. Going to get Physical Therapy going on it.

Murray’s
I discovered these folks when I bought my Gath helmet. I’ve been buying lots of stuff like hardware for modifying my waveskis. Not the cheapest prices in the world but they have really good helpfulservice, you can talk to people that can look at the stuff and help you out and the prices on the Gath products certainly are competitive with other helmets.

Noticed that
they were his looking at them a second

time around and them remembered him

shooting them that day – Stormick.



That’s good news on your shoulder, hope you

can get back soon.

Good Points…
The bottom-line is that you need to be very realistic about what conditions/dangers you will encounter, what a particular helmet can realistically protect you from and how you (again) realistically can expect it to perform. Lot’s of variables and everyone brings something different to the table.

jbv any details on testing?
jbv, can you give any details on the testing that declared WRSI safest? Who conducted the tests? What teats? Any links?



thanks

Kelvin

Stay away from Pro-Tec
Cheap one time impact helmets are not $$ well spent…



I still vote for WRSI for the best value in a “real” helmet.

still disagree
WRSI are comfortable, but the plastic is too soft to really protect in a hit. I have yet to see a single one protect someone in a hit. 0-for-3 is not good odds. They had some good marketing, but their design team needs an overhaul.

WRSI
For the failures that you witnessed, did the guys walk away? When you say failure, what do you mean? Does the yielding of the outer shell constitute failure, in some ways I would say yes. However, that tells me that the out shell absorbed an incredible amount of energy which would have been absorbed by the guys head. That may also be the reason for the multiple layers that WRSI mentions in there design. In most things, somethings got to give. If I had to throw away a helmet after a serious impact I would be okay with that if it saved me from a injury.

helmet failure
in the two cases i observed, they both involved bleeding gashes underneath where the helmet was supposed to be protecting. in one, the plastic tore open in a crack, which either allowed the head to split from the impact or from the crack pinching back on the skin. the other involved a rivet pushing through the plastic and impacting the skin hard enough to make a golf-ball sized lump with a visible impact point shaped exactly like the rivet, with an inch long tear in the plastic as well. kayaking helmets shouldn’t be a “one-hit and out” design IMO. otherwise we’d just use bike helmets. neither of the above hits were anything big. i’ve taken much larger impacts with my carbon shred ready, which both absorbed the hit, and didn’t flex, tear, or have any visible damage other than scrapes/cracks to the paint layer.

design team
http://www.jhu.edu/news_info/news/home02/may02/helmet.html

design team
directly from that website:



“The yearlong project concluded this month when Cordeiro and Lee unveiled a prototype helmet and subjected it to several tests designed to replicate whitewater conditions. The undergraduates attached the helmet to a dummy head, marked its position, then blasted it with a high-pressure fire hose that unleashed water moving at about 30 mph. The straps held the helmet firmly in place, indicating it should continue to protect a wearer’s head, even in a fast-moving river. The students also assembled an impact-test apparatus to mimic a high-speed collision between the helmet and a rock. Their test indicated the prototype helmet should absorb enough energy to prevent a serious head injury.”



so two undergrads, neither of whom i can gather are actual creek boaters design a helmet over a couple of months and test it by blasting it with water and using a vague “impact-testing apparatus”. so, my choice is to go on marketing from their own website, or actual observations from people using the helmet under real conditions, where ALL of them that i have seen have failed relative to other brands of helmets.



look, it’s your head. trust it if you like, but when it’s my life on the line i’m going with something more substantial.

Old Old Old Protec Info
Your information is out of date. Newer models of Protec helmets work fine, take multiple impacts and are used safely by whitewater paddlers and surfers with no problem. You have to make sure any helmet fits. That was the issue with the person who started this reputation for protec helmets.