Helmets
Believe me I understand the value of a good helmet. From my experience in Desert Racing, Professional Rock Crawling, Ice Hockey, Skate boarding, BMX, and the Kevlar I wore to “protect” my head during a tour in the Marine Corps, I value my head.
WRSI helmets
WRSI was started with the goal of making paddling a safer experience. Our technology was developed by the the Johns Hopkins Mechanical Engineering Department center for head injury research and prevention.
That design has evolved a lot using the basic technology JHU developed. WRSI has done extensive testing and design and continuously improved the product through industrial designers, whitewater kayakers and independent research and testing. Our helmets have a patented 3 layer enrgy absorption system in order to give them a greater ability to absorb impacts by spreading out the energy over a larger surface area. The patented strap and the o-brace are designed to tighten down when the helmet is pushed back thus keeping the helmet where it needs to be.
We stand by all our products 100% and truly believe from the immense customer feedback we get, that our products have saved lives. We get dozens of letters a year saying “WRSI saved my life and my old helmt would not have done the trick”
We appreciate any information that can lead us to making a better, safer helmet and are always updating the product. We would love to hear about stories like the 2 incidents the individual above described, because we have heard very, very few of those, but have heard many, many positive stories.
WRSI
cool
things you have done well: the liner is great and the fit is excellent. i understand completely the multi-layer protection idea and agree with the idea
things you need to improve: on the outside layer, you need a more rigid plastic, or go to a carbon fiber. the direct observations i have are that the plastic deforms/tears way too easily
i think you have a great helmet for class III, but for the higher speeds involved in class V situations, it needs to be more. part of this may be geographical. up here on the N. Shore, we don’t have the nice smooth granite like many other places, but extremely sharp slate, rhyolite, and the like, that may produce more direct hits than the glancing blows found on smoother rock.
good and better
Seems to me what we have today (compared to a generation ago) is a choice between good and better. Of course your helmet should fit. And of course it should absord a blow, which means it may be a one-time deal. In the meantime, I’m going to try to avoid hitting my head on other boats and rocks. Helmets should be a last resort.