Making bicycle helmets cool to wear – Information Centre – Research & Innovation

Specified an solution concerning basic safety and ease and comfort, some customers are likely to opt for ease and comfort. The similar is true when it arrives to bicycle helmets, which are inclined to experience much too warm following prolonged or intense rides. The shape and non-optimised vents in the helmet as well as the insulated liners frequently close up trapping a lot much too a lot heat.

Men and women commuting to operate on a bike, for occasion, do not want a sweaty head and tussled hair because of carrying a helmet. With out compromising basic safety, scientists had been challenged to make the helmets a whole lot cooler to don. The predicament was tackled by the EU-funded SMARTHELMET undertaking which introduced jointly research and sector specialists to come up with a novel remedy.

‘SMARTHELMET undertaking centered on establishing helmets with energetic thermal management, where the ventilation can be controlled autonomously dependent on a rider’s cooling requires,’ suggests undertaking coordinator Tiago Sotto Mayor of the College of Porto in Portugal.

By creating and generating new helmets that are cooler and far more comfy, the hope is that quite a few far more will begin carrying them. Additional bikers suggest a far more energetic populace and quite possibly cleaner air for these who opt for no for a longer time to commute by motor vehicle. Moreover, engineering that could save life is not only wise but is also socially responsible.

‘Moreover, helmets are passive objects with a fixed geometry and shape which cannot adapt to riders’ distinct thermal environments and ventilation requires,’ suggests Sotto Mayor.

Cooler heads prevail

Typical helmets serve only to safeguard a person’s head. So creating one particular that can also perception, predict and adapt its ventilation to the cooling requires of a rider calls for a whole lot of abilities.

For SMARTHELMET, this meant first bringing jointly a mix of specialists in biomechanics, electronics, thermo-regulation, engineering, producing and innovation.

SMARTHELMET scientists then built-in electronics into bicycle helmets to permit true-time sensing of physiological and environmental parameters. These parameters bundled coronary heart charge, temperature and relative humidity, which had been utilised to gauge a rider’s heat output and varying cooling requires.

‘We investigated techniques to adapt the helmet ventilation through adjustments in the functions of its vents and linked their procedure with the rider’s thermo-regulation requires,’ suggests Sotto Mayor.

The findings had been then built-in into an progressive helmet concept to optimise ventilation through sensing, electronics and wise procedure. The concept also took in other variables like surrounding environmental conditions and the cyclist’s amount of physical exercise.

Beyond cycling

LAZER, a corporation that models and sells bicycle helmets in far more than sixty five countries distribute over 5 continents, was also concerned in the undertaking. Sotto Mayor describes the agency as a natural partner to turn the research into progressive wise bicycle helmets.

Even so, he also notes that the research has a substantial prospective in other sectors as well, including merchandise such as bike helmets, industrial protective headgear and even protective apparel.

‘The prospective impression of the operate made in the SMARTHELMET undertaking goes past the cycling entire world,’ he provides, noting that the undertaking has also presented young scientists a great opportunity for arms-on working experience across distinct sectors.