Mike Kruger said:A former college quarterback has invented a football helmet with a
radical new design.
# Rather than being lined with rows of traditional foam or urethane,
# Ferrara's helmet features 18 black, thermoplastic shock absorbers
# filled with air that - not unlike his squirt bottle - can accept a
# wide range of forces and still moderate the sudden jarring of the
# head that causes concussion. Moreover, laboratory tests have shown
# that the disks can withstand hundreds of impacts without any notable
# degradation in performance, a longtime drawback of helmets'
# traditional foam.
I find the description lacking in that it doesn't explain that the air
cushions are not pressurized but rather full of air that compresses
under shock loads and is allowed to escape through a metered vent to
absorb even greater displacements. I also would like to see a
force/time graph comparing a conventional helmet with this design
showing both acceleration and displacement.
If it works as the six phases (step through them) shown on this web
site, it is a great improvement.
Quoted message said:Disclaimer: I'm not trying to start a discussion on the merits of
wearing a helmet. I know the usage of football helmets (where you
might get hit several times in a couple of hours) is different than
bicycle helmets (where you are most likely to go years without the
helmet getting any contact). This is a newsgroup, though, and this
sounded like news.
I am also interested primarily in the technical aspects of the design.
Jobst Brandt