My father-in-law (Harley rider): "You shouldn't wear those full face helmets."
Me: "Why is that?"
Him: "They are way more likely to snap your neck on impact. You should get a 3/4."
Me: "I'll take my chances and keep my face."

 

I wish I was quick enough to think of that but he kinda floored me with his question and it took everything I had not to burst out laughing.

 

The original Bell Star (first full face helmet, about 1969) looked like a space helmet from a bad 1950's SciFi movie. Tell your father-in-law they've been improved somewhat in the last 40+ years.

 

Ha ha. I'll have to let him know. He's a 60 year old dentist. I think he just wants the chance to repair my grill and cause me pain!

 

Never ceases to astound me how ill-concieved excuses for not wearing good gear and rationalizations for owning sub-marginal motorcycles get repeated enough to become self proving truths.

I wonder what the advantage to fingerless gloves are? Oh, right, picking a slimy one while wearing a half-helmet.

 

Totally forgot that the guy I bought my shadow from was the same way.

On the phone he said that he had a helmet for me with the bike. My first bike, so I didn't have anything other than denim for gear. I showed up, looked at the bike, was exactly as I wanted. I asked about the helmet. He rummaged through the garage and pulled it out (naturally, I replaced it asap, but gotta start somewhere, right?) We got to talking and he said, "yeah I never wear it 'cause I don't want to crash and live in a coma. I was an ER worker for awhile and saw way too many people that were paralyzed in motorcycle crashes. I'd rather just die if I'm going to crash"

Uh, OK. That's a fetch for logic... but to each his own. But it started getting good when I was asking why the pipes were so loud (they weren't straight, but had all the baffling removed). He goes on to tell me "loud pipes save lives" blah blah blah. Oh yeah, gotta have the leather vest b/c leather is so abrasion resistant, but not leather sleeves. Wait a minute. So you don't wear a helmet, but have loud pipes for safety, and wear leathers but not on the parts that would hit when you crash... this is getting good. He was selling the bike to go to school to become a minister.

Now that I think about it, the chin part of a full face helmet snapping off and breaking your neck is a great one... As a dentist I would hope that he had more trust in other humans' abilities to design and build things. If it were a problem, wouldn't they discover it pretty quickly through testing? Or is he and a select few the only ones smart enough to realize that this would be a problem? All those racers... so many lives lost to shrapnel in their throats. AND NO ONE KNOWS WHY or can figure out what to do about it! *****! it's all this extra material in the front! Why the hell have we been putting it there all these years?

Heh, oh man gotta love the little things.

 

7moore7, love the story! I think the rationale of his full face theory was not that something would break off, but that the helmet jutting out was more likely to snap the head to one side. A bunch of B.S. either way.

Heard another good one today. My buddy (he has a '06 1000rr) and I were out riding and an older guy came up and kept asking me just how much bigger and faster was my bike and such. I asked what he was basing his opinion on and he said, "Well you have both of those pipes sticking out and he only has the one under his seat."