Motorcycle high-viz, but just different. What do you think?

Off-topic
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0 0 1 590 3365 Mordiglio 28 7 3948 14.0 Normal 0 false false false EN-GB JA X-NONE /* Style Definitions */table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:“Table Normal”; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;}Hi guys,

I hope that the cold weather is not stopping too many of you from venturing out there on your bikes. Winter is certainly here :blink::crying:

I’d like to know what londonbikers think of the following:

I’ve had an idea for a range of motorcycle high visibility garments and Iwould like your opinion.

I ride all year round, and in the winter the commute to and from work ispretty much all in the dark.

I’ve noticed that the standard fluorescent yellow high-viz vest I’m wearingmakes very little difference, especially at night. The only visible things atnight are the reflective H shape strips.

Yellow or orange fluorescent vests might stand out a little during the day,but without the reflective strips they are next to useless at night in my view.

I’ve also noticed that way too many people/workers wear them nowadays, fromconstruction workers to school kids on a walk about. I bet it won’t be longbefore we start seeing office workers and stock traders in the city wearingthem on top of their suites just to cross the street on their way to get lunch(joke)

This extensive use of these garments makes them no different, in my view,from the way too excessive use of street furniture and signage that we see onour roads and in towns today, rendering them almost unnoticeable.

There are simply too many of them out there and they no lounger stand out asmuch as they should.

A research published a few of years back also shows that wearing a whitehelmet is more effective and makes riders more noticeable than just wearing astandard high-viz vest. I do agree with that statement, although I still wear ablack helmet simply because a white one doesn’t appeal to me (fussy biker).

The vast majority of high-viz vests all look more or less the same and insome cases what bikers wear is also a fashion statement. We are proud to beseen with our bike gear on (well, at least I am). I own several nice motorcyclegarments (and they are not cheap), and I’d hate having to cover them up with somethingthat makes me look like a highway maintenance worker or a delivery driver (nodisrespect for those professions of course).

I’ve come up with an idea to create high visibility, ultra reflectivegarments that are more effective and that bikers wouldn’t mind wearing on topof their protective gear.

The garments will be a long sleeves high viz over-jacket; a high viz vest; athin waterproof over-jacket; a thin waterproof over-trousers. All the itemswill be in black (and possibly yellow) and will have ultra reflective paint inthe design to make them look more like actual biker specific garments.

The design (the reflective parts) will be applied on parts of the garmentswith riding a motorcycle in mind, so to cover all actual visible parts of therider, such as upper chest, shoulders, outside arms and elbows, outside legs,etc. as oppose to the standard high viz vest, which is generally sleeveless andwith most of the reflective bits covered by the motorcycle itself.

I’m not trying toreinvent the wheel here, and I’m not bringing anything new to the market. Notnew, just different. The question is, if a biker wants to be more visible(personal choice), especially in the dark, and if they were given the choicefor a high viz vest, would they go for something that looks like this: http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41kgxevfT-L.jpgor something that looks like this (for example): http://www.motorcycleobsession.com/leathers/dainese/suits/Dainese-Tattoo-Back-Detail-Large.jpg(with the white design in reflective paint) Not to everyone’s taste I know, butas an example to make my point, I know which one I would choose.

I am in touch with designers and manufacturers in the UK and we could beready to produce these items in a couple of months, but before I dive into thisproject I wanted to validate this idea and see what other bikers thing.

So, what do you think? Is this something you guys would be interested in?

Thank you in advance

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You need to be careful with this, I have only recently taken a promotion into the offices, I spent 15 years before that working out on the roads, working Nights, winter darkness hours etc. What i find with Hi Vis jackets is that when new the reflective strips can be very bright and the outline of the person they are on becomes distorted, this is just from the simple “H” strap on a standard Hi-Vis, if you now make an extra large area of Hi-Vis material you could seriously distort the view of the car driver coming up from behind to the bike and not know exactly where the bike is on the road therefore putting him in more danger than he already is.

I do however agree with your idea that Hi-Vis isn’t worn by all due to the Yellow jacket spoiling the look of the expensive gear you already wear, it’s the reason i don’t wear a Hi-Vis on my commute or when i’m on a rideout.

If you could produce something and its proven to work i would definately be interested so keep us updated :slight_smile:

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As Sammy said, there’s a lot of science behind this type of clothing and it’s usually made a specific way for good reason.

I usually wear bright green camo draggin jeans, white lid. I go from Enfield to the city every morning and back every evening and weekends I’m usually out 8+ hours riding around on my own like a sad****, I’ve yet to have an issue with people seeing me although that may be more to do with riding in London as it’s generally well lit.

Something which impressed me the other day, a cyclist had this laser thing which projected a big picture of a pushbike onto the ground about 8 feet in front of him. Not sure how relevant that is but I was reasonably amused.

Let us know how you get on, looks like a fun idea. Sam spoke about outlines, how about a single strip which goes down the riders back and down the sleeves aswell?

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Point taken on the level of distortion large reflective areas can produce.
I’ll have to make the design subtle and not too aggressive, and make sure that is tested in various road conditions.

Thank you

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I’ll be completely honest with you, I have never never understood why people on mopeds/motorcycles wear high-vis vests or yellow ‘road sweeper’ jackets & trousers instead of OR in addition to proper motorcycle clothing.

The majority of motorcycle clothing already has quality reflective patches/strips/markings - putting a high-vis vest over it just makes you look like a highway maintenance person commuting.

If you are riding at night on an empty road then its important you can see all around you - if there is nobody else there there is nothing to worry about.
If there is someone there then if they haven’t seen your headlight or your rear red lights and the reflective parts of your clothing - then they’re probably blind and a high-vis vest won’t do much for you.

Similarly during the day - ride with your headlight on, cover your brakes when approaching side roads with vehicles waiting to emerge, use your horn if you think they haven’t seen you or aren’t looking - be prepared to brake or swerve. If other drivers don’t see your headlight and object taller than a car coming towards them - then they’re probably blind or you are riding too fast and you weren’t there when they did their final check and decided to start their manoeuvre.

The people involved in almost all my near misses weren’t looking or don’t look anyway or don’t care :angry:

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Another factor to consider is…

Will this distract people? will they be drawn into fixating on this massive glowing Orb and miss other things on the Road?

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I accept the concern, but I wouldn’t worry too much about the excessive glowing creating confusion for other road users as the design will have an effect in the dark more similar to this http://www.webbikeworld.com/r4/british-motorcycle-gear/bmg-discovery-jacket/bmg-discovery-jacket-reflective.jpg
or this http://www.plsmith.co.uk/_/rsrc/1363471659250/altura-night-vision-wind-stopper/Altura_Night_Vision_2.jpg
rather than something like this http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http%3A%2F%2Fsportlockerdotcom.files.wordpress.com%2F2012%2F01%2Fnvf-running.jpg&imgrefurl=http%3A%2F%2Fsport-locker.net%2F2012%2F01%2F14%2Frunning-playtest-review-nike-vapor-flash-jacket%2F&h=1936&w=2592&tbnid=K3k-FyucKjIVwM%3A&zoom=1&docid=VRDVDvIZajkZPM&ei=GeKGVN7_BoLmUpfYgIgC&tbm=isch&client=firefox-a&ved=0CAsQMygDMAM4rAI&iact=rc&uact=3&dur=970&page=12&start=303&ndsp=27

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Yes, the last picture is exactly what i was eluding too, the 1st picture doesn’t work but the 2nd one is cool, i’d be happy if i had a jacket that had that incorporated into it

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Saw a bike with these laser lights the other day-

I certainly wondered about the practicality and legality of sticking these on my bike. Figured it’s be perfect for filtering down a queue of traffic (think A13 east at 6pm), with huge laser light carving out your presence. So long as you don’t fire them into people mirrors and blind them too much, it’s be fine…

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They would also be great for judging gaps, will stop ars3h0les sctratching your car trying for a gap that isn’t there!!

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I do have an ex police high viz that I wear in the winter mainly due to the fact my commute involves 8miles of unlit country roads & I think its better to be seen

the main problem with hiz viz is if everybody wore them peoples brains would stop registering them thus becoming high viz blind

the legality of most cycle lights are questionable as they arnt supposed to be flashing

Now I wonder if car drivers & motorcyclist’s took to have flashing white & red lights on the modes of transport would they be thrown in the tower of London & there offspring beaten senseless

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I had one bloke yesterday with what can only be described as a flashing search light on his pushbike!! it really put me off as it was blinding me in my mirror as he got close to me at the traffic lights, and if he hadn’t jumped the red light i would have said something to him!

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Kind of on topic, I’ve been searching high and low for a pink high viz H belt, or any pink high viz belt to wear over my black gear, anyone seen any?

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Sams wardrobe would be a good place to look

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ebay item numbers

390305285939

200514046933

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Flashing bike lights are legal (even as the only light) as long as they are approved colour and frequency. Trouble is they’re supposed to have some official approval which almost no manufacturers bother going to the expense of getting. I wouldn’t consider riding my bike at night without flashing lights, the constant ones get lost amongst all the headlights out on the road. Boring link here - http://www.ctc.org.uk/cyclists-library/regulations/lighting-regulations

There is a company called proviz who make reflective bicycle jackets and the effect is really quite pronounced, makes the cyclist jump out at you as a person shaped reflection (as long as the dopey London drivers have remembered to turn their lights on) - much more effective in darkness than regular hi viz vests but I would imagine pretty useless in dusk when the bright yellow of avest stands out

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This needs to be mass produced for all bikers out there… Dragon’s Den anyone?

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I mean this kind of thing, but pink :smiley:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Motorcycle-Motorbike-HI-VIS-Brigh-Belt-Reflective-Fluorescent-/261005381318?pt=UK_SportsLeisure_Cycling_Bike_Lights&var=&hash=item3cc5220ec6

I’ve only seen two people with them, and I must have one! ha

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YES!! haha

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YES!!!

How cool would a leather tron suit be???