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Lumos helmet - image via Lumos.jpgCycling helmet with indicators beats Tesla Model 3 to design award
The Lumos Bicycle Helmet has won the prestigious Beazley Designs of the Year award for Transportation, beating off two other cycling products as well as the Tesla Model 3, at the Design Museum in London.
The helmet features front and rear LED lights, a set of indicators on the rear which are controlled by wireless controls on the handlebars, and can last a week on a single charge.
Funded on Kickstarter back in 2015, smashing its funding target of $125,000, the Beazley Design of the Year award is the most prestigious accolade placed upon the helmet.
The award wasn't won easily, either. The field the Lumos was competing against featured Tesla's heralded significantly more affordable Model 3 electric car which some commentators have said will begin to revolutionise the automotive industry.
The Lumos also beat off competition from cycling products smart cycling navigation tool BeeLine, and the OKO e-bike.
The Beazley Award website says that winners of its awards should be beautiful, emotive, benefit the environment, innovative, debate provoking, and problem solving.
>Read more: Hate remembering your lights? Lumos launches helmet with indicators
The individual who nominated the Lumos Helmet for the award is listed as Paul Marchant. In the nomination letter Marchant says the helmet addresses "the main reasons given for not taking up cycling in the UK."
He says that he hopes that "by enabling cyclists to signal and communicate with other road-users will encourage and enable cyclist and motorist to coexist and cooperate, in turn leading to safer roads for everyone."
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36 comments
Apparently they have a MIPS helmet out now.
I've only ever seen the one helmet out on the road. I thought they'd folded.
https://uk.lumoshelmet.co/products/lumos-helmet-with-mips?utm_source=goo...
I've seen a few about; I wear one myself.
Most people don't seem to bother with the indicators, though - they just keep the helmet on Flashing mode and use it an additional set of lights.
I keep it on steady, because I detest flashing lights (harder to track), and I use the indicators (because I'm a handcyclist, I don't have time to put my arm out).
Why do people always forget that handcyclists exist; Tell me, how do I turn my cranks, steer, and stick my arm out all at the same time?
This helmet is a great bit of kit for adaptive cyclists.
That's not entirely fair - there are clusters front and rear, and they extend well down the sides. Also, you should be indicating well before you intend to make the manoeuvre (having, of course, taken a look behind you before doing so).
If you're signalling, then looking behind you - you're doing it wrong.
I stand corrected on the car indicator thing. Sorry. Taxi front indicators are especially dim. I must have been thinking more about some of the newer rears, and I did see a small merk today with alright front ones. I guess I also actively look for them too, so might notice them a bit.
This is a strange request, but could we, as a consensus, drop the M and call it SIDSY, because if you're killing and seriously injuring enough for hospitilisation and causing permanent imparement, you are not really a "mate"?
I knew someone who used to call everyone "pal". This one day someone said to him "Oi, don't call me pal, makes me sound like a tin of dog food" to which he replied "Sorry chum".
I empathise with you but SMIDSY is well established now as an acronym and it does represent what drivers say in real terms rather then what we would prefer them to say (which of course is "after you mate, you've got right of way").
The thing with this sort of thing is does it do anything that something else doesn't already do? Not really.
If I want a rear light there are better and a LOT brighter options. If you're going to indicate with your hands anyway there are gloves with reflective material that work just as well.
The final consideration is how much does it cost? £145 for what amounts to a commuter style helmet. Get lost.
"The Beazley Award website says that winners of its awards should be beautiful, emotive, benefit the environment, innovative, debate provoking, and problem solving."
Beautiful? Well a matter of aesthetics, so not proven. Emotive? Doesn't make me well up. Benefit the environment? Definitely not. Innovative? It combines two proven useless things, which might be considered innovative, but hardly the way I'd describe it. Debate provoking? Definitely scores on that one! Problem solving? No.
So that's one postive out of the five criteria, and it won? What the hell were the rest like? Presumably they didn't even provoke debate.
"In the nomination letter Marchant says the helmet addresses "the main reasons given for not taking up cycling in the UK.""
Mr Marchant appears to be utterly misinformed about why people don't take up cycling. It isn't flashy helmet gimmicks, it's the danger from drivers, which this helmet/indicator idiocy will do nothing to address. Presumably this is the same Paul Marchant who is CEO of Primark, a leader in the cheap fashion industry, which might explain a lot.
Thankfully, this award will have no effect, and the combining of two useless devices into one completely useless device will be doomed to failure. Did Beazley not bother reading their own criteria for one of their own awards?
2 men walking through the jungle one day come across a hungry tiger. Calmly the first man takes a pair of running shoes from his backpack and starts putting them on. "Don't bother" says the second man."You can't outrun a tiger." The first man finishes doing up his laces and replies "I don't need to outrun the tiger, I just need to run faster than you."
Far as I am concerned you unlit, ninja doofuses make my chances a little better. (But I'm drawing the line at strapping one of these Lumos things to my head).
You know, that analogy isn't so bad. You have a selfish, myopic prick who is only out for number one, doesn't think about teamwork or the bigger picture, and is about to realise that even if he repeatedly outruns individuals, in the long term the jungle will be full of man-eating tigers and devoid of saps he can outrun.
So how does it end? He gets eaten by a tiger, doesn't he?
I have Orfos Flares for side visibility, reflective tape all over my bike and tonight was wearing a yellow jacket (not hi vis, just yellow.) It still didn't stop someone nearly crashing into me at a angled T-junction (for which they had extra time to see me because I would be going as fast a car.) I was on the road but they just didn't give way then screeched to a halt a foot away.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.4731682,-2.2534855,3a,75y,303.48h,75.73t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sbQeFQ4yrZQukrACHu8_VjA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656?hl=en
I was crossing, this is motorists view.
If they don't look they don't look. Don't diss the helmet if it helps a few cyclists, though it is just a placebo against idiocy.
The point is that even if it does help a few cyclists (and the jury's out on that one), it can't do any harm, right? Wrong.
We're already seeing the line blurring between drivers taking proper care (a legal requirement) and cyclists being penalised for not wearing safety equipment that doesn't come with proof regarding its effectiveness or a legal obligation. Court cases and government KSI stats question whether cyclists were wearing hi-viz, dark clothing or helmets.
What unsubstantiated gimmicks like this do is move the marker further down the road towards making cyclists responsible for drivers doing what drivers should be doing anyway. They don't look properly, so we try harder to be seen, so they have to look even less. Drivers, the wider populace and courts come to expect that unless cyclists go out covered in flashing plastic they're dicing with death. Meanwhile, cars get safer for the occupants so the trend is that drivers are expecting 'others' to mitigate for their complacency. That makes roads more dangerous for us.
But yeah, some wallies like up there ^^ are happy to unthinkingly sleepwalk us further down that route because flashy helmet, and haters gonna hate, yo.
What a bunch of haters!!! Do you have one of these helmets? I do and I get asked by cyclists all the time where did I get the helmet, as apparently the red blinking light at the back is very visible - day or night! I also found unexpectedly that I appreciated the indicator lights as I live in a hilly area and I appreciate being able to tap the indicator button and then focus on braking and shaving off speed before I turn (or stop if I am crossing traffic).
That said... education is needed. I doubt car drivers are looking at bike helmets as indicators yet and I've had a few mexican standoffs at intersections where turning traffic doesn't believe I am going to turn as well and will wait as if I am going straight. In addition, I admit as much as I love the indicator light when braking, I will still stick my arm out if I am crossing from one side of a car lane to another (because of the idiotic way the bike lanes are in my city) to avoid being hit by cars who are concentrating more on turning or getting into the next lane than on a cyclist about to lurch out from one side of a car lane to another.
But. My goal when cycling is to be as visible as I can possibly be and this helmet makes me feel VERY visible - and I know from both passing cyclists and car drivers that I AM visible - and for that I applaud Lumos!
Sorry to disappoint you but that's not necessarily the case.
If you think the helmet makes you more visible that's good but there's no need to get snarky with people who have genuine misgivings about the product.
If you're compensated by them, it's good form to let everyone know.
The problem with motorists is their inattentiveness, they fail to notice the things around them unless they're other motor vehicles, and sometimes they're oblivious to them as well. We all have LEDs, it's unlikely even more LEDs is going to make much of a difference. Not to mention that the helmet signal is only effective if you're holding your head at the correct angle for each driver since the LEDs will move with your head. Legally, you're still required to use hand signals if able. I notice too you said other cyclists asked about your helmet.. no motorists?
Can't do any harm I suppose, but I wouldn't buy it. Partly because I hate and detest micro-USB connectors with a passion I am unable to fully articulate.
On a computer, in the warm and dry, they may be fine. In a dark garage at 6 o'clock on a wet and stormy morning they are useless in my clumsy, impatient, gloved hands. Give me a fat, shiny, co-axial connector every time; I've had one on my old RSP light for ten years and it works brilliantly. Even for me.
I'm glad the tesla didn't win, the scooter (not mentioned in the peice) seems interesting. Gorogoro smartscooter, more of a system than an actual scooter.
They only work if the cyclist is looking straight ahead? And also...aren't the indicators a bit too close together to work properly? Especially from a distance.
Precisely. Whoever designed this is clearly not a cyclist. Indicators have to be widely spaced to work properly. That's why motorcycles have them on horizontal stalks.
I've seen this ridiculous helmet being promoted on fakebook and, as soon as the rider turns his head (y'know, just after you've signalled and before manoeuvring) the rear-mounted indicators disappear from the view of following traffic. It is a spectacularly stupid invention.
They ought to fit these new fangled indicating devices on cars first and see if they work.
Maybe next years winner will be a coat with indicators on the lapels..
or a horse with them on its @r$£
This gets my vote for Post of the Week!
(though I realise it's only Monday...)
What a load of absolute garbage. Useless and irrelevant and amounts to nothing more to sticking some LED lights on an existing invention, the helmet. Would not make cycling easier or safer. Serves no purpose. An insult to any other nominee or previous winner.
"The Beazley Award website says that winners of its awards should be beautiful, emotive, benefit the environment, innovative, debate provoking, and problem solving."
Well, it would certainly appear to achieve emotive and debate provoking! The remaining requirements seem to be questionable.
I'd rather have a Tesla 3.
The winning design had to be "...beautiful and emotive..."?
I think it is telling that a helmet with wifi lights is judged to be the pinnacle of transport design. Is that the best we can do?.
One of the problems with bike indicators of any sort is that a bike is too narrow for them to really show left vs right clearly. Even if you can distinguish the signal, what's the point? I don't think failure to see turning signals is a major root cause of danger for cyclists.
This design is destined to have a very short and inglorious life as a product.
I see they are belt and braces in the video as they still do a hand signal. Clearly not that confident in drivers paying attention.
From watching the video, it suffers the same problem modern car indicators do - overpowered by the other light.
Sorry Yorkshire, going to have to disagree with you there , modern car indicators are perfectly visable, they use lots of modern, bright LEDs, motorists have just become so lazy that flicking that little stalk with a finger is a bit too much for them.
My experience is the opposite.
I frequently see cars turning and the indicator light is only properly visible (or discernible) as they turn. This may be a combination of good (bright) headlights and small, piss-poor indicators placed right next to the headlight lens - usually inboard from the wing. I think this, along with the widespread use of (sometimes dazzling LED) DRLs, is a real safety issue IMO.
Sadly those two facts are so true. SMIDSY is a fact of life on the road, regardless of how much hi-viz etc you wear. I'd not want to endorse a helmet or other piece of kit that didn't really help, as I feel is the case here. It can easily lead to a false sense of security. There's really NO substitute for assuming that all road users are idiots and driving/riding/walking with that in mind.
Glad you came away unharmed but it's never a nice experience. Non-cyclists don't understand how each near miss can have a very unpleasant long term impact on the individual.
What problem? I can signal with my arms. So if this is for cyclists with no arms then I suppose it could be useful. Except I'm not sure how they're going to work the remote control.
Not to mention using the handlebars...
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