oceanplay wrote:rick i also was thinking of that and than i realised the use it was made for that white water rafting has some big pull also. i will post on how it handles some big impact i will go hard on it and put it to the test when it comes in.
I think some of the better kevlar shell, one impact foam helmets around that should work for kiteboarding were designed for kayaking. Still the bill concerns me. Unless you are plunging over waterfalls, I don't think you are likely to T-bone into the water from 20 or 30 ft. high hitting at speed. Then again, there are all those rocks to think about in streams but that is a different matter from drag on impact with water.
I just came in from a nice powered up session tonight. The wind built up a bit unexpectedly into the upper range for the 13.5 m kite that I had up. Add to that I was having some trouble with some new footstraps on my backup board allowing my feet to slip out. As a result I managed to induce a single and then double kiteloop by accident resulting in my slamming into the water at HIGH speed among the waves on some jumps. One of those times I hit head first. Fortunately, the Protec Ace Wake didn't load up to where I noticed any pain, in my head anyway. I would NOT like to have gone through a couple of impacts like that with any more helmet drag than absolutely necessary.
tautologies wrote:Hey Guys
I am convinced, but I need some advice when selecting the right equipment. What is a good helmet? What am I looking for in terms of type. Can one use a rollerblade helmet? Or are there any particular features that the kite helmets need?
Best regards
Alex
You want to try to find the best helmet that you can. I would not use a rollerblading helmet. I went through an accident with a marginally padded skateboarding helmet and in hindsight really would have preferred to have had something better on to have potentially lessened the degree of injury.
A good helmet should be light, comfortable, well secured and close fitting, well padded and not with the soft squishy foam alone either, it would be great if the shell is of kevlar but there are a lot more ABS plastic models out there, the hardware should be corrosion resistant, it should have proper protection over your forehead, not retain excess water or be too bulky or have excessive drag. What we really need is a purpose designed and fabricated helmet for kiteboarding. For now though you might have to choose the most appropriate wakeboarding or kayaking helmet that you can find.
There are two main types of helmet foam, single impact and multiple impact. With single impact (normally polystyrene or styrofoam) you have some of the best impact absorption available. The downside is that you hit it once, you throw it away and some of these models have too much drag for kiteboarding. The multiple impact foams allow just that mulitiple hits but the downside is that they aren't quite as efficient as polystyrene in absorbing impacts.
The other posts listed above contain a variety of helmet ideas. I am using a Protec Darrian Ace Wake while I look around for something better and with a kevlar shell. Lots of Pros use this model as well. I am interested to hear more about what people have experienced with some of the new kayak helmets under a variety of conditions.