Helmet

Peter Fonda's Stars and Stripes helmet from the movie Easy Rider (1969) went to auction seven days ago ... and failed to raise a single bid of $25,000. By my assessment, it's worth more than $500,000. What happened?

When we last heard from Lumos, the bike helmet company had announced a model which was simply equipped with a "smart" tail light. The firm is getting fancy again, however, with its turn-indicating, 360-degree-illuminating, crash-detecting Nyxel.

Using a series of inflatable ribs, the Ventete aH-1 bicycle helmet folds like an accordion when deflated to carry as easily as a laptop. When it's time to saddle up, it inflates back into helmet form via an electric pocket pump in seconds.

Lockheed Martin's F-35 Lightning II is the most expensive military fighter plane ever produced at US$109 million per craft plus $6.6 million in annual operational costs – and the helmet you need to fly it is one of the most impressive features.

An experimental new helmet could save drivers of construction vehicles from serious injuries. The device measures the extent to which its wearer is being shaken up while driving, and sounds an alert when the shaking gets to be too much.

The Aerohead II is definitely one of the strangest-looking bike helmets ever made. It should be right at home in the world of time trial racing, however, where aerodynamics are king and style just doesn't matter.

As the only visible part of a Formula One driver on global television each race, the F1 racing helmet has become a modern icon. But in a world where a Mickey Mantle baseball card is worth US$12.6 million, it's amazing how little F1 helmets sell for.

People have been collecting helmets for thousands of years, with the finest specimens either closely held or having long ago gone to museums … so when the world’s finest private collection sold at Christie’s this week, it rewrote the record books with seven of the top 20 prices of all-time.

On modern worksites, workers are typically required to carry – or even wear – quite a few electronic devices. The SmartHat is designed to make things easier, by packing a head-load of gadgets into a single safety helmet.

Light-equipped bike helmets are becoming more popular, but not everyone wants all that extra weight, all the time. The Lumos Ultra Fly is made with that fact in mind, as it works with a tail light that can be magnetically attached only when needed.

Given the fact that many ebikes can travel at speeds of up to 28 mph (45 km/h) with little rider effort, should those riders be wearing special helmets? The folks at French startup The Beam seem to think so, which is why they created the Virgo.

Although helmets are required for many sports, Canadian materials engineering technologist Albert Beyer believes that they don't provide enough protection to the back of the head. His solution is a "crumple zone for helmets" known as the DCLR8.