The RIDE’STER are high-tech jeans. Wearing them guarantees a very high level of comfort, freedom of movement and protection that meets the highest standards. In fact, they guarantee a resistance of more than 32m to abrasion if you fall off your bike. In addition, the RIDE’STER has A-XOC adjustable impact protectors in the hips and knees. These new generation EC-approved protectors are as comfortable as they are protective.
Here is a short Crash Test video made by A-XOC that perfectly illustrates the shock absorption of the RIDE’STER’s impact protectors.
In this short interview, Pierre Henry, creator of the BOLID’STER brand, talks to us about impact protectors, their different levels of protection and their integration in our jeans models.
For a long time we have been using and even imposing impact protectors in motorcycle clothing to protect bikers when they fall. The truth is that this protection is very weak when you take into consideration the forces involved. For example, helmets are tested at 27km/h… As far as abrasion is concerned, ARMALITH can manage 100% of the energy of a motorcycle fall on a road surface even at impact speeds of 45Km/h, 70Km/h or 120Km/h. In 70% of motorcycle accidents, the rider suffers from abrasion and/or laceration to the legs. This is why abrasion protection is extremely important to us, unlike the current trends and standards. Impact risk is much more difficult.
This standard is based on the measurement of residual energy after a standardized impact on a drop tower. We place the protection to be tested on an anvil. Then there is a spherical steel striker with a calibrated weight (5Kg). The striker is taken up to a certain height (1m), then it is released and falls freely down onto the impact protector. The percussion speed is 4,43m/s or 16Km/h. A force sensor is placed under the impact protector to be tested to measure the residual energy. The initial energy applied according to the 1621 standard is exactly 50KN.
The AXOC protectors integrated in the RIDE’STER (whether it be model 17, model II or even model III currently being prepared) easily pass level 2 since the residual energy is 10KN.
Initially the standard’s level 2 was developed for dorsal vertebrae. The initial energy is the same (50KN) but the maximum residual energy allowed is lower (18KN max for level 1 and 9KN max for level 2).
Even with a residual level of 10KN, the energy that will remain to be “absorbed” by the motorcycle rider will be very high, because in general the initial energies are much higher, on the one hand because motorcyclists weigh well over 5kg…and on the other hand because of the impact speed, which is much higher than the 16Km/h of the 1621 standard.
This standard is a reference and that’s fine, but it doesn’t really reflect the energies that come into play during a motorcycle accident, unlike the abrasion standards.
Also, there are several ways to reach 50J. For example if you imagine more weight at a lower speed or, on the contrary, less weight projected at a higher speed (frequency property), you would still reach an energy of 50J, but then the absorption properties of the protective material would be different.
Also, there are several ways to reach 50J. For example if you imagine more weight at a lower speed or, on the contrary, less weight projected at a higher speed (frequency property), you would still reach an energy of 50J, but then the absorption properties of the protective material would be different.
If we had to summarize, what should we retain about the standard?
In summary, the standard favours impact protectors that absorb energy from an impact of 16Km/h, whereas some materials would be much more efficient at a frequency of 50Km/h for example.
The advantage of the material used by BOLID’STER in its RIDE’STER is that the energy absorption is spectral, i.e. it is applied over a wide frequency range from 5km/h to 150Km/h and not only at the fixed speed of 16Km/h imposed by the standard…It’s logical.
The last element to take into account is that energy increases in proportion to mass. For example, if we double the mass (eg 10Kg), we double the energy (100KN). But the energy increases with the speed squared. That is, if you double the speed (32Km/h), you quadruple the energy (200KN).
In our opinion, abrasion protection should be taken into consideration first, because it can radically change the outcome of an accident. Impact protection is a decoy (except helmets, back protectors and airbags of course) even if any protection is better than nothing.
Thank you very much for your very instructive explanations on the subject.