Technology

Paper bike helmet wins Dyson award

Isis Shiffer is the designer of the EcoHelmet: a recyclable, folding cycling helmet made of paper that has won a James Dyson Award. This project is made for people who use bikes and may not always have a helmet with them.

The idea of a bike helmet appeared when she was exploring new cities. She hadn’t a helmet with her and she didn’t want to spend money buying one.

She wants to design a cheap helmet made of recyclable materials that would cost less than $5.

The structure of the helmet is like a honeycomb (for protecting the head of the impact), it is also very solid and is coated with a material that makes it rain resistant (for between 3 or 4 hours). The plan was tasted at Imperial College because they have a test rig for helmets.

The helmet has a limited number of uses and it will deteriorate over time.

The UK’s Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents don’t approve the product because they don’t know enough about it, so they give the award to an Australian group that designed an asthma management system, and to a smart contact lens designer from Canada.

Read more: http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-38004215

I don’t think is a good idea spending money to develop the helmet instead of using that money for doing something useful, like diseases research. I still think this helmet is breakable and it’s made of paper, this can’t be rain resistant!

Well, I’m not agree about this project because is useless, it will be hard to sell and there is no information to prove the real qualities from the product. I’m not supporting this investment. Sorry, Isis!