courierguy wrote:I got into the habit about 35 years ago, when I was driving a 2 WD Toyota diesel pickup, wonderfully economical but gutless driving up the 1650' vert slope I lived on then every. It was dead weight, maybe only 30 lbs., but do it twice and that's 60 lb.s, do it for a year and that's a bit over 5 ton. In all my running around local, say within 50 miles, in the last 30+ years, I have never been stranded by a flat tire, not once. Even if I were, I'd make a phone call and get picked up or whatever.

Gosh, when you look at it like that- that second kidney must be setting you back at least 100 lbs per year.

You'd have to drive this road. It starts out steep, and gets steeper. Back then, in that rig, if you didn't make it through the first switchback in third but had to drop down to second you were in second for the remainder of the drive, another 2.5 miles. Keeping it light as possible and keeping the speed up let me stay in third and cruise up easily at 35 + mph instead of a plodding 25 in second. At 35+ I would be in the flow of any other traffic (just a few neighbors) at 25 I was in the way, with few places to pass. I laugh about it now but times were tight as I had just bought my first acreage, and doing without a spare seemed like a minor deal, still does. Now I can drive the hill in 5 th. in the Dodge Cummins, or in the Prius, at over 50, times are good, but I still ain't packing no frigging spare up and down just in case. I'll gladly walk home if needed or call a friend or a cab, just to prove I'm correct in my thinking,ha ha, if I ever get a flat. But after 35 years more or less, I'm already ahead of the game. I have aviation to blame for that kind of "keep it as light as possible" thinking.

Mauleguy wrote:30 lbs is the craziest reason I have heard of for not carrying a spare. Now if we are talking about light weight airplanes then I will buy into it but when you are talking about a 3000 lb truck that's does not make sense to me.

I have had plenty of flats with perfectly good tires with many different kinds of objects. The passion rock is just one of them (just another Fu$%ing rock)

Mauleguy wrote:30 lbs is the craziest reason I have heard of for not carrying a spare. Now if we are talking about light weight airplanes then I will buy into it but when you are talking about a 3000 lb truck that's does not make sense to me.

I have had plenty of flats with perfectly good tires with many different kinds of objects. The passion rock is just one of them (just another Fu$%ing rock)

My brand new truck with 2000 miles had a blow out. Guess I wasn't taking care of my tires.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Tom wrote:

Mauleguy wrote:30 lbs is the craziest reason I have heard of for not carrying a spare. Now if we are talking about light weight airplanes then I will buy into it but when you are talking about a 3000 lb truck that's does not make sense to me.

I have had plenty of flats with perfectly good tires with many different kinds of objects. The passion rock is just one of them (just another Fu$%ing rock)

My brand new truck with 2000 miles had a blow out. Guess I wasn't taking care of my tires.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I've had multiple flats in the same day! But I drove some pretty brutal roads when I was in road construction...

Sent from my SM-G870W using Tapatalk

ShadowAviator wrote:
P.S. Regarding helmets with pax, I think you need to either ALL wear helmets, or ALL don't. When your head is flopping around with a helmet, it becomes a hazard to anyone without one.

In a Cub there is no way someone is going to be impacted by my helmet if they have shoulder straps on with seat the belt. In some kind of energy type event we are all moving in the same direction. Most accidents in the cub in the back seat would require face protection from hitting the top of the front seat frame. Pilot or front seat need protection from the instrument panel and upper tubing. I will continue to wear mine every time I fly. I fly 90 percent of the time alone anyway and usually am not pioneering a new place with a passenger.

Perhaps a different perspective. Have family with head injury. Walks, talks and works but life is forever changed. As a result I participate in many online forums and such for those who have a BI or have family with BI. Also have family who used to provide medical care in remote parts of Alaska where it is more common than is diagnosed. The effects of a brain injury on family, friends and the patient are significant and tragic. Some have compared it to living with a dead person or watching a loved one die while still breathing and walking. It does not need to be a "significant" injury to be a life altering. Better than 50% of marriages fail within 5 years of a brain injury. Friends and family disappear as personality changes and behavior patterns change due to the injury make being around the patient difficult to impossible. So, yes, I wear a helmet on a bike and while downhill skiing or playing hockey. I buy cars with as many airbags as possible. I wear cleats during the winter here in AK as does my wife. I have had my Pacer for 2 years (one of the reasons I bought this one was the shoulder harnesses already installed) and am still working through which helmet will work and not cause more issue before I head off airport in any significant way. I will likely have to remove my headliner to make it comfortable. I am not paranoid about it, but see no reason not to take the precautions that are available too me when I'm all to familiar with the life altering effects of even a seemingly minor fall or impact.

There seems to be some belief that there must be a correlation between risk management in various phases of our lives. Because I do not wear a helmet in the car has zero bearing on whether I should wear one in the cockpit. If I accept greater risk in some other activity by eschewing safety gear, I can still increase my chances of surviving a low speed crash in an airplane by wearing a helmet. We're not bound to a safety paradigm across the board.

Those who criticize or attempt to discourage people from wearing helmets in airplanes with these baseless arguments should find a better use of their time.

Those who criticize or attempt to discourage people from wearing helmets in airplanes with these baseless arguments should find a better use of their time.

X2 on that note!

I don't think any of the earlier posts tried to do that? I certainly didn't if that was aimed at me, to each his own. I actually have my eyes open for the right helmet, just haven't quite seen it yet. I wore a helmet all the time I flew hang gliders and then ultralights, but for some reason (headset issues probably) quit doing so in '87 when I started flying fixed wings. Never did need one during that time, meaning no head strikes, but wore one 100% of the time. Then years of wearing hard hats on construction sites, never needed one there either. I too know head injury victims, the one in particular I'm thinking of had a hard hat on so it probably saved his life, he's just a bit off but still alive. Broken necks have killed more people I've personally known.

"Those who criticize or attempt to discourage people from wearing helmets in airplanes with these baseless arguments should find a better use of their time."

I have not really got that from this thread, more of a rational discussion.

I have thought about this a lot, but think I won't wear one. I actually ordered one once, but I must have screwed up as I never got charged.

I had a real hard time wearing one on bicycles - I do so all the time now. I don't wear one skiing, nor do most of my professional friends (Though in Canada most ski schools now mandate them). One says "skiing is not a contact sport". I do wear one on my dirt bikes, and have been very grateful for them.

I guess I am probably illogical, but I really think this is a personal decision. Somewhere I read about a neurosurgeon who wears one in his Volvo on icy days.

There is no doubt that head injuries can be truly devastating. Would Michael Schumacher have been better off dead? He was wearing a helmet and I know where he fell, by all accounts a banal little tumble.

I think we all play divine Bingo every day, and just have to choose how we wish to modify the odds. I would never presume to tell anyone else what to do, and random strangers who tut tut in lift lines are unlikely to change my mind.

I too have a family member who suffered a major life changing BI 2 years ago. My uncle was a CEO of a major dental equipment manufacturing business. Absolutely one of the sharpest, funniest, guys I have ever known. He was 79 and tripped on the sidewalk going into his church. The BI has affected his walk and talk. Very sad.

Be careful out there.

Interesting thread. I wear a helmet bicycling--have for many years, although also for many years, I didn't. It wasn't until my first Ride the Rockies, which required all riders to wear helmets.

My Sis got some serious injuries on her bicycle on the Ride the Rockies several years ago, and her split helmet very likely saved her life, or if not her life per se, her livelihood thereafter. I'm very careful to wear seatbelts/shoulder harnesses when I drive, and a very early purchase for my airplane was BAS harnesses.

I wear a shorty helmet on my Vespa (no snide comments--it's a whole lot more fun than any Harley!), and when I had a bigger motorcycle (Kawasaki Voyager XII), it was a full face helmet. The only motorcycle accident I've had, though, was before I bought my first helmet--my injuries were minimized because I was sliding on ice!

But I haven't yet graduated to wearing a helmet in the airplane. Should I? I don't really know. I certainly don't have any rational arguments one way or the other. I have what are probably irrational arguments: comfort, overheating, previous neck surgery, the need to buy for all passengers, etc.

Regarding passengers, it's been my experience that it's hard enough to get them to wear appropriate shoes if they have to walk out of a field in the event of an off-airport landing, let alone try to convince them to wear a helmet inside an enclosed airplane. Seatbelts are so de rigueur these days that convincing passengers, whether in cars or in airplanes, to wear them isn't difficult, but us old farts like Jim (Contact) and Mike (MTV) and I can easily remember when persuading passengers in cars to wear them was like pulling teeth without Novocaine.

Whenever I'm eating at the Barnstormer at GXY and the Flight For Life helicopter comes in for fuel, all of them are wearing helmets. Do they put helmets on their patients? I don't know. I suspect that their patients wouldn't object or really don't care--they just want to get to the hospital, if they're conscious. On the other hand, with all the press about the fire danger from ruptured fuel tanks of helicopters when they crash, I'm not so sure that helmets make any difference; it's not crashing that makes the difference.

That's the real key to whether a helmet is necessary. Let's just don't crash, agreed?

Cary

Must be the smoke...this thread started out ridiculously stupid and progressed to utterly absurd. Don't usually see that until early February...

Hammer wrote:Must be the smoke...this thread started out ridiculously stupid and progressed to utterly absurd. Don't usually see that until early February...

Yep, you don't like Oregonmaule's opinion.....but make sure we know yours.

Just to lighten the discussion a little:

I need a bump cap when I'm outside the airplane. Still having to adjust to struts after 9 years with a strut-less T210. Haven't hit the strut with my head since I put floats on, but wait until wheels are back for winter! Then there's the wing trailing edge. If I leave the gear mirrors on the underside of the wings while on wheels, there's another hazard. I'm 6' 1/2" tall, worst possible height for a Skywagon pilot.

Hey, big tires might lessen my head banging hazard! I have no other justification for big tires, but they're cool, so let's go with that!

Sheesh! When did this turn into a serious discussion??

It's a matter of personal preference, someone else's opinion doesn't matter.

I don't wear one. Don't think I ever will. Same goes for snowboarding and skiing. But I totally understand why some people do.

daedaluscan wrote:"

I guess I am probably illogical, but I really think this is a personal decision. Somewhere I read about a neurosurgeon who wears one in his Volvo on icy days.

That might have been my story, but it is a Radiologist friend in a Lexus though the brain surgeon in the volvo might exist contemporaneously. He says he has seen too many sad x-rays. He looks pretty silly, but he is a radiologist, so I think they feel comfortable there.

I wonder how many people that won't wear a helmet have had significant brain trauma. A motorcycle helmet saved my life when a deer tried to kill me but I ended up with a nasty concussion and it changed the way I feel about head protection. I let my kids choose if they want to wear knee pads and elbow pads but if there is a chance of a brain injury, they are wearing helmets. Even so, they both had concussions this year and both know how much a brain injury can wreck your summer.

Thread drift, this one has run it's course in my opinion.



I think most people (me included early on) don't realize how dangerous an airplane can be in the hands of a pilot that does not have their shit together. This is not about off airport either because that is a whole different animal. I will not fly with anyone anymore that I have not seen how they fly. Maybe it is because I am a control freak or maybe I just have seen first hand enough times from the right seat how most pilots have no real precision and control over there airplane. I have never grabbed the controls even though I have wanted to multiple times on different landings with different pilots. I have encouraged pilots more then once to push the nose over on take off because I was afraid the person was going to stall it.

Maybe they should spend more time flying then posting on the internet who knows.
Anyone with thousands of posts on various sites either has to much time on their hands or is just to dang opinionated for me to probably hang around with for very long. So for all of you with thousands of post I take what you say with very grain of salt, white noise.... You are like my Grandpa Miller, man did that guy drive me nuts with all his no it all about every subject. He was a guy that could have used a good thump on the head without a helmet on. It took a stroke to change his personality into someone that I loved, he became a happy go lucky, funny man his last ten years of life. The part that I never saw as a young boy finally showed up! So maybe there is hope for some of you yet......

Regarding flying, I think its up to the pilot. If you feel your flying warrants the need for a helmet, then use one. Certain types of flying certainly can warrant the need for a helmet. (Like off-airport stuff)

The fact is that helmets CAN prevent injuries and CAN saves lives. I think we all agree on that. However, its your choice if you feel helmet use is needed.



On a side note: Some people mentioned helmet use during other activities (skiing, biking, motorcycle riding,etc.). Choosing to NOT wear a helmet while enjoying those activities, is a VERY POOR decision. You are MUCH more likely to injure your head riding a bike than you are flying. There are mounds of evidence showing the need for helmets in those areas. If I sound blunt, its because I have known too many incidents wear helmets would have saved lives. Plus, I have had several experiences where a helmet saved me from injury.

This thread was born out of a night where I was kind of bored. To much fire smoke to go fly for fun. I hoped this is what would happen. I don't want guys to get pissed or insult each other. But since anything not related to flying is forbidden it is harder to find stuff to bat back and forth.

I don't know about y'all but just talking serious airplane stuff ALL THE TIME gets boring. I don't mind the thread drift. Anyway carry on, have a great day. Go fly. If you choose to, or not, ware your helmet, nomex cloths, nomex gloves, nomex head sock, and file a flight plan.

Cheers...Rob