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Dainese Just Made Your Motorcycle Jacket Obsolete

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For reasons too obvious to mention, motorcycle gear protection has been on my mind lately. Though my broken collarbone is unfortunate, it is timely, as Dainese just released its D-Air Misano 1000 jacket, the world’s first commercially available self-contained airbag jacket for motorcyclists.

Let’s be really clear about one thing: this is a sea change for motorcycle safety.

Debuting at the San Marino GP, the venue for the Dainese D-Air Misano 1000’s release is no mistake, as the jacket builds off the Italian company’s experience with airbag suits in the MotoGP World Championship.

At the highest level of racing, airbag technology has become a game-changing technology, and now riders on the street can use essentially that same airbag system, that same proprietary crash-sensing software (modified for street use), and that same company history of safety that the professionals rely on while on the race track.

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News

Dainese D-Air Racing Suits Coming to the USA*

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*For reals this time.

For those looking for more protection from their racing leathers, Dainese D-Air Racing suits are finally coming to the USA. Already bringing the technology in Europe last year, Dainese is set finally to bring the D-Air Racing technology to the USA, in September 2015.

Riders interested in the airbag-equipped leather suit have two options: 1) the top-of-the-line off-the-rack Misano D-Air cow leather suit ($2,499), or 2) the made-to-measure Mugello D-Air custom kangaroo leather suit (Price TBD).

This announcement represents the first airbag-equipped motorcycle race suits to go on sale in the USA (Alpinestars Tech-Air system is still not available, though the rival Italian brand is close to coming to market), and offers track riders the same level of protection as Dainese’s MotoGP riders, like Valentino Rossi.

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News

Dainese D-Air Armor Now Available to Other Companies

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Announced today at Mugello, Dainese is making its D-air airbag technology available to other race suit manufacturers.

Calling the integrated airbag, electronics, gas generator, wiring, battery, and GPS the Dainese D-air Armor “open platform”, the Italian firm hopes to begin protecting all the riders in the Grand Prix World Championships with this new business strategy.

At its core, the D-air Armor technology is the same that Dainese-sponsored riders have been enjoying this season, and arguably the Dainese system is the best airbag system currently available use for motorcycle racers.

Rivaling Alpinestars in protecting GP riders with airbags, today’s announcement will mean that riders with other leather suit brands, will be able to get airbag protection. Dainese has already signed deals with Vircos and Furygan.

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News

BMW & Alpinestars Team-Up on Airbag Technology

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Any MotoGP can tell you that Alpinestars is one of the few brands making integrated airbag suits available to racers — perhaps one of the best safety features to come out thus far in the 21st century for motorcyclists.

How to take that technology off the track and onto the street though is a a tough proposition though, as there are infinitely more variable at play on public roads, when compared to a race course. Hence, we’ve had to wait a long time for this tech to trickle down to the masses.

The current trend of thinking seems for apparel manufacturer to partner with motorcycle manufacturers, as a way to popularize the expensive safety feature.

As such, rival apparel-maker Dainese has already made a very public deal with Ducati, which lead to the Ducati Multistrada 1200 D-Air, and the Vicenza-based company has (had?) other less-public deals in place, with companies like BMW.

It seems Alpinestars wants in on that action too, and has now signed an exclusive partnership deal with BMW Motorrad, which will see the German manufacturer and Italian maker enter into cooperation on designing and making jackets with the Alpinestars Tech-Air technology.

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MotoGP

Friday Summary at Sachsenring: Marquez’s Big Crash, Some Fast Yamahas, & Fixing Turn 11 Again

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There are those who say that Marc Marquez is due for a big crash soon. He is always riding so close to the edge of traction that at some point, he will go over the limit and suffer the consequences, they reason. They will therefore not have been surprised to learn that Marquez had a huge highside on Friday morning.

What will surprise them is the cause of the crash. It was not due to pushing his Honda RC213V beyond the limits of adhesion, he explained to the media afterwards, but was caused by a minor slip of his foot. His toe touched the gear lever, clicking the bike into 3rd, and that caused the rear tire to grip momentarily and flick him off.

The crash happened at Turn 2. “You turn with the gas in second gear,” Marquez said. “I didn’t know at the time, but I was touching a little bit the gear lever.” In the last part of the corner, he accidentally engaged third, and as he kept the throttle in the same position, the bike highsided.

Marquez was thrown upside down, and landed on his neck. He was lucky to walk away, but walk away he did. He returned to the garages and was straight back on the bike again, posting the sixth fastest time, six tenths off the pace of Aleix Espargaro, and a third of a second behind Jorge Lorenzo.

By the afternoon, Marquez was back at full speed, and second quickest behind Aleix Espargaro once again. He still had some stiffness in his neck, he said, but it was not really hindering him.

“The neck feels a bit locked in some corners, but it is not a problem,” he said. Intensive physiotherapy kept his neck warm, and prevented it from seizing up and becoming painful. That only happened after the session was over, and his neck started to cool down.

There was some question of why Marquez was allowed to continue straight away. After what was obviously a very serious crash, Marquez was not subjected to a physical examination to check for signs of a concussion. This is a recurring problem in MotoGP, with pressure on riders to get back on the bike as soon as possible.

Only in very severe and obvious cases does the circuit doctor intervene, and so far this has not caused any problems. How long it will continue without a rider hurting themselves by going back out too soon remains to be seen. There may be a role here for more forceful action by the Medical Director and circuit doctor.

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Opinion/Editorial

How Harley-Davidson Got Sued Over ABS Brakes & Why You Can’t Buy an Airbag Leather Suit in the USA

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I was reading DealerNews last week when I stumbled across a brief story about how Harley-Davidson was being sued by a couple, because the Bar & Shield brand did not offer the 2012 Electra Glide Classic with an anti-locking brake option.

The lawsuit comes about as a couple was riding two-up on their motorcycle in Texas, when a car suddenly cut in front of them. Locking up the wheels of the Harley-Davidson, the motorcycle fishtailed out of control, and flung the couple quite some distance. They are subsequently suing Harley-Davidson for $75,000 in damages.

I can already foresee the pro-business comments below this article, deriding these motorcyclists for a series events that amount to “their fault” for their medical and financial woes — after all, it was they who chose to buy a motorcycle without ABS, right?

Legal scholars, and those familiar with tort law and product liability in the United States though, will see the case quite differently. And barring specific details and circumstances, the conclusion to this lawsuit will almost certainly side with the complainants, not Harley-Davidson.

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Bikes

Ducati Announces Multistrada D-Air Model with Integrated Wireless Airbag Capabilities from Dainese

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With the Ducati Multistrada D-Air, the Italian brand is laying claim to the first production motorcycle with a wirelessly integrated airbag jacket system.

Something that was announced at last year’s EICMA show by BMW Motorrad, the Italians have seemingly beaten the Germans to market, though the real announcement here is the OEM integration that Dainese is building with its D-Air suits and jackets with various manufacturers.

The Ducati system, like the BMW version, includes an integrated set of electronics built into the motorcycle’s existing electronics package. This allows the Dainese D-Air system to constantly know the motorcycle’s vehicle dynamics, and use those telemetry figures to determine if/when an airbag needs to be deployed during a crash.

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Racing

Alpinestars Releases Marquez’s 209.9 MPH Crash Telemetry

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Marc Marquez would almost certainly like to forget this past weekend at Mugello for the Italian GP. Heads up to the spoiler alert, but not only did he make an unforced error during the race, crashing out of second place all by his lonesome (with a comfortable margin fore and aft, we might add), but the young Spanish rider also had one of the fastest crashes ever in the MotoGP Championship during Friday’s Free Practice 2 session.

Losing control of his Repsol Honda RC213V at 209.9 mph as he approached the San Donato corner during the race, Marquez had to jump away from his race bike, at roughly 170 mph, in order to avoid the rapidly approaching wall barrier. Escaping with a battered chin, a small fissure to his humerus bone, as well as minor soft-tissue injuries to his shoulder, Marquez came out of the incident in FP2 rather well, all things considered.

Now that Marquez has gotten a clean bill of health from doctors in Barcelona (he will have to undergo some physio the next few days though), Repsol and others in the paddock can breathe a sigh of relief, and begin to analyze the crash in more detail. Helping add insight to the crash, Alpinestars has released the telemetry from Marquez’s Tech Air race suit, which shows the g-forces involved during the crash, as well as the deployment time of the suit’s airbag.

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Opinion/Editorial

In the Future, Will You Even Wear a Helmet?

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Here at Asphalt & Rubber, we spend some pixels talking about the finer points of helmet usage, especially when it comes to the debate regarding mandatory helmet laws. Looking at helmets from 50 years ago, and the basic concept hasn’t changed all that much in the time since.

A hard shell, some impact material, and a soft lining mated to a visor and chin-strap system, over the last half-century most of the improvements to the basic helmet design have been for added fit and comfort, or cheaper and lighter materials — even the more creative and innovative designs that are being hocked around the internet right now don’t stray far from the current concept.

Think 50 years ahead though, and it is hard to imagine the same shapes and designs staying constant. In fact, it becomes possible to imagine motorcyclists wearing no helmets at all. No, I am not talking about some sort of libertarian movement that will rush through our political system, freeing us from the shackles of big government.

Instead, I am talking about the true next-generation of safety devices for the gray matter that resides between your ears, which might put the mandatory helmet law debate to rest (well…probably not).

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Products

The Dainese D-Air Racing Airbag Suit Comes to America

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Getting a look at Dainese & AGV’s 2012 collection, Asphalt & Rubber was down in Orange County earlier this week to see the highly anticipated Dainese D-Air Racing leather suit, which has a four liter airbag system that helps reduce the risk of injury during a motorcycle crash.

Dainese has been working on the D-Air Racing system for 10 years now, and after soft-launching the airbag suit in Europe, the Italian company is ready to bring the game-changing technology to American soil.

If you watch MotoGP or World Superbike, you have likely already seen the roughly one pound (650 grams) D-Air Racing suit at work, as riders like Valentino Rossi, Nicky Hayden, Stefan Bradl, Leon Haslam, and Max Biaggi have been wearing Dainese’s airbag leathers while racing, and have also been providing the company with feedback on the D-Air’s design and development.

In addition to deploying an airbag that protects a rider’s neck, chest, and shoulders, the Dainese D-Air system also provides a telemetry package that track riders can use in lieu of a basic motorcycle data acquisition system.

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