The photographs of Kansas Metropolis Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes’s helmet breaking up on reside tv throughout the broadcast of the NFL playoff sport between the Chiefs and the Miami Dolphins had been a shock to viewers.
Mahomes leaned right into a collision with Miami security DeShon Elliott and a giant chunk of crimson plastic flew conspicuously from Mahomes’s helmet. Consider it or not, this was not essentially a nasty end result.
“Simply because it broke doesn’t imply it didn’t do its job,” noticed Virginia Tech Helmet Lab director of outreach Barry Miller, PhD. Right here’s why:
Mahomes was carrying the Vicis (pronounced “vice-is”) Zero2 helmet, which is designed to cushion impacts with a comfortable deformable polycarbonate outer layer. He has struggled with concussions and Vicis helmets prime the scores by each the Nationwide Soccer League and the Virginia Tech Helmet Lab, so this revolutionary helmet is a pure for Mahomes.
Vicis explains on its web site: “Versatile outer shell know-how, unique to Vicis helmets, permits the Zero2 to reply like no different helmet in the marketplace. By deforming like a automobile bumper, influence forces are absorbed on the level of contact, earlier than they attain the pinnacle. The outcome shouldn’t be solely groundbreaking safety, however a helmet that seems like no different.”
Automotive bumpers, it’s price noting, are sacrificial gear, designed to soak up injury themselves somewhat than passing influence forces to automobile occupants. That’s the scenario right here too. “You need the helmet to soak up vitality just like the crumple zone within the automobile to extend influence length and cut back peak acceleration numbers to your head,” stated Miller.
Mahomes’s Vicis Zero2 helmet has distinctive vent holes alongside the perimeters. JAMIE SQUIRE/GETTY IMAGES
The truth is, bicycle helmets and others are designed to work like this. “Single-impact helmets are designed to crush, crumple, or crack beneath influence,” Miller identified. Whereas soccer helmets typically final a number of seasons, having the helmet sacrifice itself to guard the wearer is a passable end result.
This failure appears to have absolutely been attributable to the extraordinarily chilly temperatures at sport time, which was reported by NBC broadcasters as -4 levels F. “I’m certain it needed to do with it being actually chilly,” Mahomes mused throughout his post-game press convention.
That’s the conclusion by Vicis too. “Excessive circumstances like these skilled in Saturday night’s NFL playoff sport are sure to check the bounds of even the very best performing merchandise,” stated Vicis father or mother firm Certor Sports activities in a press release. “Whereas outer shell injury shouldn’t be best, the Zero2 helmet did its job of defending Patrick Mahomes throughout a head-to-head influence in unprecedented chilly temperatures.”
NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE
With out analyzing the helmet it’s most likely unimaginable to diagnose the reason for the failure with certainty, however “material-wise, chilly shouldn’t be actually good for pliability,” Miller noticed.
For influence testing beneath the Nationwide Working Committee on Requirements for Athletic Tools “Normal Efficiency Specification for Newly Manufactured Soccer Helmets” (ND)002-17m21 is performed utilizing 4 helmets; two on the drop take a look at and two on the pneumatic ram take a look at. One among every of these checks is finished at an unspecified ambient temperature, whereas a second Excessive-Temperature take a look at makes use of helmets which were heat-soaked at 100 levels F for twenty-four hours. There is no such thing as a Low-Temperature take a look at.
It seems that lab checks aren’t the one time that chilly temperatures have to be thought-about. The Chiefs apparently had Mahomes’s spare helmet mendacity on the group bench, the place it cooled to the ambient temperature. Whereas there have been heaters on the sideline for gamers, the temperature the place the helmet was saved was nonetheless freezing. This precipitated issues for Mahomes when he went to the backup.
“We’ve received to speak about the place we retailer the backup,” Mahomes declared. “It was like frozen. So after I tried to place it on it was fully frozen. I couldn’t get it on. We had been capable of modify it on the sideline get it type of warmed up a bit of bit and get rolling from there.”
Mahomes’s downside wasn’t solely that the chilly helmet chilled his noggin uncomfortably. The true concern was that the Vicis helmet’s a number of layers of pliable materials which might be designed to maneuver into one of the best place to suit the wearer and cushion impacts had been frozen in place. That signifies that the pads meant to provide method to offer a cushty match didn’t transfer.
Right here’s how the Vicis helmet is meant to work at regular temperatures: Beneath the deformable (typically catastrophically so, in chilly temperatures!) outer shell, Vicis helmets make use of the Vicis RFLX 2.0 system of buckling column buildings that join the outer shell with the helmet’s interior shell. These columns present influence efficiency with minimal mass, letting Vicis engineers place them strategically to tune influence efficiency in key areas.
The interior shell is a reasonably simple polycarbonate shell, however Vicis says that the form has been rigorously designed utilizing knowledge from a whole lot of various head shapes for an optimum design that matches a variety of gamers.
Inside that interior shell, Vicis makes use of what it phrases the DLTA pod system. These pods are interchangeable pads mounted in six areas on the interior shell to additional customise the helmet’s match to the wearer’s head.
These pads will not be the normal foam padding of the Darkish Ages. As an alternative, they’re 3D-printed resin lattices from Carbon, a Redwood Metropolis, Cal. additive manufacturing specialist. “Once I first noticed Carbon, I misplaced my thoughts,” stated Vicis take a look at engineer John Ward in a YouTube video testimonial for Carbon.
“I believed that was the good factor ever,” he stated. “You can really take this half, 3-D print it in no matter loopy geometry you provide you with as a result of it’s much more versatile than conventional machining, stick it in a helmet, take a look at it, and get repeatable outcomes! A lot in order that we are able to really put it on a participant on the sector. It’s mind-blowing! It nonetheless is mind-blowing. I can’t consider that we’re doing this.”
The lattice is made utilizing an energy-damping dual-cure resign that Carbon calls EPU 45, which was developed in partnership with Rice College. “EPU 45 is a pressure rate-sensitive materials, making it best for extremely breathable lattice geometries tuned for consolation at low influence speeds and vitality absorption at excessive influence speeds,” stated Carbon senior product growth supervisor Leah Heist.
Vicis finishes the Zero2 helmet with one in all eight completely different facemask designs, out there in both metal or titanium, relying on the client’s finances.
Will these patrons be involved by the breakage of Mahomes’ helmet? Most likely not, stated Virginia Tech’s Miller, as a result of they perceive the circumstances of the occasion. “The soccer helmet shopper is fairly savvy,” he stated. They need to be, he continued, as a result of the merchandise are getting so subtle. “Soccer helmets are essentially the most superior sports activities helmets in the marketplace, by far,” Miller stated. The Vicis Zero2 actually gives a strong case for that assertion, even with this high-profile incident.
