June 21, 2017 • 42 mins
Compared with people driving cars and trucks, do motorcycle riders face a higher risk of death or injury in a crash? Find out what motorcycle manufacturers and some riding gear companies are doing to make your next two-wheeled adventure a lot safer.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Go behind the wheel, under the hood and beyond with
car stuff from how Stuff Works dot Com. I had
welcome to car Stuff. I'm Scott, I'm Then we are
joined by a brand new super producer, Alex Williams nickname
t b A. So right in and tell him hello,
(00:23):
and uh give him a nickname if you wish. I know,
you probably didn't know that was gonna happen. Now he's
shocked by the whole news. Nicknames come with a job,
right right, and uh, you know, sometimes we're we're a
little off the cuff. I guess you could say that
we like to live dangerously. And that brings us to
uh part of today's topic. But first we have an announcement. Yeah,
(00:46):
we've got an announcement. Bennet's it's time for the rally again.
It's it's rally season, yes, but not just any rally.
We are talking about our friends over at Rally North America,
who we went on our first road rally ever with
with this organization. We went on something called the Ohio
Valley seven hundred where we drove through what's got seven states,
(01:08):
I don't know, it felt like that, and it's four
or five, six, seven, something like that it was. It
was a long run, seven miles, but that's the thing.
We were in Maryland for like like fourteen or twenty minutes.
It was really short to remember that at that point.
But uh, but we had a great time, and we
documented our adventures and we have an Amazon video that
you can watch. It's about an hour long but shows uh,
you know gu me Casey Nol on the road and uh,
(01:31):
you know, all of the Rally North America group and
how much fun we had and all the different stops
we made in historic sites and locations. It was just
it was a great time and and it was for
a good cause, which I think is key and it's
part of the reason that we're making this announcement today
because the folks at Raleigh North America are back ladies
and gentlemen with a different route this time. They always
(01:53):
do a new route. Uh it is the Rally Appalachia too. Yeah,
and it's going to start in uh Christiansburg, Virginia, and
they're gonna make a stop off at a couple of
race tracks during this one. Now this is happening, I
think it's starting around July tenth and it ends around
the fourteenth of July right around the corner. Yes, really happening.
It's happening soon. Um. And one of the racetracks that
they go to is Virginia International Raceway, which is a
(02:15):
road course in Alton, Virginia. It's right near Danville. And
from there they move on to North Carolina. They're gonna
be in the Great Smokey Mountains, um Waynesville, North Carolina,
then Onto and this is interesting, Ben, They're gonna go
on to Rome, Georgia again and they're gonna end up there,
but they're gonna take a day trip down to the
Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama. And that is where I'm gonna
(02:37):
meet up with Mr Glenn Beck for a day at
the track. That's right. Long time listeners, you will recall
Glenn Beck, a longtime friend of the show and an
active road rally or he's he's the mastermind behind what
we call Team Limber. What we call it that because
it's his name. Uh. He's gonna be driving his two
(02:57):
thousand six Legend Line Mustang GT. And the beneficiary for
this event is an organization called Hope for the Warriors.
Hope for the Warriors, and I would say a charity
that they've worked for before, they've donated to this this
charity before. Um it provides comprehensive support programs for service members,
veterans uh military families that are focused on transition, health, wellness,
(03:19):
peer engagement, connections to community resources, a lot of different things.
It makes a big difference in returning veterans lives. And
they've already at this point raised over sixty seven thousand dollars. Uh,
so there's two thirds of the way to their goal
of one. Yeah, that's right. And if you go to
support dot Hope for the Warriors dot org and you
(03:39):
can search for, uh, you know, the rally team that
you want to donate to, you can you can make
a little donation if you feel like it. We're not
we're not saying that you have to, but if you
feel like it, drops some drop some dollars over there,
and uh, of course, you know, search out Team Limber
and see if you can maybe donate to that. And
you know what, one of the better ways to do
that for Glenn's team probably is just go to his
Facebook page, but the Team Limber facebook page and you
(03:59):
can don't right there and oh, Ben, we're leaving up
maybe the biggest bit of information for anybody who is
maybe new to hearing this. That's right, Scott. Each of
the first forty donations in the amount of one hundred
dollars or more made to any rally team is eligible
for a raffle ticket for a Jeep Wrangler. Yeah, two
thousand four Jeep Wrangler. Now, so it's a used vehicle. Um,
but for one hundred dollars, if you donate one hundred bucks,
(04:22):
you can get a raffle ticket to win. Now, only
two hundred tickets will be sold, so your odds are
really really good. One and two hundred. They're gonna win
this thing. I'm in. I've already you know, maybe my
hundred dollar donation. I'm on the list. You can go
check it out. I'm on the Team Limber's list of donors,
and I'm hoping that I'm the one that they dropped,
but you never know. One of our listeners could win,
and I'd love it if they did. I've seen the
(04:42):
jeep on the site and it's a two thousand four
Jeep Wrangler X with a four leaders six cylinder engine.
It's a five speed manual transmission. It's a one order
owner vehicle that had no accidents. I mean, there's a
history report that's on the Facebook page. By the way,
if you do want to check out this jeep ahead
of time, you can go to the Facebook page and
it is uh oh, what does it called. I think
it's called jeep for the Warriors on Facebook. So if
(05:03):
you search geep for the Warriors Facebook, you'll see a
photo of this jeep and a couple of photos and
and the history report and all that, um. But again,
it's never been modified, abused anything like that. It has
about a six thousand miles on it, and they say
that you know that subject to change a little bit
if they drive it to any kind of promotional of that. Yeah, exactly,
anything that has to do with the rally. So that's
all they're using it for. But if you do choose
(05:24):
to make a donation like that and you want to,
of course, we're you know, saying, go to Team Limber's
page and make the donation. Why not if you know,
But if you find another team or you know someone
else on a different team, make a donation to their page,
that's fine. But for one hundred bucks you get in
on this rally. It's quite a deal. Like I said,
I'm into I hope, I hope I win it. But
if you do that and you make it to Glenn's page,
make sure that you send him an email and I'll
(05:46):
tell you the information here. It's it's Team Limber at
Comcast dot net. And that way he can make arrangements
for your Raffle ticket and act now because the drawing
is on Monday, July tenth. The big thing about this,
one of the reasons ladies and gentlemen Scott is so
excited about this is you do not have to physically
be present to win. Yeah, that's one of those deals
where you know you can just you know, you pay
(06:07):
your money, you get the ticket in the mail, and
then hey I won. Hey, well you could flip the
jeep man, you could double your money. I'll take it
off your hands. Well, let me tell you something. I've
seen it online and it's it's definitely a jeep. It's
worth keeping. This isn't like a scrap jeep or something.
This is I've seen photos of it. It's it's actually
pretty nice. It's yellow, so I might have to paint it. So,
(06:28):
you know, I've got the thing about yellow cars. You
gotta think about Yellowell's bright yellow. I mean it's it's nice,
it's really nice. But we might have to make that
thing black. I know, yeah, yellow car thing. Well, I'm
not crazy about bright yellow cars like school bus yellow car.
They call it the candy code. I give, I give maybe,
like I might give supercars a pass in some cases,
some of them and not all of them, because not
(06:49):
all of them look right in that bright yellow. But
but but this one, this jeep, I think it might
have to make a trip to um one of the
earl shot. So if you were out of town and
we are shot, it's a call back, right, I mean,
does he still do everything for I don't know, it's
been a long time that reference probably yeah, inflation, you know.
(07:12):
But would you be would you be cool if you
were away on vacation for a while or something you
came back and we had like painted your car yellow.
It was a good job, you know what I gotta says?
You might you might see the other side of me.
You would you wouldn't like me when I'm angry? Okay, alright, alright,
Bruce can uh so to summon up visit rally North
(07:34):
America dot com, where you can get all this information,
all the details, along with the stops to make along
the way. And even if you're not part of the rally,
if you just want to see some really awesome cars.
Have you got some pretty neat modifications. Sometimes people are
even in like costumes. Yeah, it's kind of a crazy
it's fun of fun cars look like race cars. It's
(07:54):
really it's a fun event. And when when win, they're
in town, it's kind of a spectacle. And uh and
it's really it's a good time. So it's good for
it's good family fund. Really, so team Limber Rally North
America dot com. Check him out. And Glenn, of course,
if you are listening, we hope you are. We would
love to hear some of your favorite moments after the
(08:14):
rally has done. I mean, you guys are gonna be
meeting in person. Yeah, so I guess I should be
putting this on you, Scott. I expect the full report
of pressure with pictures. I can do that, all right. Uh.
While we're doing that, let's return to the Segway. So nice.
I'm gonna say it twice. We like to live dangerously,
(08:35):
and this episode is about danger. Yeah, about danger. Indeed,
we're talking about if motorcycles are really more dangerous than cars?
And how about this? We just answer the question right now, Yes, yes,
some more dangerous. You can thanks everybody for listening, and uh,
we'll catch you next time. No, if there's a lot
more to it than just simple yes no answer, I
(08:55):
mean there's a lot of Uh, well, there's complexity to
this issue, really, and and why why motorcycles might be
more dangerous than cars? Um and a lot of people.
I think there are probably some people out there in
the field that they're less dangerous than cars. Do you
think there? Yeah, there may be some people. There are
definitely people who are more comfortable riding a motorcycle instead
(09:15):
of driving like a large land yacht sedan. Well, the
stats won't back it up, but some people might swear
that they're more safe on a motorcycle than they are
inside of a death trap car. So yeah, let's explore
on the way, let's explore some of the statistics. Were
also going to look at some safety technology. And I
(09:36):
have sort of a bone to pick about what I
would call a biker stereotype or motorcycle stereotype, because there
are a lot out there, and not all of them
are fair. You know, but first things first, you know,
you're there's a reason that bikers motorcyclist if you prefer
that term, gew up with leather and keV lar before
(09:58):
they hit the road. It's okay, yeah, let's just get
this out there. It looks super can I say, badass?
Okay you just did? Oh all right, sorry, Alex. So
it looks it looks really cool. But it's not just
decorative or ornamental. No, no, no no, they have of course,
all that gear has a purpose. And you find that
(10:21):
a lot of people don't, you know, don't suit up
the way that you probably should. You know, on on
the road, you'll see people wearing flip flops and shorts
and you know, tank tops when they're riding down the road,
or even no shirt at all, extremely dangerous. And some
people choose not to wear a helmet, you know, in
the states that don't have helmet laws. In fact, I
recently saw a study from I can't remember the safety
agency that it was, but it was talking about the
(10:42):
effectiveness of helmets, you know, for people that that choose
to wear helmet versus those that don't wear helmets and
states that you know, it's an option. So they found
that in those states, helmets are about thirty seven percent
effective in preventing motorcycle deaths, which is thirty seven that's incredible,
just one piece of safety equipment, and if sixty effective
at preventing brain injury. So even if you're not killed
(11:05):
in the accident, uh, there's a six better chance that
you're not going to have a brain injury if you
wear a helmet. UM. The thing is, you know, as
effective as that is, only nineteen states and the District
of Columbia have UM mandatory or mandated helmet laws right now.
So it's kind of an interesting um situation because you know,
traveling across state lines, I guess you can decide if
(11:26):
you want to leave it on or take it off.
At that point, Well, there's you know what I think
is interesting about that is there is a state by
state discrepancy. And let's let's not forget we're gonna constantly
be comparing motorcyclists too, car drivers or truck drivers. Another
example where there's a there's an interesting comparison is I
(11:50):
don't know if we've talked about this on air, but
here in Atlanta, Georgia, where we are of course based
for years, Uh, the seatbelt law did not apply to
pickup trucks. Do you remember that? I do? Was that
that was because it was it a senator? Maybe? Yeah,
there was like one congressman. There was one state congressman
who drove a pickup truck and refused to have a
(12:14):
seatbelt and thought the whole thing was a bunch of
a lark. Wouldn't pass any kind of legislation because of
that one particular person. I wish I remember that guy's name,
But yeah, it was all about the one guy that
didn't want to wear a seatbelt, and and it never
went through until until he was gone, until he's onseen.
But so those that there can be all sorts of
reasons for those sorts of discrepancies. Yeah, I mean, well
(12:35):
there's some we'll talk about some similarities and some some
disadvantages later as well. Yeah, definitely. One thing I do
wanna one thing I do want to say, uh, is
that we already start from a very very very fundamental difference.
If you are hopping into a car, you are hopefully
(12:56):
being enveloped in all sorts of safety tech knowledgy specifically
designed to mitigate your chances of death or injury. All
you have to do is click the seat belt. Yeah,
I mean you're you're in a steel cage already, right,
so that's there's already one benefit right there. You're not
exposed to the elements, you're not exposed to everything. You're
not um hopefully're not gonna get tossed out of there,
(13:17):
as you said, if you if you click the seat belt.
But also there's other things in modern cars that are
that are keeping you inside that cage, you know. I
mean if if you didn't have your seatbelt on, if
you didn't have air bags, that'd be a good chance
that you're you know, ejected from the vehicle. That happens
in a lot of cases. Um, you know, if you're
not wearing your belt, even with air bags, that can happen.
You can still be thrown out of the vehicle. A
(13:38):
lot of people have that idea that they can't be
thrown out if if they're not wearing the seatbelt but
their air bags, and that's not true either. You can
you can be tossed out that way. But but motorcyclists
kind of start that way, like their vehicle gets hit
and it's not funny. I mean they get hit and
they're off the bike one way or another. Typically, I mean,
unless they're just a simple laydown accident. But you know,
you get struck from behind or something, you're going unto
(14:00):
the hood of the car behind you. So yeah, it's
dangerous all around, even with helmets, right, even with appropriate
riding gear. The fact of the matter is that motorcyclists
face a much higher risk of a fatal crash. From
two thousand thirteen, US government data showed that for every
(14:22):
mile traveled, the number of motorcycle related deaths was twenty
six times twenty six times got the number of car
related deaths, and that gave us a total of more
than four thousand motorcycle fatality. Now this is from the
article on our website, right, okay, Now that was those
numbers I believe are from would you say, yeah, okay,
I looked at the same site again recently and found
(14:45):
some numbers, so updated a little bit, and unfortunately the
situation just got worse. Lay it on a little bit worse.
So you said in the motor number of motorcycle related
death was twenty six times higher the car related desk.
Now it's twenty seven times higher, which brings the number
of motorcycle deaths up to four thousand six. And so
(15:09):
what we'd like to do is explore, uh, some of
the causes of this, uh and some of as Scott said,
the similarities and differences between you know, your typical sedan,
let's say, and motorcycle. Yeah, the disadvantages. Yeah yeah, Okay,
so they drive on the same roads. They can be
(15:31):
equally powerful, they can both reach very high rates of speed.
But on one thing that's really a pro and con
would be the weight ratios, right, the weight to power ratio.
The vast majority of cars. If you're at a stoplight
and you are next to a motorcycle and you decide
(15:51):
to race from a dead stop, you will get smoked.
Vast majority. Again, the vast majority. Yeah, I mean I'm
not counting, like you know the Clarence. No, motorcycles are quick.
Motorcycles are super quick, They're very nimble, they have better handling,
but they also with each of those abilities comes some
significant drawbacks. Yeah. Sure, I mean, well I guess what
(16:14):
was a couple. I mean, there's there's first there you
need skill and smarts really to drive a motorcycle. I
mean you gotta have good balance. Um, so that you
know you're you're the responsibilities. I guess when you jump
on that bike, I mean they're there. Can you say
that they're more than somebody who gets bean in the
wheel of car. I don't know if you can say
they're more. Um, but you have there's more relying on
(16:34):
you and your abilities then there is in a car
when you're just sitting and I guess you have. Boy,
I'm talking to myself a new corner in this one,
because it still requires a pretty strong ability to drive
a car in order to to maneuver in traffic and
every situation. But I guess what I'm saying is that
I require an extra level of skill and expertise, uh
(16:54):
to maneuver a motorcycle in this In those same situations,
man just to hop on a motors cycle because you're
you're balancing on two wheels instead of fours. The engine
is between your legs or you know what I mean, roughly,
you're directly it's hop the engine. Any times. You have
to have quick reflexes, you have to have balance, you
have to have skill and ability and knowledge and all that,
(17:17):
and you have to you have to be mindful of
everything around you because you know it's really difficult for
you know, the driver of a car to see a
driver of a motorcycle. I mean, it's it's really hard.
I know. The old saying is the you know, loud
pipes save lives, But honestly, you don't really hear that
sound until they're either next you or past you. Anyways,
and a lot of people, and a lot of people
(17:38):
driving in a car are going to have the windows up,
They're gonna have music or dare I say, a podcast playing,
so it might be difficult to hear. But this brings
me to one of the motorcycle stereotypes that I would
like to bust. After a word from our sponsor and
(18:06):
we're back and Ben, you said you wanted to to
break up a stereotype. You wanted to bust that stereotype?
What is it? Yeah? Okay, So where I grew up,
there were a lot of a lot of bikers, really
genuinely good people who who just want to get out
on the open road, you know what I mean, pack
a pack a sleeping bag and drive out through the
(18:26):
desert and just crashing the elements poor choice of words, uh,
camp in the elements. And one one of the stereotypes
that I see a lot of people who are uh,
you know, anti motorcycle or anti bikers. One of the
stereotypes I see these people constantly having is they will
(18:47):
completely forget about the nine very responsible bikers that they see,
who are obeying traffic laws, who are driving aware of
their surroundings and very very careful, and they will only
remember the one person who was, you know, ducking and
weaving um and and showing out. Essentially because of that stereotype,
(19:13):
I think a lot of times bikers get treated unfairly.
There's no way around this fact, and it's the fact
that a lot of people forget. No matter how aware,
no matter how professional, no matter how responsible a biker is,
forces beyond their control exists, and bad car drivers are
(19:34):
often the cause of a crash. Yeah, sure, it happens
a lot. Yeah, car pulls out in front of a motorcycle.
Is nothing they can do. But then again, you know,
is that the that the car can't see the motorcycle
because they're going too fast. They weren't in that lane
half a second ago. I mean, there's a there's so
many different factors in every single crash. I mean, you
have to analyze each one isn't take it as an
individual case and look at it that way. But you're right,
(19:56):
most get the bad rap for the ones that do
cause the problem. See feel bad Apple thing. Yeah exactly.
And I don't want to paint with broad strokes here,
but I do. I do want to emphasize that, you know,
when when you were on the road, whatever you are driving,
and a lot of people hate thinking about this, especially
in traffic jams. You are responsible for your vehicle and
(20:19):
your behavior as a driver, but you are also to
a degree responsible for every other vehicle around you to
be aware of them, to even do your best to
prevent an accident if they're driving like a like a jerk,
which happens a lot here in Atlanta. But a person's
life is not worth feeling that you uh, you know
(20:43):
what won the won that situation. I mean you were
the winner. Yeah, yeah, it's it's not worth it, You're right,
I mean everybody gets wrapped up in that. Though. There's
a point where you know you're you're not gonna let
that person cut in front of you, or you know,
you put on your brakes a little bit too annoy
the person that's you know, too close to your bump
or something like that. I again, don't mess around with
stuff like that. It's just not worth it. But but
(21:03):
you're right one, you know, one bad apple can ruin
the whole bunch. Really is that? That's the saying that's
it sounds like I'm talking about bananas, I always cause
he's saying' is messed up? Don't I like a bushel
of apple? I don't know one potato in a barrel
of something. I don't know. I'm awful with these U
the zoo. But anyway, so the majority of bikers are
doing the right thing, and they're and they're obeying the laws,
(21:25):
and they're obeying, you know, the rules of the road,
and really not a lot happens, but you hear about
the bad situation now. I gotta tell you, though, I
don't know if I know a single motorcycle rider that
hasn't had an accident. Do you know anybody of some
sort either? You know, maybe they were going around a
corner and you know there's some grass out on the
street or something they slipped in that or gravel or
sand or something like yeah, something like that. You know,
(21:47):
it could be something you know, small like that, or
could be a major accident or even several major accidents.
My brother has had several major accidents of his bike
and he still rides. Um. I don't know. It just
seems like every single person that I've ever known that
has a motorcycle has at some point had an accident,
you know what. I'm thinking back on my friends who
(22:08):
are bikers. Most of the things that I can recall,
like the the really bad ones. One was one was
due to driving conditions. I think it was a hard
turn on slick pavement. Uh, But a lot of the
other ones were actually you know, drivers of a pickup
(22:30):
truck or drivers of a a larger suv. And it
goes back to what you're saying, visibility is a real issue. Yeah.
Sometimes there they crash in reaction to, you know, a
poor choice made by a driver of a four wheel vehicle.
One thing that we should mention, Ben, is that the
manufacturers of motorcycles are semi limited maybe in uh the
(22:51):
amount of technology they can put into motorcycles that make
them safer for the riders. I almost want to say
they're almost as a stand still really with stuff like this,
because they can't throw in the lane detection devices and
they can't throw in um, you know them, what do
they call it? The the radar son are for the
cruise control. They can't do stuff like that that they
can in automobiles, and they're continually just loading cars with
(23:15):
safety technology, whereas motorcycles. I mean, there's a few little
things here and there, but um, for the most part,
they're kind of a standstill. So they don't necessarily market
next year's bike is safer than this year's bike. They don't,
they don't really say that. Ah, but there is good
news there are there are very very smart manufacturers working
around the clock to make biking safer. Right, there's some
(23:39):
incredible advances and maybe we should talk about those advances
after a word from our sponsor. And we have returns,
so we always like to end on a future note
(24:00):
to find the positive side of things. And of course
we started a hard on the statistics, got some very
grim and grizzly data. But now we're going to talk
about some of the improvements that manufacturers are making, and
some of these may surprise you. Yeah, And one interesting
thing is that we're going to talk about stuff that's
not necessarily from the bike manufacturers. It's from other people
(24:24):
that are doing things that can make riding a bike safer. So, Uh,
there's some really interesting technology that's out there. Yes, lead
at that. I'll start with I'll start with one here
that a lot of people might not notice because it's
invisible to the naked eye. Electronic throttle control ride by
wire technology. Uh. It makes turning the throttle and electric
(24:46):
mechanism rather than a cable driven one. So instead of
the rider having direct one to one control over the engine,
which can lead to stalls or losses of control, this
sends an electric signal from the throttle to an e
c U and that takes an account how much throttle
or engine power the writer wants, compares it to the
current speed and the speed of the bike, and so
(25:06):
it calculates how to more precisely apply throttle. You know,
I am not a biker. You're not a biker. But
also understand a lot of my old school friends. I
want to keep stuff as as purely mechanical as possible,
So I can understand how someone might not like electronic
throttle control. But from the angle of uh, predictability and
(25:28):
uninterrupted power supply, this is great. Sure, some more you
think it's more reliable it's it seems to be just
because you know, just because if you can limit human error,
then you're also going to I would argue, limit likelihood
of certain crash situations. Yeah, I think you're right. But
(25:49):
and then someone else is gonna say this is just
the you know, the devil's devil's advocate side is that
you know, it's another electronic thing to break. Really, I
mean that you can't fix yourself that type of thing.
So those are events are always gonna be there. The
same with cars, right, I'm the one making those arguments
like half the time. Well yeah, that's why the I'm
you know, the automotive purists will say, you know, like
of course you're gonna have a cable connection between you know,
(26:10):
the carburetor and the pedal inside the car. Right, yeah,
so I mean going way back, I guess right. Um,
so yeah, there's gonna be people that that that want
the advancement than others that don't want the advancement. And
some of those things come about with like you know, headlights,
you know, uh, you know, projector beam headlights or led headlights,
tail lights that are more visible, different types of turn
(26:32):
signals that are more visible to drivers. I mean, and
there are several other things too, right, but yeah, yeah, yeah,
I'm really glad that you mentioned motorcycle headlights because they're
also adaptive. Motorcycle headlights made by a couple of manufacturers.
One is JW Speaker, and it's pretty neat what they do.
So as a motorcycle leans into a curve, sensors on
the headlight calculate the angle of the lean and use
(26:55):
it to determine where to direct the light. Oh cool,
that's that's way different than on car system. Yeah, that
is way different. It kind of reminds me of the
center the third headlight on a tucker that would also
turn with the wheel. Yeah, I mean there's a few
versions of that. I think that that, you know, lights
turned slightly, you know. To me, it's kind of like
like a corn light. Really, yeah, that's the idea, but
(27:17):
it seems like on a motorcycle, if you're actually if
you're dipping the bike down one way or the other,
the light would have to move in a couple of
different directions. It wouldn't just go left or right. It
would go you know, like left and up a little bit,
and we're right and up a little bit. Would need
a large range of motion. Yeah, yeah, that sounds that's
a cool idea. That's a neat need in uh advancement,
I guess. And I have one more there. There are
a bunch of things like this. Um. I have one
(27:40):
more though that I'm on the fence about. And I
want to know what you think, Scott, I want to
know what you think, Ladies and gentlemen, are augmented reality
having the turning the helmet and the visor of the
helmet into its own interface, right, okay, So like a
heads up display on the inside of your visor, right right, right?
(28:03):
I don't know, are you for it or against that? Hey?
You know what? It works for fighter pilots, right, it
does work for fighter pilots. But my question, but like
fighter pilots are typically not going to be playing the
radio while they're doing this there, they're also not going
to be in like fighter pilot traffic. That's okay. So
it's there's a big difference between what a motorcycle rider
(28:27):
would see inside a helmet display from what I've seen anyways,
versus a car heads up display, which is one where
you you know, don't have to move your eyes quite
as far down to see the gauges the dials right right.
And before anybody writes in, when I say fighter pilot traffic,
I mean multiple planes trying to go to different locations.
Flying in formation is totally different. So oncoming fighter plane
(28:49):
traffic right right right, Which goes back to our long
standing uh conversation about flying cars. Well, what would be
the flying car version of a Honda Odyssey for you? Because, like,
imagine someone tying you up at a fighter pilot speed.
(29:09):
Oh man, what would that be? Someone who's that you
get their blinker on? It's a it's a ridiculous thought,
I understand. But they turn left out in front of you,
you know, on the main road from the from the
mall there or something, um from What would that plane be?
Maybe a Sasna gets in the way, you know, Yeah,
(29:30):
I see something like a large scale haller, you know,
maybe a large bomber. Yeah. Maybe there's maybe there's a
plane out there that people kind of like think I think,
you know, when they see it, they're like, oh, here
we go. Yeah, I bet there's gonna it's gonna be trouble.
I'm pretty sure there is. I'm gonna be thinking about
that looking up some planes. But this This argument is
(29:50):
pretty interesting because we know that a lot of entertainment
amenities in modern view goals, despite being despite emphasizing safety,
a lot of these things can become very powerful forces
of distraction in a car. Right to take the minivan example,
(30:11):
you know, when when there are a bunch of televisions
that pop down entertained the kids or entertained the passengers,
but they can also be distracting to the drivers. And
and it's the same thing you know that can happen
with with radio or with um the ability to make
calls from the cars system, right, which I think is
I think is super cool and if used it responsibly,
(30:32):
it shouldn't be a problem. Should we put the same
stuff in motorcycles? You know? And one one thing that's
really interesting about this is that there's a helmet called
the a R one that's made by the startup in
Silicon Valley. It has a rear facing camera that projects
a live feed into the rider's you know, field of view,
(30:53):
so they can see what's happening behind them too, without
having the leam for the side mirror or turn around.
But we go back to the original question, right, is
that more of a benefit or is it more of
a distraction man, that would take a lot of time
to get used to. That wouldn't have to have that
in your field of view to see that happening, Um,
because I even you're already limited, right, I mean, you
(31:14):
don't have the full range of view that you do
in a car when you're not wearing a helmet. You're
restricted in some way. So to add you know, a
window or an area that I'm sure that it's you know,
you're able to see through it as well, but to
see that motion or that that activity in the corner
or wherever it appears, it's got to be difficult. I
would think that take a long time on the road
to just kind of adjust. Yeah, and I would wonder
(31:37):
what the learning curve is on that. Yeah, you know,
but there's something even more important that you hipped me too,
that that was really cool. Well, these are there's a
couple of things really that that I think people are
probably you know, wanting us to talk about that you know,
they've have We've neglected to this point, and there's there's
a reason cause we want to finish on this. There's
a new technology. Well, okay, you know what, maybe I
should back this up. I shouldn't say it's new because
(32:00):
Honda has kind of been doing this since about two
thousand and six, and they've been developing this for decades prior.
So here's the deal. We're talking about motorcycle air bags,
and the idea is kind of funny. I mean, it works,
it really does work, and we'll get to how it
works in a moment. But you know, in a motorcycle
we we haven't really touched on this either, that motorcyclers
don't wear seat belts because they're probably safer. They're thrown
(32:22):
off the vehicle probably, which is counterintuitive when you're talking
about a car. You'd rather stay with the car than
you get thrown from the car. But on a motorcycle,
it's probably better to be thrown away from the vehicle,
or at least stay a short distance way from the
vehicle um in the event of a crash, because that
thing is spinning around at whatever rate, could you know,
clock you in the head or something. In the nineties
(32:43):
seventies is when they begin work on air bags, and
it wasn't until two thousand and six that Honda came
out with the Goldwing that had an airbag that was
mounted on the on the motorcycle. It's not something that
you know, you're you wear or anything like that. It's
something on the motorcycle. And the sensors are located in
the front forks and this only works in a front impact.
(33:03):
You know, somebody were to pull out in front of
you anywhere to contact the side of the vehicle or
you know, the front of the vehicle or whatever, or
if you got rear ended. UM, I don't think it
would know, and I think it would have a purpose
at that point. So it um it opens from I guess,
right right in front of the rider, like where the chest.
The chest would be, where the gauges are, and the
know the windshield and all that. Because the gold Wing
is a big bike. It's a big like I don't
(33:26):
know what they call those, a big road touring bikes
maybe or where the big comfy ones. They look like
you're almost in like a big seat as you're going
down the road. You can you can watch video of
these things and you know, UM deploying and they're very
effective at at stopping the rider from going over the
handlebars if they hit something from the front, UM all
other directions that they're if they're contacted from. It doesn't
(33:47):
really do a whole lot of good, doesn't stop them
from anything except going into that vehicle or over the
handlebars rather. But they've developed this even farther now. So
you know, it took again twenty five years to get
to that point and hand has been doing it ever since.
And there's another kind of well, an interesting development. But
I think it's been around for again ten fifteen years
at this point. But they're still working. There's still you know,
(34:09):
getting new product out there. And this is air bags
that the writers wear inside the jackets and the suits
that they wear, and a lot of them have to
do with protection to the head and the neck and
the shoulders area, but not all of them. Some of
them are like chest uh air bags that inflate underneath
the vest that you wear. Um, it's really pretty cool
(34:31):
to watch. You can see all the different versions of
this out there. There's maybe four or five or six
different versions of it. And I've seen some crazy prototype
versions and I'll tell you about one in a minute,
but maybe the silliest one I've seen. UM, I don't
know how effective this would be, ok, but you know,
so again they started started working on these uh these
kind of like collars that would appear from beneath the
(34:52):
collar of the jacket when uh an impact was sense
like and that might be um via a key system
that it's sort of like you know on a jet
ski when you put a key into the ignition and
has a coiled it turns off if you fall off
exactly so the jet ski doesn't leave you and go
across the lake. Right. So the same idea, but this
is that if you have left the seat of the
(35:13):
bike quickly, uh, you know, in an impact, this thing
activates and when it pulls that when the key pulls
this uh, this little I guess it maybe a key
that activates a canister of c O two in the
in the vest uh inflates it. And it could be
a collar as I said that you know, expands around
the shoulders and the neck and the in the head area.
(35:33):
Or it could just be a vest that goes around
the entire torso area and of course shoulders as well.
But it's all underneath the protective here, I should say,
so that when you know, you do fall off the
bike and then you land on the ground or rocks
or you know, fence or another car or whatever. You've
got this barrier between your body and whatever that object is,
and it stays inflated for a couple of seconds, which
(35:54):
is usually enough for the you know, the complete accident
to kind of play itself out, the the energy to
disperse an that, um, things calm down, You've either stop
rolling or whatever, and h it uh slowly deflates. There's
a pressure relief valve that allows the air to exit,
but it stays inflated long enough to protect you as
you're hopefully as you're flying through the air. So it
(36:14):
doesn't it doesn't stay permanently inflated. Is that because of
a risk of internal injury? I don't think so. I
think it's maybe because um they don't want you trapped
in a bad position. Again, also because I think it's restricted.
It becomes more restrictive. You know that it when it's inflated,
um and it press plus is putting a lot of
pressure on your bike because it's a tight fitting thing
to begin with. When you add you know, um, an
(36:36):
air bladder to that, you can imagine how tight that
garment must field must really compress compress your body. But
as a thin but really highly pressurized barrier between you
and whatever you're gonna hit. You know, I'm clumsy enough
and maybe you are too, fellow listeners, I'm clumsy enough
that I could just wear one of these and you'd
(36:57):
have to hold that. Maybe you could hold it, and
when you've sensed yourself going over, you ripped that out inflates.
There's some really cool videos of of race of course
razors where this you know, Grand Prix racers will wear them.
You can see accidents online on YouTube or wherever if
you search where different types of vests have inflated, or
these collars that I'm talking about those have inflated. You
(37:17):
can see test videos which are I'll tell you a
couple of the test videos are a little bit silly,
and that like one of the collars that I saw
was it almost looked like um, like football shoulder pads
that inflated, except they added something around the neck that
went up a little bit higher. And when they're testing
it for you know, the press or whoever was there,
the guy rolls off the bike and he it seemed
like he may have rolled a few extra times for
(37:39):
you know emphasis. Yeah, but um, but the point is
made that you know, it's it definitely protects you know,
your head, next shoulders, and even your torso to some degree. Now,
the funniest one that I've seen this is ridiculous. I
was watching some some videos last night of of these
in action, and uh, this guy puts on this big
orange suit and almost looks like, um, a suit like
(38:01):
you know, somebody who's going parachuting with were So it's
a big, baggy, full body suit and really like almost
like like a silk material, but very very loose. So
you don't think of loose fitting material when you're talking
about a motorcycle typically. Um, but this guy gets on
this motorcycle and it's an animation, gets on the motorcycle
and uh and rides down the road a little bit,
(38:22):
you know, wouldn't you know what Ben two turns into
his ride, falls off the bike. Something happens. He falls
off the bike. I don't know if someone pulls in
front of him or whatever. But as he's on his
way over the handlebars, this the suit inflates to where
he looks like an orange like a huge ball, and
it completely envelopes his body. I mean, so it's like
the suit is like a I don't know, an eight
(38:43):
foot in diameter ball that's filled with air, and and
then he goes like just tumbling down the road in
this in this in this ball of air of this
big orange ball, and as he's laying there on the ground,
it's slowly deflates and he, you know, stands up like
nothing's wrong, like like he's totally safe. Now, it's, of course,
it's just an animation, and it's an idea. It's a theory,
(39:04):
it's a proof of concept. It is, but it looks
so ridiculous when you see it happen, and then you think, well, yes,
you know, for a second you think that's a pretty
good idea, and then you think, well, there's a lot
of situations where that would be pretty bad, right, especially
like a heavy traffic situation if there's still oncoming traffic
and oncoming vehicles rather and you're rolling across lanes of interstate. Yeah,
(39:25):
because he went a significant distance before he stopped. Now,
I wasn't like, you know, a mile or anything. It
was just down the road. But it seems like, yeah,
you want to come to a halt quicker than that,
it seems, but I don't know, it's an interesting idea.
Maybe check it out online and see what you think,
but I found it just had a bit ridiculous. But
(39:46):
of course I think we can all agree it is
uh better to look ridiculous than I have to sit
in a hospital for months recuperation, or not even make
it to the hospital, or not make it to the
hospital at all. So we hope that you enjoyed this
examination of the some of the stereotypes, some of the
(40:07):
safety technology, and some of the statistics behind the world
of biking. And if you are a biker, we'd like
to hear your stories. What were some of your favorite rides?
What are you writing now? You know, some of your
favorite road trips? Tell us what we're wrong about because
we're not bikers. We should have said that up front,
but we said we said that part way there. Yeah,
(40:28):
maybe we covered ourselves enough. I think we've put it
in enough disclaimers like hey, you know, um, just the
way I see it, but that kind of thing. And
so for nicknames for our new superproducer, that's one thing
I wanted to cover, uh alec airbags, William No, I
don't know, it's uh we're getting a strong Okay, Well
(40:49):
we're gonna we're gonna give that some thought and we
will be back next week. Let's defer to our listeners,
and let's defer to you ladies and gentlemen, uh before
we come back next week. In the mean time, right
to us and let us know what you think of
cool nickname for our new producer would be uh. And also,
if you'd like to check out some of our other
podcasts that we have done on the subject of biking
(41:13):
and even on safety technology, we have good news. You
can find every single episode on our website, Our Stuff
Show dot com. But wait, as Billy Mays was want
to say, there's more. You can also find us on
Facebook and Twitter. And if you'd like to take the
page out of Glenn Beck's book and write to us
with a topic that you think your fellow listeners would
(41:36):
enjoy learning about in the future, we are all ears,
I guess in this case eyes right to us, we
are car stuff. At how stuff Works dot com for
more on this and thousands of other topics. This is
how stuff Works dot com. Let us know what you
think send an email to podcast that how Stuff Works
(41:57):
dot com.
Go behind the wheel, under the hood and beyond with
car stuff from how Stuff Works dot Com. I had
welcome to car Stuff. I'm Scott, I'm Then we are
joined by a brand new super producer, Alex Williams nickname
t b A. So right in and tell him hello,
(00:23):
and uh give him a nickname if you wish. I know,
you probably didn't know that was gonna happen. Now he's
shocked by the whole news. Nicknames come with a job,
right right, and uh, you know, sometimes we're we're a
little off the cuff. I guess you could say that
we like to live dangerously. And that brings us to
uh part of today's topic. But first we have an announcement. Yeah,
(00:46):
we've got an announcement. Bennet's it's time for the rally again.
It's it's rally season, yes, but not just any rally.
We are talking about our friends over at Rally North America,
who we went on our first road rally ever with
with this organization. We went on something called the Ohio
Valley seven hundred where we drove through what's got seven states,
(01:08):
I don't know, it felt like that, and it's four
or five, six, seven, something like that it was. It
was a long run, seven miles, but that's the thing.
We were in Maryland for like like fourteen or twenty minutes.
It was really short to remember that at that point.
But uh, but we had a great time, and we
documented our adventures and we have an Amazon video that
you can watch. It's about an hour long but shows uh,
you know gu me Casey Nol on the road and uh,
(01:31):
you know, all of the Rally North America group and
how much fun we had and all the different stops
we made in historic sites and locations. It was just
it was a great time and and it was for
a good cause, which I think is key and it's
part of the reason that we're making this announcement today
because the folks at Raleigh North America are back ladies
and gentlemen with a different route this time. They always
(01:53):
do a new route. Uh it is the Rally Appalachia too. Yeah,
and it's going to start in uh Christiansburg, Virginia, and
they're gonna make a stop off at a couple of
race tracks during this one. Now this is happening, I
think it's starting around July tenth and it ends around
the fourteenth of July right around the corner. Yes, really happening.
It's happening soon. Um. And one of the racetracks that
they go to is Virginia International Raceway, which is a
(02:15):
road course in Alton, Virginia. It's right near Danville. And
from there they move on to North Carolina. They're gonna
be in the Great Smokey Mountains, um Waynesville, North Carolina,
then Onto and this is interesting, Ben, They're gonna go
on to Rome, Georgia again and they're gonna end up there,
but they're gonna take a day trip down to the
Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama. And that is where I'm gonna
(02:37):
meet up with Mr Glenn Beck for a day at
the track. That's right. Long time listeners, you will recall
Glenn Beck, a longtime friend of the show and an
active road rally or he's he's the mastermind behind what
we call Team Limber. What we call it that because
it's his name. Uh. He's gonna be driving his two
(02:57):
thousand six Legend Line Mustang GT. And the beneficiary for
this event is an organization called Hope for the Warriors.
Hope for the Warriors, and I would say a charity
that they've worked for before, they've donated to this this
charity before. Um it provides comprehensive support programs for service members,
veterans uh military families that are focused on transition, health, wellness,
(03:19):
peer engagement, connections to community resources, a lot of different things.
It makes a big difference in returning veterans lives. And
they've already at this point raised over sixty seven thousand dollars. Uh,
so there's two thirds of the way to their goal
of one. Yeah, that's right. And if you go to
support dot Hope for the Warriors dot org and you
(03:39):
can search for, uh, you know, the rally team that
you want to donate to, you can you can make
a little donation if you feel like it. We're not
we're not saying that you have to, but if you
feel like it, drops some drop some dollars over there,
and uh, of course, you know, search out Team Limber
and see if you can maybe donate to that. And
you know what, one of the better ways to do
that for Glenn's team probably is just go to his
Facebook page, but the Team Limber facebook page and you
(03:59):
can don't right there and oh, Ben, we're leaving up
maybe the biggest bit of information for anybody who is
maybe new to hearing this. That's right, Scott. Each of
the first forty donations in the amount of one hundred
dollars or more made to any rally team is eligible
for a raffle ticket for a Jeep Wrangler. Yeah, two
thousand four Jeep Wrangler. Now, so it's a used vehicle. Um,
but for one hundred dollars, if you donate one hundred bucks,
(04:22):
you can get a raffle ticket to win. Now, only
two hundred tickets will be sold, so your odds are
really really good. One and two hundred. They're gonna win
this thing. I'm in. I've already you know, maybe my
hundred dollar donation. I'm on the list. You can go
check it out. I'm on the Team Limber's list of donors,
and I'm hoping that I'm the one that they dropped,
but you never know. One of our listeners could win,
and I'd love it if they did. I've seen the
(04:42):
jeep on the site and it's a two thousand four
Jeep Wrangler X with a four leaders six cylinder engine.
It's a five speed manual transmission. It's a one order
owner vehicle that had no accidents. I mean, there's a
history report that's on the Facebook page. By the way,
if you do want to check out this jeep ahead
of time, you can go to the Facebook page and
it is uh oh, what does it called. I think
it's called jeep for the Warriors on Facebook. So if
(05:03):
you search geep for the Warriors Facebook, you'll see a
photo of this jeep and a couple of photos and
and the history report and all that, um. But again,
it's never been modified, abused anything like that. It has
about a six thousand miles on it, and they say
that you know that subject to change a little bit
if they drive it to any kind of promotional of that. Yeah, exactly,
anything that has to do with the rally. So that's
all they're using it for. But if you do choose
(05:24):
to make a donation like that and you want to,
of course, we're you know, saying, go to Team Limber's
page and make the donation. Why not if you know,
But if you find another team or you know someone
else on a different team, make a donation to their page,
that's fine. But for one hundred bucks you get in
on this rally. It's quite a deal. Like I said,
I'm into I hope, I hope I win it. But
if you do that and you make it to Glenn's page,
make sure that you send him an email and I'll
(05:46):
tell you the information here. It's it's Team Limber at
Comcast dot net. And that way he can make arrangements
for your Raffle ticket and act now because the drawing
is on Monday, July tenth. The big thing about this,
one of the reasons ladies and gentlemen Scott is so
excited about this is you do not have to physically
be present to win. Yeah, that's one of those deals
where you know you can just you know, you pay
(06:07):
your money, you get the ticket in the mail, and
then hey I won. Hey, well you could flip the
jeep man, you could double your money. I'll take it
off your hands. Well, let me tell you something. I've
seen it online and it's it's definitely a jeep. It's
worth keeping. This isn't like a scrap jeep or something.
This is I've seen photos of it. It's it's actually
pretty nice. It's yellow, so I might have to paint it. So,
(06:28):
you know, I've got the thing about yellow cars. You
gotta think about Yellowell's bright yellow. I mean it's it's nice,
it's really nice. But we might have to make that
thing black. I know, yeah, yellow car thing. Well, I'm
not crazy about bright yellow cars like school bus yellow car.
They call it the candy code. I give, I give maybe,
like I might give supercars a pass in some cases,
some of them and not all of them, because not
(06:49):
all of them look right in that bright yellow. But
but but this one, this jeep, I think it might
have to make a trip to um one of the
earl shot. So if you were out of town and
we are shot, it's a call back, right, I mean,
does he still do everything for I don't know, it's
been a long time that reference probably yeah, inflation, you know.
(07:12):
But would you be would you be cool if you
were away on vacation for a while or something you
came back and we had like painted your car yellow.
It was a good job, you know what I gotta says?
You might you might see the other side of me.
You would you wouldn't like me when I'm angry? Okay, alright, alright,
Bruce can uh so to summon up visit rally North
(07:34):
America dot com, where you can get all this information,
all the details, along with the stops to make along
the way. And even if you're not part of the rally,
if you just want to see some really awesome cars.
Have you got some pretty neat modifications. Sometimes people are
even in like costumes. Yeah, it's kind of a crazy
it's fun of fun cars look like race cars. It's
(07:54):
really it's a fun event. And when when win, they're
in town, it's kind of a spectacle. And uh and
it's really it's a good time. So it's good for
it's good family fund. Really, so team Limber Rally North
America dot com. Check him out. And Glenn, of course,
if you are listening, we hope you are. We would
love to hear some of your favorite moments after the
(08:14):
rally has done. I mean, you guys are gonna be
meeting in person. Yeah, so I guess I should be
putting this on you, Scott. I expect the full report
of pressure with pictures. I can do that, all right. Uh.
While we're doing that, let's return to the Segway. So nice.
I'm gonna say it twice. We like to live dangerously,
(08:35):
and this episode is about danger. Yeah, about danger. Indeed,
we're talking about if motorcycles are really more dangerous than cars?
And how about this? We just answer the question right now, Yes, yes,
some more dangerous. You can thanks everybody for listening, and uh,
we'll catch you next time. No, if there's a lot
more to it than just simple yes no answer, I
(08:55):
mean there's a lot of Uh, well, there's complexity to
this issue, really, and and why why motorcycles might be
more dangerous than cars? Um and a lot of people.
I think there are probably some people out there in
the field that they're less dangerous than cars. Do you
think there? Yeah, there may be some people. There are
definitely people who are more comfortable riding a motorcycle instead
(09:15):
of driving like a large land yacht sedan. Well, the
stats won't back it up, but some people might swear
that they're more safe on a motorcycle than they are
inside of a death trap car. So yeah, let's explore
on the way, let's explore some of the statistics. Were
also going to look at some safety technology. And I
(09:36):
have sort of a bone to pick about what I
would call a biker stereotype or motorcycle stereotype, because there
are a lot out there, and not all of them
are fair. You know, but first things first, you know,
you're there's a reason that bikers motorcyclist if you prefer
that term, gew up with leather and keV lar before
(09:58):
they hit the road. It's okay, yeah, let's just get
this out there. It looks super can I say, badass?
Okay you just did? Oh all right, sorry, Alex. So
it looks it looks really cool. But it's not just
decorative or ornamental. No, no, no no, they have of course,
all that gear has a purpose. And you find that
(10:21):
a lot of people don't, you know, don't suit up
the way that you probably should. You know, on on
the road, you'll see people wearing flip flops and shorts
and you know, tank tops when they're riding down the road,
or even no shirt at all, extremely dangerous. And some
people choose not to wear a helmet, you know, in
the states that don't have helmet laws. In fact, I
recently saw a study from I can't remember the safety
agency that it was, but it was talking about the
(10:42):
effectiveness of helmets, you know, for people that that choose
to wear helmet versus those that don't wear helmets and
states that you know, it's an option. So they found
that in those states, helmets are about thirty seven percent
effective in preventing motorcycle deaths, which is thirty seven that's incredible,
just one piece of safety equipment, and if sixty effective
at preventing brain injury. So even if you're not killed
(11:05):
in the accident, uh, there's a six better chance that
you're not going to have a brain injury if you
wear a helmet. UM. The thing is, you know, as
effective as that is, only nineteen states and the District
of Columbia have UM mandatory or mandated helmet laws right now.
So it's kind of an interesting um situation because you know,
traveling across state lines, I guess you can decide if
(11:26):
you want to leave it on or take it off.
At that point, Well, there's you know what I think
is interesting about that is there is a state by
state discrepancy. And let's let's not forget we're gonna constantly
be comparing motorcyclists too, car drivers or truck drivers. Another
example where there's a there's an interesting comparison is I
(11:50):
don't know if we've talked about this on air, but
here in Atlanta, Georgia, where we are of course based
for years, Uh, the seatbelt law did not apply to
pickup trucks. Do you remember that? I do? Was that
that was because it was it a senator? Maybe? Yeah,
there was like one congressman. There was one state congressman
who drove a pickup truck and refused to have a
(12:14):
seatbelt and thought the whole thing was a bunch of
a lark. Wouldn't pass any kind of legislation because of
that one particular person. I wish I remember that guy's name,
But yeah, it was all about the one guy that
didn't want to wear a seatbelt, and and it never
went through until until he was gone, until he's onseen.
But so those that there can be all sorts of
reasons for those sorts of discrepancies. Yeah, I mean, well
(12:35):
there's some we'll talk about some similarities and some some
disadvantages later as well. Yeah, definitely. One thing I do
wanna one thing I do want to say, uh, is
that we already start from a very very very fundamental difference.
If you are hopping into a car, you are hopefully
(12:56):
being enveloped in all sorts of safety tech knowledgy specifically
designed to mitigate your chances of death or injury. All
you have to do is click the seat belt. Yeah,
I mean you're you're in a steel cage already, right,
so that's there's already one benefit right there. You're not
exposed to the elements, you're not exposed to everything. You're
not um hopefully're not gonna get tossed out of there,
(13:17):
as you said, if you if you click the seat belt.
But also there's other things in modern cars that are
that are keeping you inside that cage, you know. I
mean if if you didn't have your seatbelt on, if
you didn't have air bags, that'd be a good chance
that you're you know, ejected from the vehicle. That happens
in a lot of cases. Um, you know, if you're
not wearing your belt, even with air bags, that can happen.
You can still be thrown out of the vehicle. A
(13:38):
lot of people have that idea that they can't be
thrown out if if they're not wearing the seatbelt but
their air bags, and that's not true either. You can
you can be tossed out that way. But but motorcyclists
kind of start that way, like their vehicle gets hit
and it's not funny. I mean they get hit and
they're off the bike one way or another. Typically, I mean,
unless they're just a simple laydown accident. But you know,
you get struck from behind or something, you're going unto
(14:00):
the hood of the car behind you. So yeah, it's
dangerous all around, even with helmets, right, even with appropriate
riding gear. The fact of the matter is that motorcyclists
face a much higher risk of a fatal crash. From
two thousand thirteen, US government data showed that for every
(14:22):
mile traveled, the number of motorcycle related deaths was twenty
six times twenty six times got the number of car
related deaths, and that gave us a total of more
than four thousand motorcycle fatality. Now this is from the
article on our website, right, okay, Now that was those
numbers I believe are from would you say, yeah, okay,
I looked at the same site again recently and found
(14:45):
some numbers, so updated a little bit, and unfortunately the
situation just got worse. Lay it on a little bit worse.
So you said in the motor number of motorcycle related
death was twenty six times higher the car related desk.
Now it's twenty seven times higher, which brings the number
of motorcycle deaths up to four thousand six. And so
(15:09):
what we'd like to do is explore, uh, some of
the causes of this, uh and some of as Scott said,
the similarities and differences between you know, your typical sedan,
let's say, and motorcycle. Yeah, the disadvantages. Yeah yeah, Okay,
so they drive on the same roads. They can be
(15:31):
equally powerful, they can both reach very high rates of speed.
But on one thing that's really a pro and con
would be the weight ratios, right, the weight to power ratio.
The vast majority of cars. If you're at a stoplight
and you are next to a motorcycle and you decide
(15:51):
to race from a dead stop, you will get smoked.
Vast majority. Again, the vast majority. Yeah, I mean I'm
not counting, like you know the Clarence. No, motorcycles are quick.
Motorcycles are super quick, They're very nimble, they have better handling,
but they also with each of those abilities comes some
significant drawbacks. Yeah. Sure, I mean, well I guess what
(16:14):
was a couple. I mean, there's there's first there you
need skill and smarts really to drive a motorcycle. I
mean you gotta have good balance. Um, so that you
know you're you're the responsibilities. I guess when you jump
on that bike, I mean they're there. Can you say
that they're more than somebody who gets bean in the
wheel of car. I don't know if you can say
they're more. Um, but you have there's more relying on
(16:34):
you and your abilities then there is in a car
when you're just sitting and I guess you have. Boy,
I'm talking to myself a new corner in this one,
because it still requires a pretty strong ability to drive
a car in order to to maneuver in traffic and
every situation. But I guess what I'm saying is that
I require an extra level of skill and expertise, uh
(16:54):
to maneuver a motorcycle in this In those same situations,
man just to hop on a motors cycle because you're
you're balancing on two wheels instead of fours. The engine
is between your legs or you know what I mean, roughly,
you're directly it's hop the engine. Any times. You have
to have quick reflexes, you have to have balance, you
have to have skill and ability and knowledge and all that,
(17:17):
and you have to you have to be mindful of
everything around you because you know it's really difficult for
you know, the driver of a car to see a
driver of a motorcycle. I mean, it's it's really hard.
I know. The old saying is the you know, loud
pipes save lives, But honestly, you don't really hear that
sound until they're either next you or past you. Anyways,
and a lot of people, and a lot of people
(17:38):
driving in a car are going to have the windows up,
They're gonna have music or dare I say, a podcast playing,
so it might be difficult to hear. But this brings
me to one of the motorcycle stereotypes that I would
like to bust. After a word from our sponsor and
(18:06):
we're back and Ben, you said you wanted to to
break up a stereotype. You wanted to bust that stereotype?
What is it? Yeah? Okay, So where I grew up,
there were a lot of a lot of bikers, really
genuinely good people who who just want to get out
on the open road, you know what I mean, pack
a pack a sleeping bag and drive out through the
(18:26):
desert and just crashing the elements poor choice of words, uh,
camp in the elements. And one one of the stereotypes
that I see a lot of people who are uh,
you know, anti motorcycle or anti bikers. One of the
stereotypes I see these people constantly having is they will
(18:47):
completely forget about the nine very responsible bikers that they see,
who are obeying traffic laws, who are driving aware of
their surroundings and very very careful, and they will only
remember the one person who was, you know, ducking and
weaving um and and showing out. Essentially because of that stereotype,
(19:13):
I think a lot of times bikers get treated unfairly.
There's no way around this fact, and it's the fact
that a lot of people forget. No matter how aware,
no matter how professional, no matter how responsible a biker is,
forces beyond their control exists, and bad car drivers are
(19:34):
often the cause of a crash. Yeah, sure, it happens
a lot. Yeah, car pulls out in front of a motorcycle.
Is nothing they can do. But then again, you know,
is that the that the car can't see the motorcycle
because they're going too fast. They weren't in that lane
half a second ago. I mean, there's a there's so
many different factors in every single crash. I mean, you
have to analyze each one isn't take it as an
individual case and look at it that way. But you're right,
(19:56):
most get the bad rap for the ones that do
cause the problem. See feel bad Apple thing. Yeah exactly.
And I don't want to paint with broad strokes here,
but I do. I do want to emphasize that, you know,
when when you were on the road, whatever you are driving,
and a lot of people hate thinking about this, especially
in traffic jams. You are responsible for your vehicle and
(20:19):
your behavior as a driver, but you are also to
a degree responsible for every other vehicle around you to
be aware of them, to even do your best to
prevent an accident if they're driving like a like a jerk,
which happens a lot here in Atlanta. But a person's
life is not worth feeling that you uh, you know
(20:43):
what won the won that situation. I mean you were
the winner. Yeah, yeah, it's it's not worth it, You're right,
I mean everybody gets wrapped up in that. Though. There's
a point where you know you're you're not gonna let
that person cut in front of you, or you know,
you put on your brakes a little bit too annoy
the person that's you know, too close to your bump
or something like that. I again, don't mess around with
stuff like that. It's just not worth it. But but
(21:03):
you're right one, you know, one bad apple can ruin
the whole bunch. Really is that? That's the saying that's
it sounds like I'm talking about bananas, I always cause
he's saying' is messed up? Don't I like a bushel
of apple? I don't know one potato in a barrel
of something. I don't know. I'm awful with these U
the zoo. But anyway, so the majority of bikers are
doing the right thing, and they're and they're obeying the laws,
(21:25):
and they're obeying, you know, the rules of the road,
and really not a lot happens, but you hear about
the bad situation now. I gotta tell you, though, I
don't know if I know a single motorcycle rider that
hasn't had an accident. Do you know anybody of some
sort either? You know, maybe they were going around a
corner and you know there's some grass out on the
street or something they slipped in that or gravel or
sand or something like yeah, something like that. You know,
(21:47):
it could be something you know, small like that, or
could be a major accident or even several major accidents.
My brother has had several major accidents of his bike
and he still rides. Um. I don't know. It just
seems like every single person that I've ever known that
has a motorcycle has at some point had an accident,
you know what. I'm thinking back on my friends who
(22:08):
are bikers. Most of the things that I can recall,
like the the really bad ones. One was one was
due to driving conditions. I think it was a hard
turn on slick pavement. Uh, But a lot of the
other ones were actually you know, drivers of a pickup
(22:30):
truck or drivers of a a larger suv. And it
goes back to what you're saying, visibility is a real issue. Yeah.
Sometimes there they crash in reaction to, you know, a
poor choice made by a driver of a four wheel vehicle.
One thing that we should mention, Ben, is that the
manufacturers of motorcycles are semi limited maybe in uh the
(22:51):
amount of technology they can put into motorcycles that make
them safer for the riders. I almost want to say
they're almost as a stand still really with stuff like this,
because they can't throw in the lane detection devices and
they can't throw in um, you know them, what do
they call it? The the radar son are for the
cruise control. They can't do stuff like that that they
can in automobiles, and they're continually just loading cars with
(23:15):
safety technology, whereas motorcycles. I mean, there's a few little
things here and there, but um, for the most part,
they're kind of a standstill. So they don't necessarily market
next year's bike is safer than this year's bike. They don't,
they don't really say that. Ah, but there is good
news there are there are very very smart manufacturers working
around the clock to make biking safer. Right, there's some
(23:39):
incredible advances and maybe we should talk about those advances
after a word from our sponsor. And we have returns,
so we always like to end on a future note
(24:00):
to find the positive side of things. And of course
we started a hard on the statistics, got some very
grim and grizzly data. But now we're going to talk
about some of the improvements that manufacturers are making, and
some of these may surprise you. Yeah, And one interesting
thing is that we're going to talk about stuff that's
not necessarily from the bike manufacturers. It's from other people
(24:24):
that are doing things that can make riding a bike safer. So, Uh,
there's some really interesting technology that's out there. Yes, lead
at that. I'll start with I'll start with one here
that a lot of people might not notice because it's
invisible to the naked eye. Electronic throttle control ride by
wire technology. Uh. It makes turning the throttle and electric
(24:46):
mechanism rather than a cable driven one. So instead of
the rider having direct one to one control over the engine,
which can lead to stalls or losses of control, this
sends an electric signal from the throttle to an e
c U and that takes an account how much throttle
or engine power the writer wants, compares it to the
current speed and the speed of the bike, and so
(25:06):
it calculates how to more precisely apply throttle. You know,
I am not a biker. You're not a biker. But
also understand a lot of my old school friends. I
want to keep stuff as as purely mechanical as possible,
So I can understand how someone might not like electronic
throttle control. But from the angle of uh, predictability and
(25:28):
uninterrupted power supply, this is great. Sure, some more you
think it's more reliable it's it seems to be just
because you know, just because if you can limit human error,
then you're also going to I would argue, limit likelihood
of certain crash situations. Yeah, I think you're right. But
(25:49):
and then someone else is gonna say this is just
the you know, the devil's devil's advocate side is that
you know, it's another electronic thing to break. Really, I
mean that you can't fix yourself that type of thing.
So those are events are always gonna be there. The
same with cars, right, I'm the one making those arguments
like half the time. Well yeah, that's why the I'm
you know, the automotive purists will say, you know, like
of course you're gonna have a cable connection between you know,
(26:10):
the carburetor and the pedal inside the car. Right, yeah,
so I mean going way back, I guess right. Um,
so yeah, there's gonna be people that that that want
the advancement than others that don't want the advancement. And
some of those things come about with like you know, headlights,
you know, uh, you know, projector beam headlights or led headlights,
tail lights that are more visible, different types of turn
(26:32):
signals that are more visible to drivers. I mean, and
there are several other things too, right, but yeah, yeah, yeah,
I'm really glad that you mentioned motorcycle headlights because they're
also adaptive. Motorcycle headlights made by a couple of manufacturers.
One is JW Speaker, and it's pretty neat what they do.
So as a motorcycle leans into a curve, sensors on
the headlight calculate the angle of the lean and use
(26:55):
it to determine where to direct the light. Oh cool,
that's that's way different than on car system. Yeah, that
is way different. It kind of reminds me of the
center the third headlight on a tucker that would also
turn with the wheel. Yeah, I mean there's a few
versions of that. I think that that, you know, lights
turned slightly, you know. To me, it's kind of like
like a corn light. Really, yeah, that's the idea, but
(27:17):
it seems like on a motorcycle, if you're actually if
you're dipping the bike down one way or the other,
the light would have to move in a couple of
different directions. It wouldn't just go left or right. It
would go you know, like left and up a little bit,
and we're right and up a little bit. Would need
a large range of motion. Yeah, yeah, that sounds that's
a cool idea. That's a neat need in uh advancement,
I guess. And I have one more there. There are
a bunch of things like this. Um. I have one
(27:40):
more though that I'm on the fence about. And I
want to know what you think, Scott, I want to
know what you think, Ladies and gentlemen, are augmented reality
having the turning the helmet and the visor of the
helmet into its own interface, right, okay, So like a
heads up display on the inside of your visor, right right, right?
(28:03):
I don't know, are you for it or against that? Hey?
You know what? It works for fighter pilots, right, it
does work for fighter pilots. But my question, but like
fighter pilots are typically not going to be playing the
radio while they're doing this there, they're also not going
to be in like fighter pilot traffic. That's okay. So
it's there's a big difference between what a motorcycle rider
(28:27):
would see inside a helmet display from what I've seen anyways,
versus a car heads up display, which is one where
you you know, don't have to move your eyes quite
as far down to see the gauges the dials right right.
And before anybody writes in, when I say fighter pilot traffic,
I mean multiple planes trying to go to different locations.
Flying in formation is totally different. So oncoming fighter plane
(28:49):
traffic right right right, Which goes back to our long
standing uh conversation about flying cars. Well, what would be
the flying car version of a Honda Odyssey for you? Because, like,
imagine someone tying you up at a fighter pilot speed.
(29:09):
Oh man, what would that be? Someone who's that you
get their blinker on? It's a it's a ridiculous thought,
I understand. But they turn left out in front of you,
you know, on the main road from the from the
mall there or something, um from What would that plane be?
Maybe a Sasna gets in the way, you know, Yeah,
(29:30):
I see something like a large scale haller, you know,
maybe a large bomber. Yeah. Maybe there's maybe there's a
plane out there that people kind of like think I think,
you know, when they see it, they're like, oh, here
we go. Yeah, I bet there's gonna it's gonna be trouble.
I'm pretty sure there is. I'm gonna be thinking about
that looking up some planes. But this This argument is
(29:50):
pretty interesting because we know that a lot of entertainment
amenities in modern view goals, despite being despite emphasizing safety,
a lot of these things can become very powerful forces
of distraction in a car. Right to take the minivan example,
(30:11):
you know, when when there are a bunch of televisions
that pop down entertained the kids or entertained the passengers,
but they can also be distracting to the drivers. And
and it's the same thing you know that can happen
with with radio or with um the ability to make
calls from the cars system, right, which I think is
I think is super cool and if used it responsibly,
(30:32):
it shouldn't be a problem. Should we put the same
stuff in motorcycles? You know? And one one thing that's
really interesting about this is that there's a helmet called
the a R one that's made by the startup in
Silicon Valley. It has a rear facing camera that projects
a live feed into the rider's you know, field of view,
(30:53):
so they can see what's happening behind them too, without
having the leam for the side mirror or turn around.
But we go back to the original question, right, is
that more of a benefit or is it more of
a distraction man, that would take a lot of time
to get used to. That wouldn't have to have that
in your field of view to see that happening, Um,
because I even you're already limited, right, I mean, you
(31:14):
don't have the full range of view that you do
in a car when you're not wearing a helmet. You're
restricted in some way. So to add you know, a
window or an area that I'm sure that it's you know,
you're able to see through it as well, but to
see that motion or that that activity in the corner
or wherever it appears, it's got to be difficult. I
would think that take a long time on the road
to just kind of adjust. Yeah, and I would wonder
(31:37):
what the learning curve is on that. Yeah, you know,
but there's something even more important that you hipped me too,
that that was really cool. Well, these are there's a
couple of things really that that I think people are
probably you know, wanting us to talk about that you know,
they've have We've neglected to this point, and there's there's
a reason cause we want to finish on this. There's
a new technology. Well, okay, you know what, maybe I
should back this up. I shouldn't say it's new because
(32:00):
Honda has kind of been doing this since about two
thousand and six, and they've been developing this for decades prior.
So here's the deal. We're talking about motorcycle air bags,
and the idea is kind of funny. I mean, it works,
it really does work, and we'll get to how it
works in a moment. But you know, in a motorcycle
we we haven't really touched on this either, that motorcyclers
don't wear seat belts because they're probably safer. They're thrown
(32:22):
off the vehicle probably, which is counterintuitive when you're talking
about a car. You'd rather stay with the car than
you get thrown from the car. But on a motorcycle,
it's probably better to be thrown away from the vehicle,
or at least stay a short distance way from the
vehicle um in the event of a crash, because that
thing is spinning around at whatever rate, could you know,
clock you in the head or something. In the nineties
(32:43):
seventies is when they begin work on air bags, and
it wasn't until two thousand and six that Honda came
out with the Goldwing that had an airbag that was
mounted on the on the motorcycle. It's not something that
you know, you're you wear or anything like that. It's
something on the motorcycle. And the sensors are located in
the front forks and this only works in a front impact.
(33:03):
You know, somebody were to pull out in front of
you anywhere to contact the side of the vehicle or
you know, the front of the vehicle or whatever, or
if you got rear ended. UM, I don't think it
would know, and I think it would have a purpose
at that point. So it um it opens from I guess,
right right in front of the rider, like where the chest.
The chest would be, where the gauges are, and the
know the windshield and all that. Because the gold Wing
is a big bike. It's a big like I don't
(33:26):
know what they call those, a big road touring bikes
maybe or where the big comfy ones. They look like
you're almost in like a big seat as you're going
down the road. You can you can watch video of
these things and you know, UM deploying and they're very
effective at at stopping the rider from going over the
handlebars if they hit something from the front, UM all
other directions that they're if they're contacted from. It doesn't
(33:47):
really do a whole lot of good, doesn't stop them
from anything except going into that vehicle or over the
handlebars rather. But they've developed this even farther now. So
you know, it took again twenty five years to get
to that point and hand has been doing it ever since.
And there's another kind of well, an interesting development. But
I think it's been around for again ten fifteen years
at this point. But they're still working. There's still you know,
(34:09):
getting new product out there. And this is air bags
that the writers wear inside the jackets and the suits
that they wear, and a lot of them have to
do with protection to the head and the neck and
the shoulders area, but not all of them. Some of
them are like chest uh air bags that inflate underneath
the vest that you wear. Um, it's really pretty cool
(34:31):
to watch. You can see all the different versions of
this out there. There's maybe four or five or six
different versions of it. And I've seen some crazy prototype
versions and I'll tell you about one in a minute,
but maybe the silliest one I've seen. UM, I don't
know how effective this would be, ok, but you know,
so again they started started working on these uh these
kind of like collars that would appear from beneath the
(34:52):
collar of the jacket when uh an impact was sense
like and that might be um via a key system
that it's sort of like you know on a jet
ski when you put a key into the ignition and
has a coiled it turns off if you fall off
exactly so the jet ski doesn't leave you and go
across the lake. Right. So the same idea, but this
is that if you have left the seat of the
(35:13):
bike quickly, uh, you know, in an impact, this thing
activates and when it pulls that when the key pulls
this uh, this little I guess it maybe a key
that activates a canister of c O two in the
in the vest uh inflates it. And it could be
a collar as I said that you know, expands around
the shoulders and the neck and the in the head area.
(35:33):
Or it could just be a vest that goes around
the entire torso area and of course shoulders as well.
But it's all underneath the protective here, I should say,
so that when you know, you do fall off the
bike and then you land on the ground or rocks
or you know, fence or another car or whatever. You've
got this barrier between your body and whatever that object is,
and it stays inflated for a couple of seconds, which
(35:54):
is usually enough for the you know, the complete accident
to kind of play itself out, the the energy to
disperse an that, um, things calm down, You've either stop
rolling or whatever, and h it uh slowly deflates. There's
a pressure relief valve that allows the air to exit,
but it stays inflated long enough to protect you as
you're hopefully as you're flying through the air. So it
(36:14):
doesn't it doesn't stay permanently inflated. Is that because of
a risk of internal injury? I don't think so. I
think it's maybe because um they don't want you trapped
in a bad position. Again, also because I think it's restricted.
It becomes more restrictive. You know that it when it's inflated,
um and it press plus is putting a lot of
pressure on your bike because it's a tight fitting thing
to begin with. When you add you know, um, an
(36:36):
air bladder to that, you can imagine how tight that
garment must field must really compress compress your body. But
as a thin but really highly pressurized barrier between you
and whatever you're gonna hit. You know, I'm clumsy enough
and maybe you are too, fellow listeners, I'm clumsy enough
that I could just wear one of these and you'd
(36:57):
have to hold that. Maybe you could hold it, and
when you've sensed yourself going over, you ripped that out inflates.
There's some really cool videos of of race of course
razors where this you know, Grand Prix racers will wear them.
You can see accidents online on YouTube or wherever if
you search where different types of vests have inflated, or
these collars that I'm talking about those have inflated. You
(37:17):
can see test videos which are I'll tell you a
couple of the test videos are a little bit silly,
and that like one of the collars that I saw
was it almost looked like um, like football shoulder pads
that inflated, except they added something around the neck that
went up a little bit higher. And when they're testing
it for you know, the press or whoever was there,
the guy rolls off the bike and he it seemed
like he may have rolled a few extra times for
(37:39):
you know emphasis. Yeah, but um, but the point is
made that you know, it's it definitely protects you know,
your head, next shoulders, and even your torso to some degree. Now,
the funniest one that I've seen this is ridiculous. I
was watching some some videos last night of of these
in action, and uh, this guy puts on this big
orange suit and almost looks like, um, a suit like
(38:01):
you know, somebody who's going parachuting with were So it's
a big, baggy, full body suit and really like almost
like like a silk material, but very very loose. So
you don't think of loose fitting material when you're talking
about a motorcycle typically. Um, but this guy gets on
this motorcycle and it's an animation, gets on the motorcycle
and uh and rides down the road a little bit,
(38:22):
you know, wouldn't you know what Ben two turns into
his ride, falls off the bike. Something happens. He falls
off the bike. I don't know if someone pulls in
front of him or whatever. But as he's on his
way over the handlebars, this the suit inflates to where
he looks like an orange like a huge ball, and
it completely envelopes his body. I mean, so it's like
the suit is like a I don't know, an eight
(38:43):
foot in diameter ball that's filled with air, and and
then he goes like just tumbling down the road in
this in this in this ball of air of this
big orange ball, and as he's laying there on the ground,
it's slowly deflates and he, you know, stands up like
nothing's wrong, like like he's totally safe. Now, it's, of course,
it's just an animation, and it's an idea. It's a theory,
(39:04):
it's a proof of concept. It is, but it looks
so ridiculous when you see it happen, and then you think, well, yes,
you know, for a second you think that's a pretty
good idea, and then you think, well, there's a lot
of situations where that would be pretty bad, right, especially
like a heavy traffic situation if there's still oncoming traffic
and oncoming vehicles rather and you're rolling across lanes of interstate. Yeah,
(39:25):
because he went a significant distance before he stopped. Now,
I wasn't like, you know, a mile or anything. It
was just down the road. But it seems like, yeah,
you want to come to a halt quicker than that,
it seems, but I don't know, it's an interesting idea.
Maybe check it out online and see what you think,
but I found it just had a bit ridiculous. But
(39:46):
of course I think we can all agree it is
uh better to look ridiculous than I have to sit
in a hospital for months recuperation, or not even make
it to the hospital, or not make it to the
hospital at all. So we hope that you enjoyed this
examination of the some of the stereotypes, some of the
(40:07):
safety technology, and some of the statistics behind the world
of biking. And if you are a biker, we'd like
to hear your stories. What were some of your favorite rides?
What are you writing now? You know, some of your
favorite road trips? Tell us what we're wrong about because
we're not bikers. We should have said that up front,
but we said we said that part way there. Yeah,
(40:28):
maybe we covered ourselves enough. I think we've put it
in enough disclaimers like hey, you know, um, just the
way I see it, but that kind of thing. And
so for nicknames for our new superproducer, that's one thing
I wanted to cover, uh alec airbags, William No, I
don't know, it's uh we're getting a strong Okay, Well
(40:49):
we're gonna we're gonna give that some thought and we
will be back next week. Let's defer to our listeners,
and let's defer to you ladies and gentlemen, uh before
we come back next week. In the mean time, right
to us and let us know what you think of
cool nickname for our new producer would be uh. And also,
if you'd like to check out some of our other
podcasts that we have done on the subject of biking
(41:13):
and even on safety technology, we have good news. You
can find every single episode on our website, Our Stuff
Show dot com. But wait, as Billy Mays was want
to say, there's more. You can also find us on
Facebook and Twitter. And if you'd like to take the
page out of Glenn Beck's book and write to us
with a topic that you think your fellow listeners would
(41:36):
enjoy learning about in the future, we are all ears,
I guess in this case eyes right to us, we
are car stuff. At how stuff Works dot com for
more on this and thousands of other topics. This is
how stuff Works dot com. Let us know what you
think send an email to podcast that how Stuff Works
(41:57):
dot com.
CarStuff News
Hosts And Creators
Scott Benjamin
Ben Bowlin
Popular Podcasts
40s and Free Agents: NFL Draft Season
Daniel Jeremiah of Move the Sticks and Gregg Rosenthal of NFL Daily join forces to break down every team's needs this offseason.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.