Eye protection

[Z (fka Sweet Tooth)]

ewwww It's amazing how fast those infections can spread. Glad you have it under control with antibiotics.

[CYLax]

I found *three* bug splats on the face shield.

Three WHOLE bug splats? Whoa

I have to keep a bottle of windex under my seat to clean the bugs off my face shield every time I stop. I NEVER ride with the shield up. It comes up at stop lights so I can cool my head off. Light turns green, shield goes down, bike starts moving.

Sorry to hear about the eye Flynrider. Hope it heals up quick.

[sharpmagna]

Wow, yeah what are the chances. I never ride with the shield all the way up, I'll crack it a bit so some air can go through though. I guess a bug could sneak in, but what are the chances?

[Lion_Lady]

I can't believe this happened. I wear a fullface helmet, glasses with fairly large shatter proof lenses, and have a fullsize plexi winshield mounted on the bars.

Last Saturday, I'm riding home down a major street at about 45 mph. I have my faceshield up because it has a heavy tint and it's night. Still got the windshield and the big glasses right?...

As I've been doing more road riding especially in warm weather I get hit at least once per ride. Right in the faceshield by a bug... I have only an instant to register that it is coming, before WHAP! it hits. A couple of those would have hit me right in the face or bridge of the nose if I'd had my faceshield up. I wear "Bobsters" sunglasses under my clear faceshield. Got tired of having to carry a clear shield in my bag for night riding.

If you regularly end up out after dark, and have ANY tint in your helmet faceshield, you really need to carry a clear shield to switch to. You don't realize how much you cannot see with the tint in the dark.

flynrider: Glad you weren't badly hurt. Thanks for the lesson.

Pam

[Andrew]

Good luck with the infection. Those can be nasty.

Everytime a bug hits my helmet I think, "man, that would have hurt." i don't turn my nose up at people who ride without helmets or eye protection, but I'm sure this is something they deal with all the time. I couldn't do it.

[Skel3tor1]

Have windshield on the bike now. The full face visor is always down when riding. I don't use a tinted one so I can see out of it at night. During the day I just wear shades underneath the visor. Haven't had any bug issues in my helmet.....yet.

[flynrider]

Thanks for the good wishes. The swelling has come down quite a bit and I can see out of the bad eye, so it looks like the antibiotics and steroids are doing the job. It still looks pretty ugly, but everything works!

As for options, I'm thinking of just dropping the tinted shield for a clear one and using some clip-on sunglasses over my regular glasses. I really like having the tinted shield out here in the desert, but I usually ride after dark most days and constantly changing shields would become a chore.

Maybe that bug was a million to one shot, but I sure don't ever want to go through this again.

[M109R]

That s^cks, at least it wasn't a bee. Had them fly up under my open shield a couple of times and sting me. Try to stop safely when that happens.

Glad to hear you are feeling better. Maybe you should consider glueing some foam around the inside of the glasses you wear riding. The HD stealers sell overpriced riding glasses with the foam on them if you need an example but with a little know-how and glue you could easily make your own and be able to not worry about that happening again.

Good luck with avoiding that in the future...

[sharpmagna]

flynrider - If you're in the market for a new helmet, the Nolan N102 has what they call VPS (Vision Protection System). There is a tinted visor that flips down on top of the clear regular visor. It doesn't totally cover the clear visor, but gives you about 2.5" of tint. I have this helmet and absolutely love that feature. I don't carry sunglasses with me because I just pull the tinted visor down when needed and flip it back up when it is over cast.

I think it is a feature that should come on all full face helmets.

[Mr_Salad]

Oh man, sorry you got the bad end of the stick this time. Hopefully you'll be healed and back out on the road in no time.

I get hit by bugs everytime I ride, I couldn't imagine riding without a full face helmet. Props to the guys out there who can do it. Just this weekend I was riding and saw this bug coming at me. I just braced and let it hit. The guy DIDN"T DIE! He just kept walking around on my face shield. So I watched him for a while (not concentrating on the road, stupid ) and then ejected him with a swift flick from my left hand. I guess he was just trying to hitch a ride.