Advice Required Re. Potentially Harmful Gloves

Following on from Daves recent accident I`m glad to say he`s now out of all the braces and plaster casts and is awaiting physio.

Shortly after his accident I raised a question/concern that it was rather odd that he broke exactly the same 9 bones in his hands and both wrists (tho one wrist was more severely damaged and required surgery). I wondered if perhaps the new RST gloves he`d bought had been a contributory factor to the damage.

Now he`s had the opportunity to put the gloves on and look at the position of the armour etc. in relation to the broken bones in his hands it stands out like a sore thumb (no pun intended ) that the gloves must have been the culprit. It was such a low speed off and when you look at the back of the gloves just below the knuckle armour there is a solid rounded plate which when the hands are angled backwards digs in to the exact same place where he had broken bones. On the right hand glove the plate has broken and this is the wrist that was a little worse and required surgery.





Dave will take the gloves with him on his next orthopaedic appt. and ask the consultants opinion but I feel that we need to make RST aware of the potential risk to people wearing these gloves. Prior to surgery Dave was warned that they might not be able to repair the damage to his hand and he could face amputation. That`s so scary hence the importance (I feel) of informing RST.

He doesn`t want compensation as its more important that other people don`t suffer the same fate but he would like the cost of the gloves reimbursed cos they weren`t cheap. Has anyone any experience of this kind of complaint before and ideas on how we go about starting the ball rolling?

What type were they? I'll check my RST Razor gloves tonight if I remember.
Personally if the consultant believes they played a contributing factor then I would go for compensation. We pay good money for equipment to protect us, not make things worse.

wow!! that looks like a really nasty break for a low speed off!! glad that braces are off as they are the most painfull thing i have ever had!!! make's sense about the gloves as i would be going for compensation too, due to the fact that amputation was a poss!

Go for it Claire. If it is down to the gloves and you will have the backup of your consultant then of course it needs to be drawn to the attention of RST. Obviously many accidents are unique and somebody landing the same way as Dave had may not have resulted in the same injuries but the point would still remain that it has happened and even if your complaint prevents it happening just once more then it is wholly worth it. If it had got down to amputation then I'm sure you'd be hollering for compensation but I can see why you'd just be grateful he has movement back in both wrists. Not that they won't cause Dave issues in future

[mister c]

I think that problem you will have is that RST aren't going to accept resposibility because that would open the floodgates for people that want to sue them.
I think that you will get the usual " we are sorry to hear about.....Blah blah blah, but we have never heard of this, blah blah blah" & they will probably reimburse you for the gloves, then a new design of glove will appear on the shelves.
It would be nice to see what a medical consultant thought about the "armour".
Glad he's on the mend Claire

[yorkie_chris]

It is hard because of the number of possible crashes, what is designed to save your knuckles on some sort of flailing highside may cause more damage in a FOOSH type thing.

I think a lot of gloves go OTT on armour for sales points.


Which breaks are you on about Considerably more of a mess than mine was!
Could you put a pic of gloves up?

Thanks everyone.... to clarify Chris he broke the same 7 (I think it was 7) bones in both hands and the same bones in both wrists but the right wrist was slightly more damaged and required the titanium plating. Co-incidentally the plate (I think it was made from carbon fibre) on the back of the right glove broke in several places which could possibly account for the more severe damage to the wrist?

Apart from the broken carbon fibre there is no damage or even a scuff mark to any part of the gloves and Dave says his hands didn`t even hit the floor as he didn`t let go of the handlebars.

These are the gloves he was wearing......






and this is a side angle which shows the plate (edged in red) which I think has caused the damage....





I just wonder if the manufacturers have gone too far with all this armour power ranger look and the stuff thats meant to protect us actually has the potential to damage us

[yorkie_chris]

It's probably excellent at spreading out impact if you backhand the tarmac at 100mph... but yeah it's the wrong side of that compromise, better a couple of busted knuckles than losing a hand!

Where do you reckon the edge of the plate dug in?

He thinks the main edge dug in just where the hand joins the wrist... if you follow the line of your thumb down to where it just joins the wrist you should feel a protruding roundish bone? it was that area there where there was a lot of damage and that protruding bone broke off on both wrists. The broken bones to his hands were all in the area just below the knuckle armour

Just checked my RST (Tractech not Razor's) and they're quite similar...


I can't feel any plate except for the edge of the carbon fibre knuckle and even then I can't actually bend my hand back far enough for it to make contact with my wrist. Essentially my wrist would have to brake first.