A Guide to Electric Scooter Safety Gear

Riding a unicycle can be immensely enjoyable, whether you practice that skill for fun and entertainment or for the athletic challenge that some disciplines of riding present. In many ways, it is so much more challenging to master a unicycle than it is to master other forms of wheeled transportation.

As it requires you to have an excellent sense of balance and awareness, it provides a much greater, full-body workout than many other forms of cycling. There is even evidence to suggest that those who tackle the unicycle learn to become better critical thinkers and problem solvers. At any rate, it is a sport, a challenge, that many riders willingly take up for diverse personal reasons.

With that in mind, there are some inherent risks associated with getting atop a wheeled machine. Unicycles, specifically, bring with them a host of challenges and risks that are elevated above the risks associated with bikes and other forms of wheeled transportation. For example, unplanned dismounts, so to speak, are just a fact of life for those learning to ride a unicycle. Patience, attention, and dedication will cut down on these falls over time, but they still do happen, and proper precautions must be observed.

Knowing yourself and your abilities can go a long way to preventing injuries that occur as a result of falls, but at the same time, there’s no replacement for the preparation and foresight of wearing appropriate safety gear.

Unicycle riders, therefore, must wear certain protective gear that is critical to keep them as safe as possible in the event of a fall. Get back to the title of this article, however; what do unicycles and electric scooters have in common with each other?

They’re both forms of transportation that rely on the wheel, they both require some level of skill to ride, they both can be practical and offer endless opportunities for great fun, and they both require you to prepare with adequate safety gear. As more and more people take to the streets and parks on electric scooters, we thought it only fitting that we would offer some advice for the electric scooter safety gear with which you should prepare if you intend to ride one.

Why People Love Electric Scooters

Electric scooters may be surprisingly expensive, but they’re definitely enjoying a surge in popularity among some people who absolutely love them. For some, it might be a throwback to the days when receiving a Razor Scooter was the highlight of a year, and for others, it might just be about the objective fun.

There are certainly those out there who love electric scooters because it reminds them of their early days when they spent hours and hours riding around the neighborhood on the above mentioned Razor Scooters. In the late ’90s and early 2000s, Razor Scooters were a staple in the repertoire of many a garage, and kids (and probably adults) spent hours if not days riding around casually and perfecting tricks on them, and paying the price in a scooter or two to the ankle.

Then there are others who may have never experienced the Razor craze firsthand but who enjoy the fact that electric scooters are just downright fun to ride. It’s a likelihood that many people who own and ride an electric scooter do so not for practical purposes but simply because they are light, fast, and fun to ride.

Of course, these previous demographics are only a small portion of the greater picture, and there are no doubt countless scores of people who ride electric scooters for pragmatic purposes.

On the one hand, electric scooters are great for people who live in urban and suburban areas and need an effective and efficient means of getting from place to place. This is especially true with respect to those types of trips that straddle the middle ground between “too far too walk” but “not far enough to drive to.” Electric scooters are a fast, convenient, and even enjoyable way for people to get around cities and neighborhoods without having to worry too much about expensive fuel costs, insurance, or other costs associated with cars. We may have a car culture here in the United States, but they can be very expensive.

On the note of practicality, there are probably people out there who use their electric scooters to commute to and from work and to run errands, just as some people ride bikes or drive cars. The difference is that cars are expensive and scooters give riders the ability to be free from exerting themselves in the ways that a bike would require.

Inherent Hazards

As you can see, there are more than a few reasons that electric scooters are so popular, ranging from nostalgia to practical purpose. Their rise in popularity, however, has exposed some of the risks associated with them, and as more and more people begin to ride them, so do accidents involving them commensurately rise.

Does this mean it is inherently dangerous to ride an electric scooter? Not necessarily, so long as you practice the same defensive driving techniques you would on a bike, in a car, or even on a unicycle. However, there are some features of electric scooters that mean you need to exercise additional caution - and wear the proper electric scooter safety gear - while you are riding one.

The first thing to keep in mind is that people often ride these electric scooters on the road alongside cars and buses, and while we might think of scooters as a toy, these machines can reach speeds of over 15 mph and provide no protection to the rider. A scooter might be relatively innocuous in the park or on the sidewalk, but put one on the road and you’ll need to exercise additional situational awareness if only for the fact that you must share the road with cars.

In addition, the fact that electric scooters have smaller diameter wheels than bicycles (and unicycles, for that matter) can be a somewhat troubling matter. This is because the diameter of the wheel is one of the factors that impact the smoothness of a vehicle's ride, with or without suspension. Take, for example, the larger front wheel of a penny farthing bicycle, that, among other things, helped to absorb some of the bumps of the road.

Larger wheels are inherently more stable in the face of a rough road than smaller wheels are. Roads can be rough and dangerous, and hitting a pothole or a curb at speed on an electric scooter can be downright risky. This is through no fault of the rider and even cautious riding cannot overcome this risk outside of avoiding a rough road altogether. The simple fact of the matter is that it is easier to lose control of a vehicle with smaller wheels when encountering obstacles. Electric scooters, by their very nature, have smaller wheels, and therefore are not as stable when negotiating a rougher road.

It has also been observed that the rear lights - and any other safety lighting if the scooter has it - is smaller and in a less noticeable location on an electric scooter than it is on other vehicles. Consider the fact that a bike’s rear reflector is about at eye level for drivers of most sedans, and about at waist level for most people. The rear safety lighting on most electric scooters is small and obscure by contrast and also positioned far too close to the ground on many models.

For all of these reasons - and for others that we have not investigated here - it is imperative to wear the proper electric scooter safety gear when you take one out on the road.

Always Wear Electric Scooter Safety Gear

Ask a rider just what the most important electric scooter safety gear is and you are likely to get the same answer in the first slot time and time again, being a helmet. After that, it might vary according to the rider’s own experiences on the road. With that in mind, start here when you are evaluating safety gear and consult us if you want more in-depth information on what safety gear is important and why.

1.Helmet

As mentioned, the single most important piece of safety gear for electric scooters is a protective helmet. While many accidents are not dangerous, the majority of accidents involving serious injury deal with injuries to the head. While defensive, cautious driving is your first and best defense against accident and injury, it is not adequate to protect you.

Therefore you need to prepare yourself, first and foremost, with a helmet that can provide adequate protection to your head in the event of an accident. You can find a number of helmets in our collection of safety gear for unicycles and several of these make more than a fitting match for those who would venture forth on an electric scooter.

Helmets like our Unicycle.com Unicycle Helmet might be designed for riders of the one wheeler, but they offer a good degree of protection as well as comfort, both desirable traits for those who ride electric scooters. This helmet contains styrene foam inserts inside of a hard plastic shell - protective and comfortable. Other helmets like our Giro Fixture MIPS are not only ventilated but contain Multi-Directional Impact Protection Systems, which are designed to afford an enhanced degree of protection against certain impacts.

2.Knee Pads and Shin Guards

A helmet might be the most critical piece of protection that you need no matter what you are riding, but you can still get pretty roughed up if you take a tumble and all you are wearing is a helmet. Therefore, our collection of safety gear offers you much more than just that.

When you experience an unplanned dismount, your extremities are probably going to take the brunt of the impact, and these are not only your hands and feet but also your elbows and knees. You’re probably going to be wearing shoes, so your feet will be protected, but you should take the extra effort and make sure that you are wearing knee pads as well. Even if you don’t fall hard, the cushioning of knee pads can protect you against everything from minor scrapes to what might have otherwise been a serious injury.

3.Elbow Pads

Additionally, and as mentioned, your elbows are likely to take the brunt of a fall, especially if you fall forward. A forward fall will cause you to instinctively reach forward to shield your body with your hands and arms, which will bring your elbows into less than friendly contact with the ground.

Most of the time this will result in nothing more than scrapes, but you can definitely experience unpleasant injuries from a fall onto your elbows, and those injuries are best avoided.

4.Gloves and Wrist Guards

You’ll also want to protect your hands, although gloves are not the first thing that comes to most people's minds when the question of safety gear pops up. Even so, wearing a good, heavy protective pair of gloves can save you from scrapes that would affect your hands, whereas a pair of wrist guards can protect your wrists against some impacts in the event of a fall. Protect your hands the first time and you’ll be glad you did if you fall. You can get right back up, but you need your hands to ride effectively and you should give them the protection they deserve.

Call Us for More Information

Do you want to learn more about what makes for a complete repertoire of safety gear for riding? Don’t be afraid to reach out to our team for more information or in the event that you have questions. You can reach us via the live chat at the bottom right of this screen, where you can leave a message if we are not here, or you can give us a call! Reach out to us at 678-494-3962 and we’d be more than happy to help you out.