A match made in heaven.

[mycallsevern]

from the 3 people i've seen crash in them id never buy a set, lets just say they didnt perform to well...

Thanks rene I now no longer feel safe in my leathers and am going to be riding like a jessy!!!! Cheers.

[rene]

well they did there job! just i wouldent buy them... after the crash all the seems had split or come undone and worn right down to the armor

when i came off my alpine stuff has just a few scuffs on it, no rips ect

but then i paid quite abit more than the RST stuff as well!

[mycallsevern]

Yer I also think it depends how you fall, I learnt to ride off road so falling off was a big part of that and you quickly learn how to fall with grace. I went down the road at 60 wearing a Spada textile jacket and jeans, and both me and the jacket where fine.

Come to think of it I have never has road rash or grazes, even when a car pulled out in front of me and I had severe bain bleeding.

[gubbs]

What do you tink of your RST leathers, mines a 2 piece and it took a bit of time to break in (I had to ride HARD) but now they are really comfy.

The main reason I bought them is they are brilliant value, and a British company.

Here's what I have said previously on this issue:

RST leathers meet with a rather mixed reaction in biking circles.

I just bought the cheapo RST Dark one-piece suit off fleabay for £100 and felt for that price it was a bargain ..

However several people who have crashed in RST suits had a lot of negative stuff to say about their stitching and the quality of the hide.

I quote:

I was just think that. I have a friend who also hit the tarmac in a RST leathers. They didn't hold up well.

Cheap is cheap for a reason.

&&

I have a RST one piece, just like that one... it fell apart on the first crash.

So just don't fall off and you'll be fine.

&&

Well. Mine ripped apart on the butt in a 30-40mph highside and the zipper came away.

Be careful when you use them, specially on a track day, you'll need to tape the zipper up at the top or they will unzip, like mine did 3/4 of way dowm revetts straight...

When fully unzipped, like they will be, they turn into a nice big sail and at 150+ it can be interesting to say the least...

I did a bit of hunting around on google and it turns out that about two years ago RST moved their production and there are opinions on forums from owners of their leathers that their quality may have suffered. Older RST suits get glowing endorsements, but the newer, specifically budget items (the £300 suits) have come in for some harsh criticism.

My defence - why did I buy a cheap suit with negative press? At £100 I dont care if it only lasts one crash. I think its false economy to spend £500-700 on leathers then crash in them repeatedly.

Admittedly, you get better protection from the higher spec suits, but the ROI is not enough to warrant the outlay for someone who ostensibly only needs abrasion protection in a road off.

As I'm sure we all know, its not coming off that kills you. Its what you collide with .. and no leather suit will protect you against a 70 mph+ impact.

TBH my opinion is that they are perfectly good suits and the price reflects the intended purpose. I would say they are single crash kit and the leather could be thicker and the lack of proper armour in the hips and back is also a factor in the price.

I wear a Knox back protector anyway so I don't mind that and don't see the point of paying huge sums of money for flash kit I am going to sling down the road anyway at some point.

I prefered to spend my money on proper footwear, head wear and gloves. IMHO these extremities are more likely to suffer in a 50 mph off if I get pinned or collide with a static object than my butt cheeks.

[mycallsevern]

I couldn't agree more, I bought an Arai Chaser for a reason; my head is important to me. Same with my boots I could of had some much cheaper ones than my Sidi's but the amount of people I know with foot and lower leg injuries, its just not worth risking. Also like you I have a back protector, and from my experience of sliding down roads I usually do it on my knees, elbows, shoulder or back and all these parts have CE armour.

[rene]

your right but in a high speed crash, e.g. over 100 then they will just fall apart, if your not ridding hard, and willing to replace them after each crash then i guess they'd do the job

Personaly i dont put a price on any part of my body, if i can increase my chance of keeping limbs, skin and other body parts i'll spend a toad load on it

What would you rather do, £300 extra on a suite OR 4 months of your life recovering in a bed growing back your skin, then haveing horrid scars all over your body

i know witch one id chose..

[mycallsevern]

Very true, you are wise indeed rene.

[gubbs]

TBH mate, if you come off on a public highway at anything more than 50 mph chances are you aren't going to walk away anyway ..

The purpose of leather kit is abrasion resistance. Thats it!

Unless you are very unlucky and get pinned under the bike - which is nearly always a boot issue - then you aren't going to skid down the road in a static straight line.

In most RTA's you will slide no more than 3-4 yards before you hit armco and die; hit a curb and shatter your pelvis into a million pieces, hit a lamp post or those fucking awful concrete anti-overtaking things they put every 30 yards ..

Fact is, you are going to be horribly injured by the stuff at the side of the road or in the middle of it not abrasion.

Loss of skin is almost always attributable to wearing jeans and trainers and crap or no gloves.

Next time you are riding, just take note of the amount of stuff on, in or by the side of the road and imagine what it would do to you if you hit it at merely 30 mph or 8.9408 meters per second. Thats more than enough to kill outright/severely injure anyone. 8.9408 meters per second - just try and rationalize that for a moment. You know roughly how long a meter is, so you know best part of 9 of them in a single second + a immobile object is going to be messy. Thats 30 mph. Thats what old women and blind old center line huggers do to Tesco's in a metro. What do you do?

Armco usually slices people in half or decapitates them instantly. Its not pretty.

Its 30 for a reason - so all the signs tell us. They aren't being hysterical. Seriously.

With all that in mind, I want my feet to stay attached to my body and my ankles intact. I want my knees, elbows, butt and hands intact. I want my skull intact and I want no road rash on any part of my body. Thats a big ask as it is, now look at the guys on scooters doing 60 mph with no gloves on, in Nike trainers and shell suit bottoms tucked into their socks.

Fuuuuuuuuck!

PS: The next biggest killer is the White Van Man right up your butt. He can't possibly stop or avoid you in the event of a crash.

Good eh.

[rene]

i came off at around about 95 odd and skidded down the road and was lucky to walk away without a single mark on me

fact is mayby you are more likely to hit somthing and die BUT what if you dont? Your now lucky enouth not to be killed instantly but insted your leathers fail. Not a risk i'll be takeing

[gubbs]

Here's a pic I took of a bloke at work ..

Look at what he is wearing, despite his injury. Fucking spacker.

That was a 10 mph off in the work car park after he grabbed a handfull then hit a car reversing out of a space ..

He still don't have any gloves.

[gubbs]

i came off at around about 95 odd and skidded down the road and was lucky to walk away without a single mark on me

fact is mayby you are more likely to hit somthing and die BUT what if you dont? Your now lucky enouth not to be killed instantly but insted your leathers fail. Not a risk i'll be takeing

Thats fair enough.

Its all about whatever you can afford and how you feel in what you do wear ..

[boldaholic]

back to the original theme (sorry )

i have spada leathers. black and grey, and black sidi boots and black gloves
got them from http://www.mpmcc.co.uk i would reccomend him to anyone, he's really spot on. my mate bought a helmet from there and one of the pads had a slightly rough edge so he completely re-padded it and told him that if it starts feeling loose in 6 months he'll do it again for free!!
also my leathers seem wasnt quite right and he replaced them without question!!!

no its not me! lol


They look better in the flesh, the pic makes the silver a bit over powering. its more a dull grey/silver

[mycallsevern]

Oooh, oooh I have thos boots.

[mycallsevern]

On what Gubbs said, 30mph is actually 13.41 metres per second, which is even scarier. I actually only check because I couldn't believe it was as much as 8m/s so imagine my shock when the answer came back as more.

Perhaps the scarier thing is 120mph (and we all know how easy it is to creep up to that when you are tucked behind your screen and there's an empty motorway in front of you.) works out at 53.64m/s now I can just about run 100m so the thought that I am doing that in less than 2 seconds is actually really worrying.

But back to the original thread, I do like those Spada leathers.

[rene]

i've done 150 down a twisty back road before (this part wasent that twisty) works out at abotu 67.056 meter p/s

never seems that fast when your riding!