What are the best new products or inventions that most people don't know about?

The Invisible Bicycle Helmet

It is often cited that helmets mess up one’s hair and especially, may not fit properly over women’s hairstyles. Some people choose hairstyle over helmet and risk their safety. Some choose helmet and keep whining about their ruined hairstyle.

Folks! There's a new product which claims,

• to offer the protection of a helmet and
• to keep your hairstyle intact

Sometime back, Nan Waldman told me about this new design of helmets that are self-inflating in the event of a crash. An useful innovation, I must say! In contrast to traditional cycle helmets, it is worn like a collar with no need to cover the head.

Hövding is a collar that you wear around your neck while cycling. The collar contains a folded up airbag that you’ll only see if you happen to have an accident. The airbag is shaped like a hood, surrounding and protecting the cyclist’s head. The trigger mechanism is controlled by sensors which pick up the abnormal movements of a cyclist in an accident.

The actual collar is the visible part of the invention. It’s covered by a removable shell that you can change to match your outfit.

When in use, the black box continuously monitors the cyclist’s movements, and the collar deploys its air bag protection whenever a dangerous situation arises. The unit is charged by USB.

  

When I think of best new products, I think of products that solved a problem we previously thought was not possible.

Examples:

• Use an umbrella in windy weather, and you know how pointless the umbrella becomes. A relatively new umbrella, called Senz stormproof umbrella,  can withstand wind speeds of 100+ km/h.
  
  
  http://www.ippinka.com/blog/senz...
  Disclaimer: our company sells this product
• Alfa is a cardboard bicycle made 100% from recycled materials. Amazingly, it is both waterproof and fireproof. The inventor, Izhar Gafni, and his business partner ERB has an ambitious goal of manufacturing these bikes for $9 to benefit people in the third world.
  
  
  Alfa: $9 Cardboard Bicycle
• A new watersport equipment, called Flyboard, allows you to fly around across the water like Iron Man. Think of it as wearing boots with a fire hose attached to them.
  
  
  
  Flyboard: Iron Man Jet Pack
• If you've gone camping before, you've probably used a propane cooker or propane lantern. It works, but propane gives off toxic gases when burned and you have to bring propane canisters with you - heavy, flammable, and what if you run out?
  Biolite CampStove solves this problem. Just use twigs and wood chips you find anywhere, and you have clean-burning fire and electricity.
  
  
  http://www.ippinka.com/blog/post...

• A bookcase that is also a staircase for people who are vertically challenged (like me).
  
  
  
  http://www.ippinka.com/blog/post...
• Bike helmets are great for protecting your head. But they have always been a pain to carry around because its so big. It's the #1 reason why people don't wear a bike helmet. Some company created a bike helmet - called Overade - that you can fold and unfold within seconds. Now, that's a new product that saves lives.
  
  
  http://www.ippinka.com/blog/post...
•  
• Loopwheels (Inventor: Sam Pearce)
  
  Replacing spokes and the conventional suspension in bicycles with badass carbon composite folded(looped) leaf springs between the hub and the rim, which provide suspension in every (practically encountered) direction.
  
  This is their Kickstarter video:
  
  They have been positively reviewed by  BikeRadar :First ride with Loopwheels and Martin Cox, among others.
  
  
  Don't re-invent the wheel, they said.
  Bitch please, Sam Pearce said.
  
  Tangential Suspension:
  
  
  
  
  
  They have been specially designed for folding bicycles. After all, do ye want yer travel bike to have them bulky shocks?
  
  This is an image of the bike these people worked on:
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The design up close, in your nose:
  JP = Jelly Products. More on this later.
  Bought in = Bought in!
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A Loopwheel under compression:
  
  
  
  As of now, only for 20". There are some constraints involved:
  
  In action:
  Each wheel incorporates a regular hub, with a hub brake and hub gearing. Instead of spokes, however, three looped carbon composite springs run from the hub to the rim. Whenever the wheel hits a bump in the road, the energy is absorbed by those springs.
  This causes the hub to momentarily dip down within the wheel by up to 45 millimeters, so it’s actually a bit off-center until the springs flex back into their regular state. For this reason, the wheels will only work on bikes that already have sufficient space between the fork/frame and the tire – otherwise the bike would be hitting its own tires when the springs compressed.
  
  Loopwheels come in front- and rear-specific versions, one of the key differences being that the springs in the front wheel are twice as compliant as those in the back. This is (presumably) to help keep the wheel that does the steering from being knocked and bounced around, plus it compensates for the fact that more of the rider’s weight tends to be centered over the rear wheel.
  
  And yes, it has been thought of before, but the right materials couldn't be created and the available ones couldn't do the job.
  
  
  
  How, How much time and Who is the inventor?
  
  UK based mechanical engineer and industrial designer: Sam Pearce.
  
  Pearce got the idea for the Loopwheel while waiting for a flight and watching parents pushing children in strollers over a gap in the flooring. Every time a stroller hit that patch of floor, the child would be jostled forward. A cycling enthusiast, Pearce knew that cyclists had a similar problem to those kids in the airport, so he started drawing up ideas for in-wheel shock absorbers.... (more)