THE TRUTH BEHIND D3O

Words by Robert Johnston 

SPONSORED CONTENT

We recently paid a visit to D3O’s laboratory and office in London, England, to learn more about their products and how they’re made, for this Dissected feature. This visit came off the back of a viral Instagram Reel we had filmed during Sea Otter earlier in the year, on which we received countless comments suggesting that D3O was “just orange Oobleck” (a mixture of cornstarch and water). Of course, D3O wanted to dispel this myth, and we were interested to learn more too, so we hope we can educate and entertain in equal measures.

We had a lot of fun playing with goo and smashing plates and eggs, but importantly we learned a lot, and got to see first-hand how D3O goes about developing the next generation of their materials. These are used in products like premium mountain bike knee pads and body protectors, which we’ve been trusting to protect us on the trails for years. So, learning more about how D3O offers the flexibility and protection that it does was of great interest to us.

WHAT ACTUALLY IS D3O?

D3O is a materials company first and foremost. They develop materials that are used in a wide variety of industries, with the focus on providing comfort to the wearer without compromising on protection. For the mountain bike market, the primary use for their products are in limb and body protection such as knee pads and torso protectors. They’re also beginning to be found in comfort-based applications, such as shoe insoles and even the recently released grips in partnership with ODI.

D3O sums their products up with the following description:

“D3O® materials follow non-Newtonian principles, meaning they are soft and flexible in their rest state – making them an excellent option from a user comfort and wearability perspective – and yet stiffen up, to absorb and dissipate the energy from impacts, thus reducing the amount of force that gets transmitted to your body compared to standard foams.”

“D3O technology incorporates special polymers with distinctive properties into protective products. The special polymers change position in the molecular structure when impacted to help absorb shock or impact, but then return to their original position at rest.“

WHAT SEPARATES D3O FROM THE COMPETITION?

D3O summed this up as:

• “Many materials out there show non-Newtonian behaviour, but their rate-stiffening ability is capped by their traditional chemistry. D3O’s formulations are pushing the boundaries of what foam and elastomers can do, therefore making our products more comfortable, lighter weight, lower profile, more durable without sacrificing impact protection.”
• “Most competitors have to accept trade-offs. D3O does not.”
• “D3O is more than just its formulations. We have a large team of in-house designers, production engineers and testing engineers who bring these innovative materials to life with market-leading products.”
• “We work with our partners to bring to market the best possible solutions to a given design problem. D3O is a solution provider, not a foam supplier.”

So then, D3O is a non-newtonian material like oobleck, but there’s clearly more than just cornstarch and water to it. As you’ll see in the video, when put to work, the improved protective properties are there to be seen.

Can you explain the non-Newtonian phenomenon?

We could try to sum this up, but D3O is slightly better qualified for the job…:

“A non-Newtonian material possesses unique properties, where it changes behaviour depending on the force acted on it. E.g. at rest, the material will remain at a low stiffness, meaning it bends and conforms very easily. However, when a force is applied, the material will stiffen up and absorb that force. Once this force is removed, the material will then return to its original, low stiffness state. This is also known as shear-thickening or rate-stiffening.”

Why does it make for a good material for protection?

“The application of non-Newtonian properties in our products allows the protector to remain soft and flexible in resting state, allowing for greater comfort. However, when impacted the material will stiffen to absorb that shock/impact, dissipating the force and protecting the user. The technology has many uses from knee pads to phone cases, suiting the needs for every-day protection. ”

What does that mean for D3O mountain bike protectors?

Over the years we’ve tested countless D3O-equipped mountain bike protectors, and they are typically very flexible and well ventilated relative to their level of impact protection. In recent years with products like D3O Ghost and the new Diablo protectors, they’ve made advancements in how the protectors are formed in order to give further boosts to these beneficial properties without reducing the amount of protection on offer, and they continue to be amongst the best protectors available without a doubt.

Being able to take a Level-2 certified knee pad for an all-day pedaling mission without excessive heat buildup or restriction to movement is incredible, and it means that you can get away with wearing more protection, more often. These sentiments were echoed by D3O ambassador, Remy Absalon, who praised the fact that D3O enables mountain bike racers to wear increased levels of protection for both training and competition.

What non-protective uses does D3O have? 

“Our technology and know-how have now also been applied into vibration damping applications now too, where our specially formulated materials help to absorb and dissipate the forces caused by low-frequency vibrations. This technology has been applied in gloves, footwear and bike grips too, with the potential for many other applications.”

“D3O is also a great option for lower impact energies such as heel strikes (footwear) or kneeling (industrial knee pads). In such applications, comfort and stability trumps pure impact protection. D3O materials like Decell are great at absorbing those lower energy impacts, distributing the load evenly and maintaining their performance over time.“

From the D3O X ODI mountain bike grips, to cases for our phones and laptops, it’s safe to say that knee protection isn’t the only thing that we’ve enjoyed trusting upon D3O for.

Now that we’ve backed up our learned trust through the use of their products with the first-hand experience of seeing how their products are developed, it’s safe to say that we’re happy to continue to use D3O products on the trails and in our day-to-day life off the bike.

We’re especially excited to welcome D3O Diablo-equipped protectors into our kit bag to see how they perform, as the impressive breathability and flexibility that they feel like they’re going to offer may just be a game changer for our protection on the bike.