Hint: Don’t break the fall with your arms.
My brain knows that but the body often reacts differently.
A typical bail/fall/UPD on a uni is very unlikely to result in any kind of serious injury, if at all. But, as with anything else, the faster you go, the greater the risk, whether on a bike or a uni. This is especially true of geared unis,where speeds can approach that of a a bike moving at a good clip. I went out yesterday with my G26er and Garmin GPS, and documented three speed runs, each being faster than the last.
On the fastest run I was covering a hair more than 25 feet per second! A fall at that speed would be almost impossible to run out, since you would have to be instantly running more than 17mph. And it’s one thing to be riding that fast on smooth, even ground, but this was on uneven double track, strewn with little sharp rocks, spread loosely over hardpack. Here was the result:
But it also depends on the rider, I’ve ridden MTB 3 times this year, I fell at least once during each ride, I can ride the same trail on my Muni with no dismount, on my geared hub.
Unicycling is much safer for me, biking can be safer for others. You can’t prove one is safer than another, it’s all about the person riding it IMO.
There is one, global, normalized measure, deaths/rider:
MUni = 0
MTB > 0
I would postulate that if there existed the same number of mountain unicyclists as there are mountain bikers, worldwide, that we might see a “greater than” symbol in our column as well. But it’s a moot point since MUni will likely never be as widespread as MTB. And to opine a bit further, I think that is a good thing. 
That may be true but there’s no reason it should be more true for unicycling than bicycling.
I think you end up with different injuries, and in my personal experience, worse injuries.
If you fell off a bike at the same speed as a uni (say 15-20km/hr), you tend to be clipped in, so either lose skin on your legs, or land on the outstretched arm- resulting in mainly upper limb and clavicle injuries.
On a unicycle, you plant your feet against uneven terrain in all sorts funny angles. I’ve seen some horrendous ankle and knee injuries. You rarely see those on a bike. The force is also greater because you usually have your entire body weight on the joint, because it’s the lower limb.
Probably the only way to make a comparison would be some sort of case-control study where you match bicyclists with unicyclists of similar age, sex, skill level and compared the injury severity (eg need for surgery, hospitalisation etc). Or else a cohort study with unicyclists and bicyclists of similar demographic.
Well! For Schlumpf general discussion: my hub was sticky and not shifting right. Long story short,I had to replace a little spring inside the hub.
Pictures of a hub apart and details on my blog:
corbin
That’s a choice. There’s no reason you have to fall badly coming off a unicycle. If you really think being clipped in makes your falls less bad, ride clipped in on your uni.
+1
Moreover, the millisecond you are out of control on a uni is the millisecond before you are off the uni. 
Whereas with bkes on trails, you can go waaaaaaay faster than your ability to stop or steer the bike when a hazard arises unexpectedly. Hence, folks get launched into rocks at speed off of bkes. Which is not such a good thing for mere mortals of flesh, blood and bone. (I know, because while riding muni I was the second person to come across a bke endo victim in the talus/scrub next to my favorite trail [Pipeline up Millcreek Canyon] and I was on the Wasatch Crest Trail when a young woman with a splinted compound forearm fracture from a bke accident was being hurried to the highest nearby peak for a helicopter ride to the ER in the valley.) 
Furthermore (and don’t get me started), how many times have you nearly been run over, or run off the trail by someone on a muni? 
But I digress… 
By that logic, there is no reason you have to fall badly coming off a bicycle either.
When was the last time you saw anyone with an ankle injury off a bike? I doubt it matters whether they are clipped in or otherwise.
The pictures with hub apart…is there a bunch of pieces not pictured?
I’ve never seen inside one and figured there would be a lot more…thanks
those are the core components, for the full set here is a screengrab from the how its made video showing the full set of parts.
the full video can be found at
Ok, very good. Now that looks more like what I expected. Thanks for posting the video too.
Silly wabbit, you know unicycles are dangerous, why be in de’Nile?
Whatever, you all just put that head back in the sand, I did the same thing for a bit myself, but there’s no denying experience, bikes are safer because they have two wheels, just like cars are safer than motorcycles.
Stability increase safety, any engineer will tell you that.
But I’ll let you go about your business, I’m not one to argue with walls
@Aracer: I did have a Guni for long enough to know the product, in other words I rode it plenty, the speeds are higher so falls are more significant, what else is there to know? Fortunately I never had a hub related failure cause a fall, cuz that would suck!
Can’t speak to frequency, but my good friend completely destroyed his ankle from an unclipping incident. It does happen.
He was rolling his bike into a technical section and decided that he wasn’t going to ride it. As he stopped, the bike unexpectedly lurched and fell to the opposite side he was planning. As he unclipped at the last second, he came down badly on his ankle - full weight plus bike and looked down to see his foot turned 90 degrees the wrong way. End of that biking season right there.
Don’t know whether the clips made it worse, but it sure is faster to step off a flat pedal in an emergency.
I’d say the falls should be more or less equivalent at a given speed.
Happens to BMX guys all the time.
Obviously you’re more likely to fall off a unicycle than a bike. But I don’t think any engineer will tell you that the falls off a unicycle should be inherently worse than the falls off a bike at a given speed. And I think they’ll tell you that since we are at lower speeds, injuries from a given fall should be lesser.
I’m also pretty sure that engineers will tell you that bike fall injuries will be typically lesser than motorcycle fall injuries, despite the fact that the two platforms have more or less equivalent stability.
[QUOTE=tholub;1613113]
I’d say the falls should be more or less equivalent at a given speed.
I don’t know very many muni riders yet two of them have broken their backs and I while I have broken my ankle mtbing I think the frequency of falls, at speed or not, still makes muni at least marginally more prone to injuries.