Friends just bought a backyard trampoline.
Straight off, as a gymnastics professional, I advise everyone against backyard trampolines. I am surprised they are still legal in Canada.
Kids should do trampoline only under the supervision of trained coaches on properly maintained equipment.
If you insist on putting a dangerous trampoline in your yard, consider a trampoline without springs. For example, the Spring Free SF90E.
As backyard tramps go, I am impressed. This company is focused on safety.
Eliminating the springs is a great innovation!
But I dispute the company’s claim that “SpringFree is the Safe Trampoline!”.
It’s a safer trampoline. But the reaction force from the elastic bed can still injure children.
UPDATE: Check the comments below:
“in two weeks my son severely fractured his ankle”.
20 comments ↓
If you ring the Australian Office of SpringFree, they say the world’s ONLY SAFE TRAMPOLINE – this is of course complete rubbish.
Hi,
While I had nothing to do with the design of the SpringFree trampoline, I was associated with the development of this product in its genesis at the University of Canterbury, and should declare a possible conflict of interest in responding, as I continue to assist the company in its market development. The design objective was to remove all of the traditional “impact zones” that the status quo design exposed jumpers too. I’m not a soft tissue injury expert, so can’t really comment on that, other than to say the vast majority of trampoline induced injuries (to which the springfree design was responding) were statistically focused on the impact with the frame (padded or not – fractures still happened), impact with steel coil springs, and falling off onto hard surfaces.
More recent additions to old style trampolines now include frame padding and a range of different enclosure net designs. Impact testing confirms that so long as a manufacturer is prepared to invest in applying around 10-12 inches of high quality closed cell foam to the frame, with an appropriately maintainable fastening system, then traditional design trampolines can deliver the same impact absorption characteristics as those delivered by SpringFree’s patented soft edge system. The fact is that most old style trampoline purchasing decsions are made pretty much solely on price, so there is a built-in incentive for manufacturers to invest less in impact protective padding, not more. The result is easy to see in the market – the average thickness of foam is around 25mm and is of a quality that degrades rapidly with actual impact. Our test results suggest that a traditional designed trampoline with 25mm of protective frame padding represents an HIC (Head Injury Criteria) rating of ~1000, vs the SpringFree soft edge rating of ~77. The difference is a statistical likelihood of a fracture in 99% of cases where an impact with the padded frame occurs, vs less than 1% with the SpringFree edge system.
At this stage, statistical comparisons in the injury prevention effects of the safety nets used on tradtional trampolines (employing a padded steel pole skeleton construction) vs SpringFree’s fully deformable flexibile net system are in their early stages, however, again, padded steel appears to represent increased injury risk vs. a design that absorbs impact by deforming in all planes.
So, the SpringFree view is that the vast majority of trampoline generated injury data suggests that the SpringFree design has completely removed the “impact zones” implicated in the traditional design “equipment induced” injuries.
If that is true, then that means injury risk on the SpringFree is limited to the reaction forces mentioned, or mis-use activities. SpringFree is increasingly working with interest groups in the development of effective trampoline education tools that further minimise these risk.
I don’t expect you to publish this, but in response to Harold’s comment, I think it is fair to say that from an equipment induced injury perspective, SpringFree IS the world’s only safe backyard trampoline.
I am thinking of buying a Springfree for my daughter age 7, she is an aspiring gymnast and wants to learn tricks, what about the amount of bounce of a Springfree. I have seen a lot of web pages devoted to the Springfree with photos of people sitting on them, against the net, etc but am yet to see a photo of a child bouncing on them. What I am concerned about is that it is not bouncy, just an enclosed play area???
I have worked with kids on this trampoline.
Forward and backward somersaulting is very doable.
That said, most gymnasts will tell you that the “spring free” system is “dead”.
I think it would be very beneficial for a light, 7-year-old child.
But when she is 13 or so, she would likely not bother using it for skills, only for “fun”.
Rick McCharles,
editor GymnasticsCoaching.com
I am looking at purchasing the springfree trampoline for my young kids. They work out at Chow’s where Shawn Johnson practices, she’s amazing.
My question is will the bigger springfree offer more of a bounce than the smaller ones or is it the other way around.
Thanks
Good question, Dan.
Neither will be “springy” as they are spring free.
Best test both sizes with the weight of children and compare.
The larger one will be no more safe, so that is not a factor.
[...] And until backyard trampolines are made illegal, I reluctantly recommend the safest tramp on the market: The “Springfree”. [...]
The comment in the originating mesage,
“It’s a safer trampoline. But the reaction force from the elastic bed can still injure children.” makes sense to me.
We purchased a spring free trampoline and within two weeks my son severely fractured his ankle. Unfortunatly we did not follow the manufacturer’s instructions, and let two people of unequal weight to jump at the same time. There were no collisions, but they were putting quite a bit of effort into their jumps, which I think has something to do with the fact that the tramp has a softer bounce, so you have to work it harder to achieve the same height you would expect from a regular tramp. I am no engineer, but I am guessing, when you work the bed of tramp harder, the reaction force or energy transfer behind each jump is greater. The reaction force behind one jumper “coming up” as the other was “going down” was enough to severly fracture and dislocate the lighter jumper’s ankle. So having learned it the hard way, I would like to reinforce to the readers of this message, do not become complacement by the manufacturers claims to have built a “safe trampoline” and neglet to follow all of the regular trampoline safety rules, especially, for this type of trampoline, the “one at time” rule. PS: of the several people I know, that own a trampoline, none enforce the “one at time” rule.
Hi, I’ve been told the Large Circle Springfree SF90E is a lot firmer to bounce. And the Springfree Capsule SF60E has a lot more bounce, and is prefered by gymnastics???
There is also a different type of springless trampoline for sale under the name airzone more traditional design but I have been told much more bounce
Thanks Ann.
I checked out the Airzone:
http://www.airzonetrampolines.com/
Not really enough information on the website to render judgment.
I don’t like the technique described on this tip, though:
http://www.airzonetrampolines.com/trampolines/tips3.html
Why the push for trampolines to be illegal in canada? I guess your the type of person that wants terrain parks to be taking out of skiing and kids shouldent have diving boards at pools and stuff
you safety natzi totally piss me off.
I had the opportunity to try a square 13' Springfree trampoline and an Alley Oop Double Bounce trampoline right next to each other in a showroom today. The Springfree seemed to have a slightly better bounce to both me (190 lbs) and my nearly seven-year-old son compared to the Alley Oop. So, in my mind, claims to the contrary are pure hogwash and are blatantly biased. Neither one seemed to offer dramatically more safety than the other as both seemed to have subtle, but obvious-to-me, drawbacks leading me to conclude that if it's fun, it's dangerous. I'm no expert, but I'm very well educated and have read many claims, but have seen little objective information out there.
I like your conclusion. "If it's fun, it's dangerous …"
Lot of truth to that.
I would see it is great innovation that eliminate springs, but I still feel worried about the “finger cut”, so base on it, I prefer the “cloth spring”, like this http://www.lifespantrampolines.com.au/Spring-free-trampolines.html, anyway, different people have different choice.
Hello, I am Doctor Rogina. I am a GP and have been one for almost 17 years now. I have seen many kids who have broken their arms or legs, jumping on trampolines. The first thing I ask them is, “Was it spring free?”
About 80% reply no, and I, being a mother of two, have bought my children a spring free trampoline, as I think it is safer than the traditional kinds. Please, do not take my advice as an advertising helping hand in any way, but I highly recommend the spring free trampolines. They have no springs to poke up through the bouncy mat, and a safety enclosure that kids can have both fun jumping against and less chance of an injury. My oldest child’s friend’s sister bounced too high on a springy trampoline and as a result she fell off and hit her head on concrete. She was in hospital for almost 6 months trying to get over the injury and become herself again. PLEASE do not buy the traditional springy trampolines, you could save a life.
Hi, i was wondering, not for safty purposes, but i am going to buy a trampoline. I was wondering if the spring free one was better for just bouncing with friends? This is just going to be for fun. I want the bouncyest trampoline there is, so is the spring free one a good choice?
No, the Springfree is less bouncy. One of the reasons it is slightly safer.
Dr Rogina, you give the medical profession a bad name……of course 80% reply no, it should of course be higher as the ratio of trad to springfree tramps must be about 98:2. The vast majority of serious injuries are from coming off tramps, collisions and whiplash type bed reaction injuries. Do some proper science if you are going to recommend one over the other.
I have owned the spring free tramp for 3 years now and guess what……NO BROKEN BONES. But I will tell you my friends kid broke her arm last week playing in her back yard. With that said nothing is safe 100%. Kids are kids and will get hurt. If your kid can break his ankle just jumping then thats talent and if he can do it jumping on a trampoline then he can do it jumping on the ground with a skipping rope. Heres an idea by your kids a bubble to live in if this trampoline is your life’s biggest worries
Leave a Comment