re countersteering faq please post in article apr rd hydro on ca jlevine rd hydro on ca jody levine writes we all seem to be in agreement that there are two explanations for why one can use the handlebars to lean a moving motorcycle the question is is one of the effect dominant and which one is it the idea would be to design an experiment which would seaprate the two characteristics and see which effect produces a similar result to the one with which those of us who have bikes are familiar as you point out the experiments would be difficult but we know enough about the physics of the situation to do some calculations there are in fact three effects contributing to leaning the bike over to begin a turn gyro effect causing a torque which twists the bike over contact patch having shifted to one side causing bike to fall over contact patch being accelerated to the side causing a torque which twists the bike over take an average bike rider average bike wheel and at speeds of and mph say calculate how much twist of the bars would be needed to produce say degrees of lean in say seconds by each effect alone my guess is that at slow speeds is dominant and at high speeds is dominant and at all speeds contributes not far off bugger all relatively speaking by the way a similar problem is this how does a runner who wants to run round a corner get leaned into the corner fast is there a running group where we could start counter footing arguments and have them all falling over as they tried to work out how they go round corners chris malcolm cam uk ac ed aifh department of artificial intelligence edinburgh university forrest hill edinburgh eh ql uk dod
