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The motorcycle of the future is so safe riders can cruise without helmet—all of the thrills with none of the danger—according to BMW.
The German automaker unveiled on Tuesday its Motorrad Vision Next 100, a sleek, self-balancing prototype the company released as part of its 100th anniversary celebrations.
The zero-emissions bike has self-balancing wheels designed to stand upright even at a complete stop, stability that the company says will allow riders to forgo riding a helmet.
"Its self-balancing system will help protect the rider at any time," said Edgar Heinrich, the design director of BMW's motorcycle division. "Any late reaction from the driver will trigger and the vehicle will balance out."
"In the future, motorcycle riders will be able to enjoy riding without protective gear."
The TRON light cycle is almost here.
(Score: 4, Informative) by WizardFusion on Thursday October 13 2016, @11:56AM
What about a head on crash where the rider is thrown forward at great speed. I am sure a helmet and other protective gear will be needed then.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @12:08PM
... Or how about a high speed corner that unexpectedly has wet leaves on the road. Even if this "TRON light cycle" stays upright with some kind of gyro stabilization, there isn't enough tire grip to stay on the road. It is headed for the ditch, and the rider will probably be launched off the bike.
Maybe this fantasy is so far in the future that the bike "talks" to the road and the road warns of the wet leaves? It seems unlikely that V2I (vehicle to infrastructure) will ever have this level of detail.
Even more unlikely, maybe there won't be any more road ditches? Somehow there will be budget to put all road drainage underground (even little secondary country roads).
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Nuke on Thursday October 13 2016, @12:30PM
maybe there won't be any more road ditches? Somehow there will be budget to put all road drainage underground
Trees, wall, lamposts and road signage will also have to be put underground. Every road will need to have 50 yards of soft sand each side of it. Oh, and roads will all have to be one-way only. So I've sotrted those problems, but I still haven't solved the problem of people pulling out in front of the motorcyclist.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @12:38PM
We have the technology, it's called the Hyperloop.
(Score: 2) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:47PM
The first time I saw a person die on a motorcycle, the helmet was no help.
A car backed-out, into the path of the bike, from behind a blind hedgerow.
I have other tragic descriptions, for this and the second and third times, too. But I will spare you.
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 2) by jimshatt on Thursday October 13 2016, @12:08PM
(Score: 2) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:50PM
The motorcycle of the future won't need a rider
http://phys.org/news/2016-09-motorcycle-future-wont-rider.html [phys.org]
But you know - not marketing.
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 3, Informative) by mcgrew on Thursday October 13 2016, @06:30PM
Terminator IV had riderless motorcycles.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @12:35PM
Needed for what, to keep the remains in one piece? What you're describing doesn't sound survivable even with a helmet and leathers. Of course they could make a less severe crash survivable.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by mendax on Thursday October 13 2016, @12:57PM
Or like what happened to me last year, in which I was hit from behind at a red light by a guy too impatient to wait for me to move. The bike went forward, I went backward, and I hit the car that hit me and then the ground. I was wearing a helmet but still suffered a concussion. It left me with a month and a half of horrible headaches that kept me from working (doctor's orders), two months of neck pain from the whiplash, and permanent ringing in my ears. I doubt a self-balancing motorcycle would have prevented any of that. A personal force field maybe, however, but I doubt I'm going to find one of those on eBay.
There is another side to this issue. The danger of riding a motorcycle is part of the thrill, or so I believe in my case.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Thursday October 13 2016, @01:55PM
bike went forward - you stayed in place . Inertia...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:12PM
We (or at least I) understood what he meant but this isn't a formal physics article. It's a blog comment. I'm sure he knows the difference too he was just exercising grammatical freedom.
(Score: 3, Informative) by RamiK on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:41PM
Nope. You snap back because you're soft and the bike is hard so by the time the bike is rolling over forwards you're rebounding backwards.
It's full body whiplash.
Been there. Done that.
compiling...
(Score: 1) by Pax on Thursday October 13 2016, @03:40PM
and just from masturbation as well!
(Score: 2) by mendax on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:56PM
Indeed. Thanks for the correction. Actually, it was bike AND car went forward, I remained in place, and landed on the car that was now under me. Either way, it was not fun.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Thursday October 13 2016, @03:08PM
Jesus. Hope you sued the crap out of that guy. Back when I had a bike I had people push me out of lanes into oncoming traffic, but nobody hit me like that.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by mendax on Thursday October 13 2016, @04:31PM
I have yet to file a claim. The insurance company keeps on pushing me to get a move on with it, but I have until next June to file it. I'm traveling right now, but when I get home next week I'll be writing the demand letter, probably for around $50k, plus medical expenses. That's too high I know, but it's a starting point. The headaches and whiplash were hell. The ringing in my ears is no fun but manageable with hearing aids.
Incidentally, the "pain and suffering" calculation I'm making is based upon what a friend of mine got when he was T-boned and ended up with a broken arm. $10k. I've had a broken arm, and from a car accident. I'd rather have the broken arm than the headaches.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 2) by cubancigar11 on Thursday October 13 2016, @03:49PM
Ah... happened to me once. Had leg-pain and shoulder-pain for several years, broke right mirror (that person hit me from left) and found out that it is part of a full-assembly. Had to get the whole thing replaced in 10% of total cost of bike.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Francis on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:01PM
It's bullshit for a few reasons. One being that the enjoyment of the motorcycle is as much about actually controlling the bike as it is riding it.
But, the other issue here is that keeping the bike upright is usually the easy thing. You can pretty much always keep the bike upright. The problem comes from when keeping the bike upright is at odds with keeping the bike in a safe path. Sometimes, you screw up or conditions change and you can't both keep the bike upright and keep the bike off of a collision course.
They can probably make this work by having the bike ride around like a car, but that's not terribly fun and if something happens to cause the system to kick in, all of a sudden it's going to take a lot more effort to steer the bike. And when it stops, the steering goes back to normal and you'll likely oversteer.
The whole thing seems like a bad idea unless you're going to go completely automated, and even then, we're probably at least 40 years away from the technology necessary to read and understand upcoming traction conditions on the road being good enough to make it happen.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:08PM
I suspect that whoever made that statement about not needing a helmet was a victim of head injury without wearing a helmet.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @03:59PM
Or having a rock kicked up by a car hitting you in the face. So many reasons to wear a helmet that have nothing to do with balancing the bike.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday October 13 2016, @04:21PM
Bugs.
Big bugs.
Don't know what kind of bug it was, but had my helmet make a kind of 'dong' noise from a bug once. Was glad i had it on.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 1) by cmdrklarg on Thursday October 13 2016, @06:32PM
I'm not a motorcycle rider (not interested thanks), but when I was a teenager I was driving my dad's 3-wheeler back home down the gravel road about 45 MPH. I felt a something hit my chest HARD, like someone had punched me. As I came to a stop I found a big dragonfly (about 6 inches long I'd say) laying in my lap, stunned from the impact. Fortunately he recovered and flew away to munch on more mosquitoes.
The world is full of kings and queens who blind your eyes and steal your dreams.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Thursday October 13 2016, @06:34PM
Old joke: Q-How do you tell if a biker is happy?
A-He has bugs in his teeth.
It was probably a June bug. One hit me in the forehead once at about 20MPH. Hurt like hell, started wearing a helmet after that.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday October 13 2016, @09:48PM
June bug was my thought, figured a bee might go "moosh" more than "gong".
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by gawdonblue on Thursday October 13 2016, @08:21PM
Don't know what kind of bug it was, but had my helmet make a kind of 'dong' noise from a bug once.
You weren't driving in the opposite direction to Lorena Bobbitt, were you?
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday October 13 2016, @09:50PM
Ah, that's.... that's.....oh, that's...... aw, mannnnn....... :(
And I just ate!!!
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Thursday October 13 2016, @06:28PM
Indeed. As long as there are humans piloting other vehicles, motorcycles are still very dangerous. Once cars and bikes are all autonomous, maybe then you can do without protective gear.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by canopic jug on Thursday October 13 2016, @12:17PM
Fine. They can ride this one or any other of model of motor cycle without a helmet, but only if they have a valid, maxed out donor card.
It may be stable but not crash-proof. Between wet leaves, car doors, and just general crap behavior from enough cars and trucks, it is just a matter of when and how you set it down not if.
Money is not free speech. Elections should not be auctions.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by choose another one on Thursday October 13 2016, @12:58PM
More to the point, if it self-balances how _do_ you set it down? Seems to me you would be going with this bike unless you fly off high at speed, laying it down and taking the road rash just won't be an option, for better or worse.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 13 2016, @01:49PM
Oh boy. Conventional wisdom, years ago, was that laying a bike down was preferable to several bad things. Most of the reading I've done on "modern" biking insists that laying it down is bad, bad, bad. No matter how you look at it, laying it down is a more-or-less controlled crash. You've basically chosen to crash into the ground, in hopes that it helps you avoid crashing into something else, like that oncoming cement truck.
But, what they are saying today is, keeping your tires on the ground, and your brakes applied, will slow you much faster than the steel/aluminum/plastic skidding across the ground. And, incidentally, much faster than your leathers will slow YOU down.
I've only ever laid a bike down once, and it wasn't really intentional. It was among the list of options that ran through my mind, but the decision was taken away from me when the front tire decided to follow a trolly car track. The goal was to avoid being run down by the speeding cop car, sans lights or sirens, coming out of a side street. My first evening in Brooklyn, New York. What a welcome, huh?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Francis on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:08PM
Basically the only time when it would make sense to lay the bike down intentionally is if you've run out of room and desperately need to get under something. Modern tires are rather grippy and even when they're worn down they still provide more traction than you'd get from the plastic and metal on the sides of the bike.
But, barring the case where, you're running out of space and desperately need to get under a moose, laying it down doesn't do you any good. Even then, it's a bad idea because you're betting that you can guess where the moose is going to be at the very last moment and you're accepting some additional momentum at the time of impact if you wind up hitting it.
Back in olden times when you might only have one drum brake on the rear wheel, it probably did make sense at times to lay the bike down so you got better use of the front end as a bumper, but brake and tire technology have vastly improved since then. Even with cars, it used to be more reliable to run into things at times because those brakes also sucked.
(Score: 3, Informative) by canopic jug on Thursday October 13 2016, @03:21PM
I've only ever laid a bike down once, and it wasn't really intentional.
Exactly my point. If you ride enough, you will crash. It's not something you can plan or schedule, it just happens. Even if you are very careful, you can't control the cars or predict wet leaves or black ice. I used to know a lot of people who rode. Some even rode with, um, groups of like minded individuals as it were. They all had personal crash stories and were witnesses to many more. One, where the stabilized bike would not matter, was when a friend was sent over the handlebars from being intercepted by part of a car. In his case, he tucked and rolled like a ball a ways down the road. When he got up and started walking back towards the scene accident, the car driver panicked and drove off. Leaving him with a wrecked bike. Even though there was no serious damage to him, he still wasn't quite right for a month or two. Another friend dodged a car that came at him, but it sent him into the path of two trucks, which he also dodged but which set him on some gravel at a tight curve near a drop. He went off the road into a tree, followed by the bike. Then he fell and then the bike fell too and landed on him. He lived but spend many weeks in the hospital. That's just two out of many.
Yeah, the plural of anecdotes is not data, but in neither case would a stabilized bike have helped, and without helmets either one would have been quite dead. And without other protective gear, many other cases I heard about would have been much worse. No one I knew got road rash, at least not bad enough to complain, but then they never went riding in short and a t-shirt, as one sometimes sees these days, but always had proper leathers even in the summer.
Money is not free speech. Elections should not be auctions.
(Score: 2) by fliptop on Thursday October 13 2016, @04:31PM
This. I've put mine down twice, both times to avoid a collision w/ a deer. I've had some close calls in traffic but after riding a while you start to recognize a potentially dangerous situation and learn how to best make yourself seen, or even avoid them altogether.
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
(Score: 2) by art guerrilla on Friday October 14 2016, @12:12AM
i wonder if deer aren't a bigger problem than we generally know...
hell, they take out enough cars as it is...
(not to mention, the factoid -if you didn't know- that deer are the number one killer of human beans on the planet...
not poisonous snakes, not hippos, not crocs, not sharks, but bambi... true story...)
since we don't let cougars and wolves do their thing, the deer overrun a LOT of places like rats...
it is scary enough to imagine hitting one with a regular vehicle, taking one on with a motorcycle sounds like a thousand kinds of hurt...
(Score: 2) by fliptop on Friday October 14 2016, @01:19AM
Both times it was dark out. The 1st was around 12:30am, I came around a curve and he was just standing in the middle of the road. I went into the ditch, but couldn't coax the bike back up out of it and went down. I wasn't going fast and was OK. Bike was banged up but I was able to ride home. Second time it was about 6am and foggy, it jumped out of the road on my left and then turned and sort-of ran along side me a little bit, in the other lane for oncoming traffic, then turned and jumped back the way he came. I was startled by the suddenness of it that I again hit the ditch on the right side instinctively trying to avoid it. Luckily there was a ditch at that spot b/c the road was on top of a hill, and there's a stretch of road just before that spot w/ a guardrail and steep drop-off. It took some time to swallow my heart back down after that one. I was a little banged up but OK, and was able to limp the bike home.
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Nuke on Thursday October 13 2016, @12:26PM
I don't know much about motorcyling, but I do know that not all crashes are caused by riders losing their balance. In fact I'd guess that hardly any crashes are caused that way. I have done a lot of cycling (pedal powered) and I never even needed to think about balancing, it became an automatic refles, like balancing when walking. Having spoken to motorcylists I understand that the main danger is from people "not seeing them" and pulling out in front of them - same as with pedal cycling.
I've never been a great admirer of BMW either, but this silly statement hits rock bottom.
(Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Thursday October 13 2016, @12:52PM
The zero-emissions bike has self-balancing wheels designed to stand upright even at a complete stop, stability that the company says will allow riders to forgo riding a helmet.
Ah yes, of course. The number one cause of motorcycling death is people falling over while they wait for the lights to change.
How are these wheels supposed to work, anyway? It's not like a segway, which can rock back and forth to keep a dynamic balance. Or do they pivot left and right under the bike?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 13 2016, @01:59PM
Well, it appears to me that those tires are wider than the womans ass and hips, in the photos. Now, I don't have a woman's broad hips and posterior, but I've never lost my balance when sitting on my ass. My ass is wide enough to be stable under most conditions. I've been blown over by high wihds, and knocked over by waves, but generally speaking, my ass is quite stable.
I suspect that any two wheeled vehicle is going to be stable with three foot wide tires on it.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday October 13 2016, @05:22PM
It will be even more stable when all that tire friction means you have no gas left after 20 miles.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday October 14 2016, @12:09AM
Wonder how stable those tires are when the water lies on the road? Hydroplanes from hell!
(Score: 2, Disagree) by crb3 on Thursday October 13 2016, @01:39PM
A motorcycle is not like a bicycle where, when you arm-wrestle the vehicle, you win, and you can, if you must, steer it like a car. Cornering on a bike at speed is done by leaning it over (by pushing the handlebars the other way -- counter-steering) so that the rectangular footprints of the tires turn trapezoidal, and then the edges of the two gyroscopes do the actual work of changing the course of a quarter-ton of machinery. If you can't lean, you can't steer.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:01PM
A motorcycle's tires do not have a rectangular footprint, they are rounded like a bicycle's tires.
And the steering is the same. At low speeds you turn the handlebars in the direction you want to turn, but after 20 km/h or so, you need to turn the handlebars in the opposite direction to get the bike to lean in the direction you want to turn.
A motorcycle is much more massive than a bicycle, so while you may be able to weight-shift on a bicycle to induce it to lean, on a motorcycle the only practical way is to apply force to the right side of the handle bar if you want to turn right, and vice versa.
And the helmet statement is bullshit.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 13 2016, @04:29PM
You got one right, and sorta missed the other.
If you have a chainhoist and a motorcycle, pick that bike up, spread some dust or something on the floor, sit the bike down on it's tires, pick it up again, and you will see that the "footprint" is indeed rectangular. If you figure out how to make the bike lean, and leave a nice clear footprint when you set it down again, you will see that the shape has changed slightly. The print will be a little bit trapezoidal when it leans, and quite naturally, the further it leans, the more trapezoidal the print will become.
I guess it's fair to note that the more weight on the tire, the more squared the footprint will be. Sitting just the wheel into the dust to make a print, the print will be much thinner, and a little bit shorter. Leaning the tire without weight on it will probably exaggerate the trapezoid as well.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:03PM
You must lean in a pedal bike as well.
When I was learning, it took many failed attempts to make a turn because it did not know Newton's first law of motion.
Counter-steering works just fine on a pedal bike as well: so long as you don't jam the inside pedal into the ground.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:13PM
Countersteering on a bike is kind of a dicey proposition. You have to be going quite fast for that to work because the bike itself has a lot less mass on the wheels to create the gyroscopic precession that forces the counter steering.
It's probably possible, but in a practical sense, you have to be going faster than I ever got going before you have to do it. Perhaps with a racing bike and being in really good shape, you can do it, but if you try to countersteer a bike at reasonable speeds, it's not going to work out so well.
(Score: 2) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:42PM
I routinely counter-steer at less than 3MPH.
It allows you to control precisely how much the bike is leaning by moving the wheel out from under it. I suppose I to simultaneous corrections my shifting my body weight so that it is still over where the wheels contact the ground.
The dicey part is as I mentioned: chance of a pedal strike. I have damaged 2 bicycles trying to rush a left turn.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Friday October 14 2016, @02:09PM
That's rather unlikely. It's not possible to countersteer when going that slowly. It's impossible to countersteer until you've got sufficient momentum built up to overcome frictional forces on the tire and force you to lean. It's impossible to countersteer a motorcycle if you're going less than about 15mph. Below that you direct steer.
In the case of bicycles, it's doubtful that you're really countersteering there for similar reasons. Most likely the minimal lean you need to turn the bike is coming from a shift in the body weight rather than actual countersteering. The fact that your pedals are anywhere near the ground while turning at such a slow speed indicates that you're not likely to be countersteering at all, you're most likely leaning the bike manually and counterleaning to keep things balanced.
(Score: 1) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Friday October 14 2016, @02:22PM
Yes, that was what I meant to say. My post got mangled.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Nuke on Friday October 14 2016, @01:56PM
Countersteering on a bike is kind of a dicey proposition. You have to be going quite fast for that to work
I makes me wonder what you understand by "countersteering". I have just checked the Wikipedia definition, and it is in line with what I thought it to be. (I am an experienced racing [pedal] cyclist BTW). To turn a corner you first need to turn the front wheel away from the direction of turn to make the bike "fall" inwards, whereupon you steer into the turn to "catch" the fall at just the right angle; you are then cornering. This brief outward turn is so subtle, brief, and by reflex that most riders are probably unaware that they are doing it - and probably deny it (as you are) because it sounds counter-intuitive. There is no reason to think that the physics are any different for a motorbike.
As for "you have got to be going fast", take a look at the photo sequence in Wikipedia. It is being demonstrated on one of those little monkey bikes indoors at obviously a fairly slow speed. Speed, wheel size and gyroscopic effect have nothing to do with it.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Friday October 14 2016, @02:31PM
I understand it quite well as a physics tutor and motorcyclist, I understand the concept better than just about anybody out there not holding a PhD in physics.
It is completely impossible to countersteer at low speeds. I've tried it myself on multiple times and you cannot countersteer at low speeds. I've drawn the diagrams myself and done the math and it's completely impossible to countersteer unless you're going fast enough. This is something that's taught by the MSF when they teach people to ride, you cannot execute a low speed u-turn by countersteering, it's completely impossible. It's possible to do a high speed u-turn with countersteering, but it's incredibly difficult.
The whole idea of people unconsciously countersteering a bicycle in order to reconcile this just smacks of lazy science at best or pseudo-science at worst. In most of those cases, they're not countersteering at all, they're shifting their body weight to lean the bike. That's what I'd do as bikes don't move fast enough to require countersteering and they haven't got enough gyroscopic precession to force the issue. Assuming they're even leaning it to a noticeable extent. Not to mention that if you were to try it, you'd fall over as there'd be insufficient gyroscopic precession to keep the bike up.
Also, you don't have to lean a bike in order to turn, I'm not sure where that myth came from, but it's demonstrably false. You do have to be going rather slowly in order to do it, but, as long as you have sufficient friction on the tire to take you around the turn, there's no need to lean the bike at all. Take a bike, turn the wheel to the side and counterlean you'll find that at low rates of speed the bike will turn even though there's no lean at all to the bike.
When all is said and done, I wish people would stop spreading these myths about how two wheeled vehicles turn. It's rather tiresome arguing with people that clearly have no idea what they're talking about quoting other people who have no idea what they're talking about when the correct information has been known for decades, if not longer. Most of this stuff has probably been known for at least 80 years.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Nuke on Friday October 14 2016, @07:43PM
I understand it quite well as a physics tutor .....
In that case you will understand that when cornering the force vector which is the resultant of the gravitational and centrifugal forces must follow a line between the centre of gravity and the tyre contact patch (as viewed in a vertical cross section). This line will be inclined : for example at a speed of 10 m/s on a curve radius of 20 m the centipetal acceleration is :
10*10/20 = 5 m/s/s (about half g)
So the angle of lean will be :
ArcTan (5/9.807) = 27 degrees (9.807 m/s/s being gravitational acceleration, g)
Of course, the bike itself does not have to lean - the rider could lean out from his bike (pointlessly) as long as the centre of gravity of the two is "leaning".
you don't have to lean a bike in order to turn, I'm not sure where that myth came from, but it's demonstrably false. You do have to be going rather slowly in order to do it
No matter how slowly you ride, as long as there are some figures to put into the above calculation there will need to be some leaning.
It is completely impossible to countersteer at low speeds. I've tried it myself on multiple times and you cannot countersteer at low speeds.
Perhaps we are understanding different things by "countersteer". The guy in the Wikipedia photo sequence is managing what I understand by it.
they're not countersteering at all, they're shifting their body weight to lean the bike.
Maybe motorcyclists shift their body weight, I wouldn't know. Competent pedal cyclists generally don't. Shifting body weight is the same as leaning the bike as far as the physics is concerned as it is the CG of the rider/bike combination that matters.
As for not needing countersteering, consider a rider going in a straight line, in quasi-steady state. To corner he needs an external lateral force (the centripetal force) on his centre of gravity, but the only possible source of external lateral force is from his tyre patches which are somewhat below the CG. If he promptly steers left (say) the tyre patches will go left but his CG will continue straight on (at first) as there is no lateral component of force on it (yet). With his vertical support force now to the left of his CG (inducing a clockwise force couple about his forward axis *) he will start to rotate clockwise about his forward axis and begin falling over to the right. However, if the initial left steer was fairly slight, he can now start to steer to the right in time to catch the fall by the time he reaches a balance angle (27 degrees, say, if he taking the turn in the example above) and stabilise in that turning configuration. That leaning angle allows a lateral force component at the CG that provides the required centripetal force. The whole action is done without thinking - it is developing the ability to perform this action without thinking that "learning to ride a bike" is all about, it is fundamental to it.
Thus he achieves a right turn by initiating it with a momentary left steer - so momentary in practice that it will be hardly noticable except to instrumentation. It does not matter how slowly he is going, the principle is the same. It is not possible to corner any other way.
It's rather tiresome arguing with people that clearly have no idea what they're talking about
If you ever come to London, avoid the Underground trains. I was the guy who did the calcs to check the margins against derailment :-)
* The gyroscopic forces of steering the front wheel to the left will only add to the clockwise force couple on the bike frame.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 14 2016, @06:24PM
Countersteering is the only way to turn a single track vehicle. Period. Bicycles are light enough that you don't perceive you're doing it, especially at low speed. This is why kids take a while to learn to ride and crash into mail boxes and other static objects when you take the training wheels off. Once your brain unconsciously understands the trick to it, it's second nature. Motorcycle simply requires more input.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @01:52PM
Guys, ignore that stupid line. The cool part is this self-balancing part.
It sounds like BMW has been watching Lit Motors.
Here's a 5-minute promo video [youtube.com] from Lit Motors showing their self-balancing 2-wheeler doing its thing.
The first half is just music, but the second half they actually talk about it.
(Score: 1) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:28PM
That video does not show leaning into a turn at speed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @03:03PM
I never said it did.
I picked one showing them yank the c1 perpendicular to the wheel-base because I thought THAT was fucking cool.
If it isn't cool enough for you, there are a ton of other c1 videos, You are allowed to watch them too, its OK.
(Score: 1) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Thursday October 13 2016, @04:00PM
I was able to find one on Youtube. 4 ad points for a 10 minute video :P
But I will concede, it does appear to be capable of leaning.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @08:04PM
If you see ads on youtube, you aren't doing it right.
I have literally never once seen an ad on youtube, not in the 10+ years its been in existence.
(Score: 1) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Friday October 14 2016, @02:26PM
I figured out how they could have faked the cornering shots: turn off the gyros.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:26PM
Right now, many motorcyclists ride around without any protective gear. Doing so is incredibly stupid, to the point where cops routinely refer to them as "organ donors", but people still do it knowing that it could get them killed.
And as many have pointed out, the reason motorcycle crashes are so dangerous is because people get thrown off the bike really easily, and that can happen for all kinds of reasons that have nothing to do with balance problems.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1) by justinb_76 on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:38PM
in all fairness, myself and most riders I know are convinced that the statistics have been heavily skewed by dumb kids on 'crotch rockets'. I ride what I think is a decent sized bike (1200 Sportster) that has a whopping 48 horsepower - I can't think of any reason why I would need several times more on a bike with 1/2 the weight. But hey, at least when a kid on a bike crashes, they usually only take themselves out unlike someone in a monster SUV...
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Thursday October 13 2016, @03:06PM
I'll admit, my perceptions are a bit skewed by growing up in New Hampshire and seeing all the hardcore bikers that show up at the big annual bike week. Since libertarian-minded New Hampshire considers it your own business if you get yourself killed, there aren't any helmet laws or anything like that, so most of the bikers don't wear them while they're riding up and down the highways.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by CoolHand on Thursday October 13 2016, @07:28PM
I object to your apparent definition of hardcore, sir. I think most of my compatriots in our BMW riding club would consider themselves hardcore riders. Yet, they all ascribe to the notion of ATGATT (all the gear all the time). I imagine the average riding mileage of our club would far outpace any group of "cruiser" (ie Harley) riders..
Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job-Douglas Adams
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @03:09PM
> myself and most riders I know are convinced that the statistics have been heavily skewed by dumb kids on 'crotch rockets'
And 80% of people consider themselves above average drivers. [nih.gov]
The fallacy of personal superiority. Gets 'em every time.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday October 13 2016, @06:21PM
While that's true, it's not much comfort to that family of the guy I saw lying down after a distracted pickup truck shredded the side of a sedan, and one of them sent him flying into a concrete barrier. He had gear, he was not speeding (his bike was too noisy, but that didn't help).
You can be careful and still end up a statistic, because other road users are idiots.
You're just less likely to be a victim of your own stupidity, but you're still more exposed to that of others.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @08:08PM
Survivorship Bias [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 1) by toph on Thursday October 13 2016, @02:53PM
As a motorcyclist I prefer the ease by which I may leave the bike to suffering life threatening g-forces inside a cage (a.k.a. car). Of course I wear my protective gear.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @03:05PM
> where cops routinely refer to them as "organ donors",
In the emergency room we refer to all motorcycles as donorcycles.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Thursday October 13 2016, @03:21PM
Given that, I have always wondered why they don't make motorcycles with canopies. It hinges at the front and clips down once you're on the bike. Then you can ride through the rain without getting drenched, turn on the AC, and cut down on road noise. Put air bags in the frame, and you greatly reduce fatalities caused by laying down the bike or getting thrown from it. If people like the feeling of wind as they ride, swap the canopy for an open roll cage. There would be the look of such a thing, but that's a design issue; I always thought the TRON light cycles looked pretty cool.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Thursday October 13 2016, @03:37PM
Then add two more wheels and you have a car. Not what is wanted.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Thursday October 13 2016, @06:25PM
Exactly. It's just like people who drive Jeep Wranglers: their choice has absolutely zero to do with practicality.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Thursday October 13 2016, @09:45PM
Not zero. A used bike that needs a little love can be had for under $1000, and insurance is cheap too. Plus good fuel economy if it isn't too big. Add the cage and extra wheels and you need a bigger engine which burns more gas, and all that costs more. You can get a decent motorcycle brand new for $5k.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 3, Informative) by art guerrilla on Wednesday October 19 2016, @11:16AM
and those jeeps are LOUD with road/engine noise...
man, i could not stand riding in it for the 90-99% of the time you are doing normal road driving...
i was in a buddy's the other day, and i was thinking, why bother having a radio/CD player, you couldn't fucking hear it...
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 13 2016, @04:40PM
I ride in the rain without getting drenched. My riding jacket is already "waterproof" to a large extent. My boots are almost waterproof. I normally ride in denim jeans, but if I know the rain is about to hit, I stop and put on a raincoat over the riding jacket, and rain pants. Additionally, I keep a set of Frog Togs in the tank bag, just in case I destroy the more expensive rain suit.
There's a guy at work who rides in all weather. I'm not sure he even owns a car - five or six Harleys, but I've never seen him drive a car. When he gets to work, he's as dry as anyone else.
It's a bit of nuisance, keeping the raingear at hand, and in good repair, but it pays off.
(Score: 2) by fishybell on Thursday October 13 2016, @06:37PM
With two huge gyroscopes on each end and a bunch of little ones in the engine, motorcycles are extremely stable (unless you have a Moto Guzzi or other transverse engine bike). They may not be self-stable stopped, but why bother? One of the great attractions to motorcycles is their simplicity, which carries over to their cost. The most expensive mass-produced motorcycles are under $40,000, and most are closer to $10,000 new. Combined with gas mileage they are so much more attractive than cars. Motorcycles aren't dangerous because they don't balance well, but because they don't have things like seat belts, roll cages, exterior frame at all, air bags, the fact that they appear invisible to most drivers, etc.
When I took my motorcycle safety course many years ago they emphasized that the stability of a motorcycle is directly related to the speed and grip. If you have the grip, increasing the speed = more stable. Damn physics making things easy.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @08:04PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @08:08PM
Such a motorcycle was already build a few years ago, the Acabion GTBO:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8xgSdZOwvo [youtube.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 13 2016, @10:08PM
Many bikers on this forum have called car drivers stupid, as in: you can be an intelligent biker and do everything you are supposed to but then be killed by a stupid car driver. Excuse me? You, my biker friend, have gone out of your way to choose a mode of transportation that consists of your bare body lightly gripping a several hundred horsepower machine while traveling over 60 miles an hour (frequently much more). No protection should ANYTHING happen. You tell me who is the stupid one.