Hmmmmm? photo: @fat cyclist
This is perhaps painfully obvious to everyone but me and if so, sorry I’ve yet again wasted your time. The other day, after falling off another floating board in the ocean I had to admit my balance might suck. And my coordination too or I might have been good enough at baseball to actually like it and play it. Nope, ball sports are right out. What I want to celebrate is the fact that our bikes have two magic gyroscopes spinning underneath us. You want to sit up at 40 kph, casually reach behind and tuck your gilet under your jersey? Be my guest but you can only do that because of the gyroscopes, not your awesome balance. If good balance was required to ride bicycles every prat and his brother wouldn’t be chatting on their iphone while zipping down the lane.
Descending at great speed is so damn much fun because the bike is rock solid when hauling such mighty ass, until it isn’t and that is is pilot error, not the fault of your dualing gyroscopes. To quote one of Maine’s greatest exports, Yvon Chouinard, “speed is safety”. He was talking about mountaineering and the need quickly get across exposed couloirs to avoid potential rockfall or avalanche but it’s also true for cycling, to a point. OK, he could have said speed is stability if he was more of a cyclist.
Does this mean we shouldn’t own deep section carbone wheels, with their lighter rotating mass providing less momentum? No, folly my friends, the deep section wheels are spinning faster because you are going faster due to the aero-awesomeness of those wheels. A year into my tubular tire/50 mm Cancellara carbone wheels and I’m more chuffed than ever about them. Unless it’s raining heavily and I’m descending then, not as chuffed. But I digress, that is another lecture.
So far so good. What the hell is absent minded professor talking about? All this spin angle momentum and torque should have us riding in circles not going in straight lines. That is your weekend homework. Test on Monday. Buon weekend.
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@cognition
All I can say is that the WWII Patrol Boats (UK MTBs, US PTs) had contra rotating props otherwise they would have about a 15 deg list due to engine torque at full power.
I believe the later UK ones did not for cost savings and were a bit of a 'mare.
@Teocalli
Ooh, cool. Always nice to hear about real-world examples.
Now I'm going to have to rig something up so I can check it out for myself and demonstrate it to my students...
@Teocalli
This is presumably why the American track team have developed a new track bike with Felt that has a left hand side drivetrain to counteract the natural skewiffiness of righthandside drivetrains and anti-clockwise banking? Or is it simply because they like switching things to the wrong side to confuse is Brits?
The Chinook helicopter is a terrific example of how counter rotation can be used to cancel out torque steer.
It only prevents the fuselage from spinning, and allows the chopper to use power for forward momentum. Blade pitch is is to steer.
Counter rotating wheels on the same axle should react the same as each other
@Cam
Mother Fucker! Truth, you are a cruel mistress! Thanks Cam. I guess.
Damn, I hate when that happens. FFS. Well. If I was Dutch I'd continue to argue my point and ignore Cam's article.
>>>The reason why the M cancels is because the moment of inertia has an M in it…None of this is intuitive…<<<
Physics is Phun. Cheers all
@Cam
>>> The faster we ride, the smaller the steering adjustment needs to be, simply because the bike moves much further in a given time. When riding very slowly the steering adjustments required are very large. <<<
And this I suspect is why I am far more likely to wreck on a mtn bike when going slow vs going fast yes?? maybe??
This also explains why riding on rollers is significantly more difficult (in regards to balance) than riding on the road. You have the same gyroscopic forces but no forward motion and therefore no trail.
@Randy C
@ Randy C Nope, the reason for wrecking while going slow on a mtb is because any impact to your front wheel (roots, rocks, etc.) will make it stop more easy if you´re slow, whilst your body will try to keep the momentum at going over the handlebar. On the other hand, if you´re faster it´ll be bumpier óver those roots&rocks but you´ll be able to clear the obstacles and keep on rollin´...