Seriously. One of the comments also pointed out that their bike still had a caster angle, just a negative one instead of a positive one.
Also, look at kid's foot-powered scooters. They have some pretty minuscule caster angles on the steering shaft, and they don't stay upright very well at all without a person at the controls. Now, some of that is undoubtedly the effect of very tiny wheels and slow speeds resulting in low gyroscopic effect, but the caster angle likely plays some part in it as well. -Kurt On Thu, Apr 28, 2011 at 9:02 PM, Kyle Munz <[email protected]> wrote: > I did think that that video "Physics of a riderless bike" was a little > light on the actual physics involved. > > -Kyle > > > On Thu, Apr 28, 2011 at 7:58 PM, Kurt Nolte <[email protected]>wrote: > >> Or none of the above, and it's just something nobody's ever really tried >> to explain seriously? >> >> I didn't really hear anything that contradicted the opinion that trail >> angles /assist/ in self-centering tendencies; that's an assertion that is >> backed up by quite a bit of automotive steering research as engineers try to >> come up with better and better steering cars. Caster and Camber both have >> profound impacts on the steering dynamics of a wheel; in our case, the >> camber (and toe) are intended to be minimized, so now we're really just >> discussing caster angle... >> >> -Kurt >> >> >> On Thu, Apr 28, 2011 at 8:48 PM, Kyle Munz <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>> So, >>> physics is all wrong, our bikes are all wrong, or this video is all >>> wrong... >>> http://www.sciencefriday.com/videos/watch/10376 >>> >>> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "Nighthawk Motorcycle Lovers!" group. >> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >> [email protected]. >> For more options, visit this group at >> http://groups.google.com/group/nighthawk_lovers?hl=en. >> > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Nighthawk Motorcycle Lovers!" group. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected]. > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/nighthawk_lovers?hl=en. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Nighthawk Motorcycle Lovers!" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/nighthawk_lovers?hl=en.
