- #1
Spikeywan
- 15
- 0
It seems to me that motorbikes are built to have a low centre of gravity.
I can understand this, having dropped mine twice. Once it gets away from you, there's no stopping it, and having a low CoG helps to make the bike easier to handle in the garage.
However, once you're riding it, then all those issues go away.
I went out for the day with someone on an identical bike to mine. He was a small, light chap, and took nothing else with him. I weigh at least 2 stone more than him, had my girlfriend on the back, and had a fully loaded top box.
He commented that I didn't seem to be leaning much, whereas he felt like he had his ear on the ground following me.
This made me think thusly...
Take two identical bikes, but make one with a very low CoG and one with a very high CoG.
The bike with the high CoG would be able to move more weight over for the same amount of lean. This extra weight transfer would mean that the HCoG bike would have to corner faster than the LCoG bike in order to balance the forces for the same amount of lean.
So, why don't race bikes have a really high centre of gravity?
I can understand this, having dropped mine twice. Once it gets away from you, there's no stopping it, and having a low CoG helps to make the bike easier to handle in the garage.
However, once you're riding it, then all those issues go away.
I went out for the day with someone on an identical bike to mine. He was a small, light chap, and took nothing else with him. I weigh at least 2 stone more than him, had my girlfriend on the back, and had a fully loaded top box.
He commented that I didn't seem to be leaning much, whereas he felt like he had his ear on the ground following me.
This made me think thusly...
Take two identical bikes, but make one with a very low CoG and one with a very high CoG.
The bike with the high CoG would be able to move more weight over for the same amount of lean. This extra weight transfer would mean that the HCoG bike would have to corner faster than the LCoG bike in order to balance the forces for the same amount of lean.
So, why don't race bikes have a really high centre of gravity?