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Reverse-Rotating Rotors
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I have searched the web for & failed to find any mention of this...
Quote
Inventor Robby Kasten had come up with a potentially revolutionary
design to "eliminate speed-related steering effort while increasing
stability." His idea was Reverse Rotating Rotors (RRR) which would
counteract the gyroscopic effect of the front wheel by spinning the
rotors in the opposite direction of the wheel.
My physics isn't good enough - would this work ?
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It's bollocks. Corn-fed, high octane bollocks.
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Without the gyroscopic effect won't the bike fall over ?
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I don't think it will have any significant effect on stability. However, it
may well work in terms of reducing the effort involved in making steering
adjustments. The faster a wheel is rotating, the harder it is to change the
(geometric) plane in which it is rotating, due to gyroscopic effects. This
is very easy to demonstrate with a bicycle wheel and spindle. If one person
holds the wheel spindle at each end and the other spins the wheel rapidly
the person holding the wheel finds that it becomes very difficult to change
the angle of the wheel spindle due to the gyroscopic properties of the
spinning wheel. Steering a motorbike involves major changes in the planes
of rotation of the wheels as the bike leans over. Anything that reduces the
gyroscopic effect of the spinning wheels should make it easier to lean the
bike and easier to make any handlebar adjustments. For example, going
through an S-bend where the bike has to be rapidly moved from leaning one
way to leaning the other should require less effort and could be done more
quickly. I think the hoped-for trade-off is that any increase in weight
will be offset by more rapid progress through corners.
It shouldn't have any major effect on basic stability - IFAIK Newton's first
law keeps bikes upright "....an object in motion tends to stay in motion
with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an
unbalanced force". Although the reduced gyro effect of the wheels would
mean that less force was required to tip the bike over whilst in motion, it
also means that less effort is required to correct any tendency to fall over
so the overall effect is probably pretty neutral.
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Yes, but only indirectly: see my previous answer.
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I read it, you're almost completely wrong.
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The gyroscopic effect doesn't keep the bike up.
Actually, there was a guy wrote an article for Motorcycle Sport, about 20
years ago, about how he had tried something similar, but with annular
flywheels mounted inside the tyres. He expected that the gyroscopic effect
of the flywheels would keep him upright at a standstill. On his first test
ride, he came briskly to a halt after spinning up the flywheels, waited...
...fell over. Duh.
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What do folks think
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I think it's been tried and made no difference at all to the stability.
Could have been Tony Foale.
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FWIW, I reckon that as long as there's *some* precession force in the
right direction then the bike will self-balance, otherwise, as you
imply, it will rely entirely on rider input or some active system to
keep it upright, or maybe increased rake/trail would keep it stable.
I'm not sure that that would be a good thing, TBH.
The steering would become incredibly .., weird, thinking about it.
On the one hand, the natural balancing forces (as in keeping a bike
upright) would lighten considerably, but on the other, the wheel
itself would still resist being turned; the steering forces would be
reduced or even cancelled out.
Then there's the unsprung weight, which would almost certainly be
heavier.
In all honesty, it looks like a solution looking for a problem.
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Things you'll never know.
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