Hanging off

[RotorACT]

Heres my bit
Go to the track and ask a (really) fast rider to slow down and follow him/her for a few laps to see getting off first hand
It works and your not riding on the edge of your tyres
but who knows <i></i>

[CapeBusa]

I've been doofin around checkin out old posts and came across this gem filled thread and couldn't resist to add the following.

1. I get my arse of the seat.

2. I know how and why i steer right to go left, but i don't care cause i turn left when i want to and it works.

3. I've followed and passed heaps of guys who get their arses off the seat and yet they wonder why they can't turn faster. Shift ya head too! I've seen guys hanging off the bike so far it looks like they're trying to take a crap in their leathers (mind you if they keep at it much longer they will involuntarily) but their heads are still above the windshield. Or worse they are counter weighting by putting their heads out the top side of the bike while their arse is hangin off the other side.

4. You want to do it right?
Point your knee to the inside of the corner. Not out. Not up. Not even down. The idea is to shift the weight onto the inside of the front wheel. Get down between the bike and the road. Sounds scary, and i vaguely remember, the first time i got it right it was. Once you're between the bike and the road move your knee forward towards the apex of the corner.

Try it if you dare. Don't blame me if you come unstuck. But throw money my way when your corner speeds increase by HEAPS.

To quote Gassit "I was speeding case bikes fall over if you go slow."

Ok. Feel better now i got that off my chest. Just for the record all you guys with all your wise and educated answers. Love yas. It was fun to read and your all tellin it like it is and i got heaps of respect for those who understand how it all works. But once my arse is on the seat I don't give a shit how it works just so long as it keeps working.

C yas in the twisties.
Geoff

PS the only reason to touch your knee on the ground is to establish that you are at full lean and that if you lean any further you are going to run out of contact patch on the rear wheel.

PPS When your knee does touch the ground and your discover that you arnt going to make the corner don't lean any further. This would be bad on a big scale. Reduce speed and you will be able to turn in tighter without more lean. Remember to keep watching where you WANT to go and not where you THINK you might end up. The bike goes where you look.

PPPS If reducing throttle when your knee is dragging through a corner doesn't provide enough extra turn to make the exit on ashphalt i would suggest that you have taken the corner too fast and are going to crash. My advice here is to bend forward as much as possible centering your bending at your belly button so as to facilitate getting your head beneath your balls so that you can kiss your arse good-bye.

PPPPS Have fun! Ride fast! Turn Fast! Wear out your knee sliders! Be a ledgend!

[kawasuki]

another tip , dont fall off.

[mechanx]

Always wear pink pantys,just like kawa does?

[kawasuki]

Pink and Green maniax.

[maggot]

Pink and Green maniax.

I think he just means the actual colour Ray, not the mould growing on em

[kawasuki]

Arh Maggott,,, the Mechanx is only a bannana bender . And he dosent do that well SO I HAVE BEEN TOLD.

[xocet]

Easiest thing in the world to do, right up until more than just your knee is down. If you're going to do it, make absolutely sure you're not crossed up. If you cross your body up over the bike, you will over lean the bike and spud in. One way to make sure you're not crossing up? Get your head over the same side of the bike as your body. Getting your arse off the seat is dumb. You only need one cheek off. Get the outside knee smashed hard into the tank with a strong calf muscle. Get you inside knee so that your legs are ninety degrees to each other. You'll need to rotate your inside foot so the toe is on the peg, AND, the heel resting on the peg guard. As you enter the corner, get you noggin to the inside of the inner fairing. Lower you chest to the tank as you apex.

Does that sound busy? Friggin should! The only time racers get to rest is actually in the corner. The rest of the time they're very much earning the dollars.

[Astro]

Ahhh.... an oldie, but a goodie!

[NEMESIS]

f*** that.

Im not trying that shit with my own bike.
Il do it with someone elses though

[Shifu]

That is an excellent thread and it is a shame that not many riders look into that corner.
Regarding hanging off and steering left to turn right.
Bear gave an accurate explanation of the "mechanism" of the dynamics that will lean your bike to the right if you steer to the left resulting in taking a right turn. A lot of riders do not understand this but act instinctively and that is the whole point. Who cares how it works as long as it does and without fail
However the whole "hanging off" technique absolutely makes no difference to your cornering speed other than maybe a psychological one. And here is the reason purely from the view point of science of motion dynamics:
Newton figured out that everything wants to move in a straight lines, bikes including. So as we start traveling on an arc (cornering in that case) we require sometning to overcome that tendency for traveling straight. All we have is the friction between the tires and the road - the precious traction. There is only so much of it and it does not depend on how big patch of rubber is on the road but only on how much force (the weight of the bike and rider) pushing it into the road. Now there is a good thing. To conteract the centripetal force while cornering, we are leaning the bike into the corner untill it's weight balances it. So now we have more force pushing the tires into a road (the suspension is more compressed than normal) and we have more traction - good thing. Now is the bad news. It does not matter at all whether at this point you are "hanging off" the bike or not as the amount of the centripetal force depends only on the total mass in motion through the arc and it's velocity. The position of the centre of gravity in this case will have absolutely no effect on it. It will only affect the amount of lean required to balance the bike. Correct "hanging off" technique will lower the centre of gravity requiring less lean angle for a given speed but that is all. It might be very important if you have clearance problems but it will not give you any more traction. And the traction is the only limiting factor on how fast you can travel through the corner. So whether you are "hanging off" or seating straight on you can really get through it with the same speed (all other things being equal of course). So why most of the riders do it then? Well, there is a number of good reasons why it is well worth learning and using this technique. First it is a psychological one as it gives you more confidence. I call it the closest thing to a low level flying you can get to without buying an aeroplane. It also helps you to judge correctly your lean angle as someone already mentioned in that thread. Knee in the set position on the ground (requires a lot of balls and experimenting untill you find what that position is) is the limit on how far you can lean the bike before you off the edge of the tire. It helps to have a buddy riding behaind with a camera for a good refererence. Finally, the benefit of lower centre of gravity is increased stability of the whole bike while cornering and a bit of advantage when coming out of the corner - quicker to get it up.
The art of going quick through corners is a combination of the correct line and using maximum amount of available traction to conteract the centripetal force. That means a steady and fluid motion as very little will be left for acceleration (should not even think of it really) or braking which many have learned the hard way - highside for the first, lowside for the second. Both bloody painful and expensive.
Now I am going to practice what I have preached

[Belzybob]

Thats what I would call a well considered post, take three and a bit years to think about it

[Shifu]

Thats what I would call a well considered post, take three and a bit years to think about it

Best comment of the thread

[Belzybob]

Glad you saw the funny side!

[Katana2]

[quote='Shifu' pid='241906' dateline='1303712695']
"increased stability of the whole bike while cornering"
This is the important peice of information, and what I have been 'hanging' for someone to say on any thread about this topic. As an old 'bike' rider, most of the reason I get of the bike is so that I can better help the bikes suspension settle the bike through bumps and surface changes in the real world. Race tracks have a far more consistant surface. The real world does not. Forget being faster around a bend. You can go faster around a similarly tight corner on a track on any day. But in the real world I try to make sure that the bike is as stable as it can be. You can better manage the bikes stability by being a suspension component yourself and let the bike settle under you when you know how to correctly hang off. Not nessessarily faster but more stable and hence, safer. My two cents worth.