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Fun project!
As far as I know there are/were three big developments on bike aero (apart from having a
smooth fairing in the first place) with three different goals:
The BMW K1: reduce drag and turbulence, especially between layers, the front mud guard, flip
up screen and small "cases" behind the legs
The Honda CBR900RR and the NSR's from that time: holes in the fairing to prevent the
formation of a upward ground effect between bike and ground under extreme lean angles
The current MotoGP bikes: winglets to help to keep the front wheel on the ground during
acceleration.
Are you racing the bike on track or more a case of having the slickest bike on the road?
Materi 1,5
Dear Members,
this is my first post, glad to be part of this board. Know some of You have huge knowledge, this
why I let myself to start topic in here. Been building my bike for almost 7 years, now its time to
work on better aero, I was inspired by moto gp bikes.
I had to options do it just for look, are do all necessary calculations, I choose second way.
What I want to achive is better flow all over the bike, separat flow and reduce drag. I count also
on better stability in to the corners (with "stock" look of the bike).
Lets start.
Im using aircraft science knowledge to make them work in my case, am I correct I don't know
but if values will resonable I guess I will be. When we look at the bike from above it has
approximately shape to tear drop, so I looks like wing in cross-section. So I think when we want
to make vortex generators we can use same calculation as aviation.
I only think now about upper stream of air (fastest air) as its most important for us,
second side of bike is equal (I know exhaust).
V = Stall Speed
W = Weight of the aircraft
g = 9.81 (Acc. Due to Gravity)
ρ = Density of Air
S = Wing Area
Clmax = Coefficient of Lift at Stall
Wing area is our whole bike (of course not in 100%) but I will count it as a length and from
highest point to the ground.
Another value which I need to solve is Coefficient of Lift at Stall which is angle of attack,
I will take value from center line of the bike (from above) to maximum angle of bike turning point.
All these will let me to get Reynolds Number which I need to determine the height of my main
wing and then.
During the weekend I did some calculations ang get some numbers. I cut cardboard form of
main wing (to be honest there should be 3 of them across whole hight of the bike).
All numbers are for rectangular vortex generator beacuse I have good explenation how to do
this. Anyhow rectangular profile is good as it self because of a big operating surface.
After I get size of the wing I calculate winglet for it basing on diameters of the wing.
Was thinking about profile, what I get its about 8mm maximum thickness, which should be 1/3
length from front of the wing. Need to read about it more. Shape should depand on Re number
size.
After all I calculate best postions and hight for wing to be placed.
Back in a days I did also handle fairings, but know I think they should be a bit bigger (I change
clip on's position to wider.
Pic. material:
What do You think about it?
Materi 2
Motorcycles are inherently un-aerodynamic because of us, the occupants. Unlike a car,
plane, or even the hull of a boat, the surfaces of a motorcycle moving through the fluid
(in this case air) is interrupted by a human body that is draped rather inelegantly
over the top and spills down the sides in a gangly mess of limbs. As a result, air that
was previously sailing effortlessly alongside the smooth fairings of the bike come
crashing into our wrinkled, flailing bits causing massive air turbulence.
That’s not
spaghetti on his back… this computer simulation of air flow shows violent, turbulent air (in blue)
separating from the free flowing air (green) and tumbling around behind the rider.
On a bike, once you go over about 30 km/h, air pressure starts to dominate
proceedings. Air pressure rises to the cube of speed, meaning that for every kilometer
per hour, the corresponding air resistance increases by a multiple of 3,
It doesn’t take long before this quickly adds up to consume all of a motorcycle’s power,
so much so that at a mere 100 km/h, 80% of a motorcycle’s energy is spent just
overcoming air resistance. While that’s largely the same for any vehicle, including cars
or planes, they are mercifully smooth, enclosed shapes. The motorcycle on the other
hand, is a collection of random engineered parts and a human body which together form
a shape almost perfectly suited to disrupt smooth air flow.
Turbulence is air that behaves like a teenager: it’s listless, high in energy but cannot
decide where to go. And like a moody teenager, turbulent air has the amazing talent of
agitating everything it touches. When pockets of turbulent air disrupt an object in
motion, the air molecules touching that object create friction that pushes against it. Even
after it’s gone, it causes a vacuum effect behind you, further draining you of momentum.
Green definitely does not mean “go”. That ghostly apparition behind the bike is energy being
wasted
That is aerodynamic drag, and it literally sucks you back. We’ve all heard the rumble
and felt the knocks of turbulent flow around our helmets, and probably had the sore
necks to remind us about it.
If turbulence is a militant teen then smooth, orderly air flow, called laminar flow, is like a
parade of thoroughbred horses. Laminar air moves easy, has modest energy and
doesn’t rock your head. It’s happiest when running fast and free. It dislikes sharp
corners and loose materials, anything with bumps or rough surfaces that may slow it
down. We all hear laminar flow around our heads every time we ride. It’s when the wind
noise is a constant drone, like the whistle of a jet engine.
Slicing Through the Air Like a Wet Sack of Potatoes : A No-Win Situation
Motorcycle designers have spent a lot of time worrying about your head, making sure
that the evils of turbulence stay as far away from your helmet as possible. Wind screens
are shaped, punctured and vented so as to direct the air past your noodle as smoothly
and pressure-free as practicable.
These staged publicity photos show lovely parallel lines of laminar air flowing nearly over and
around the motorcyclist.
But the rest of your body is not much of a consideration. It may come as a shock to
most motorcyclists, particularly those used to reading boastful claims in motorcycle
advertising to the contrary, but 99% of motorcycle OEMs don’t give a damn about
aerodynamic efficiency. The reason? It’s such a lost fight that it isn’t worth the effort.
The average passenger car on the road today has a drag coefficient (the measure of air
resistance) of about 0.3 (a lower number being better). Even a large, blocky car like a
full size SUV or my ’87 Westfalia camper rate around 0.4. A racing motorcycle with a
smooth, full fairing and professional rider in a full tuck? 0.6. In other words, those 5’9”
jockeys crunched up behind the windscreen of a tiny Moto3 grand prix bike create more
drag in the air than a Chevrolet Suburban.
This actual photo of a wind tunnel test shows how violently laminar air flow unravels after the
rider, even on a purpose-built racing motorcycle.
This is just the nature of the beast, and no amount of finesse in the wind tunnel can fix
that. The designer of a motorcycle can do a lot to control air flow and minimize
aerodynamic resistance at the front, around the front wheel, radiator, engine and in front
of the rider, but once the fairings and bodywork ends, its turbulence city.
It’s not just the sticking out bits like elbows, head, feet and knees that break up the
lamina air flow, it’s the sudden disappearance of a smooth guided path. Once air
crosses the trailing edge of a motorcycle’s fairing into the open space between the
fairing and rider, laminar flow disintegrates. The air pocket behind the wind screen is
roiling mess of eddies and currents that are highly turbulent. Slow moving, but full of
odd and unpredictable pressures, they slam into the high-speed, laminar flow rushing
past. That collision creates a vacuum effect, sucking the turbulent air into the laminar
flow, agitating the collision still more.
The resulting turbulence then squeaks out in pulses wherever it can: under an armpit,
over a shoulder, along a an invisible vortex of high-speed air trailing dozens of meters
behind the motorcycle, like the foamy currents of a fast-moving river after a large rock.
Behind the rider air is in pure chaos. The rear wheel is churning up air like a blender,
sucking it in on one side and blowing it out another, while the hot exhaust gasses are
blasted out backwards, adding much heat energy to the random mix. No matter what
shapes exist behind the rider’s back, the air has been chopped up and spit out like a
felled tree through a wood chipper.
The first generation Yamaha FJR1300 tourer was notorious for sending searing hot
radiator exhaust up between the frame and fuel tank, which made for pleasant heating
in cool weather and terrible discomfort in warmer climes. It was a flaw not detected in
testing (done in northern Europe and Japan in autumn), but later fixed with the addition
of one internal plastic duct. On the original Ducati Multistrada, the under seat mufflers
caused the plastic passenger seat unit to melt due to insufficient air flow when the
passenger’s legs were present.
In racing, the main objective of aerodynamic refinement until this year has been heat
management. It may seem an unlikely place to find speed, but when Yamaha made
slight changes to the size and shape of the radiator outlet on the 2011 M1 MotoGP
design, they reduced coolant temperatures by 17 degrees. Lowering the temperature of
a racing engine can translate into more horsepower, increased engine reliability or
reducing the amount of coolant you carry, which means shaving kilograms of weight. It
all adds up.
By far the oldest use of aerodynamics in competition motorcycles was the fully enclosed
motorcycle body that existed from just before the second world war and lasted until the
late 1950’s. Epitomized by models like the NSU Sportmax and Moto Guzzi 500 V8, the
fully covered front wheel treatment suggests amazing reduction in drag and increased
speed for the same horsepower.
“She may not look like much, kid, but she’s got it where it counts.” 1957 Moto Guzzi 500 V8
Named dustbin fairings by the British (who has a waste bin for dust? Editor ‘Arris, can
you answer this…? Yes, England is very dusty – ‘Arris) were a brief diversion in the
evolution of motorcycle aerodynamics. First experimented with in the prewar years by
ambitious Nazi government backed manufacturers in Germany like NSU, Zündapp and
BMW, they crafted smooth, bullet-shaped bodies over conventional motorcycles and
discovered, unsurprisingly, that this made them much faster without the need for more
power.
The experiment continued into the post-war era with NSU, Giilera and Moto Guzzi
leading the charge. Forbidden by the victorious Allies to manufacture aircraft, Germany
and Italy’s aerospace engineers turned to making motorcycles, applying their expertise
in aluminum construction and aerodynamics to boast some of the most slippery race
bikes every conceived. Guzzi possessed a wind tunnel on site in their factory, taking full
advantage to minimize drag.
Which they did. In a straight line.
The point must be emphasized because the very thing that made dustbin fairings so
efficient at cheating the wind head-on also made them dangerously unstable in other
conditions. This was because they place the center of air pressure (CoP) ahead of the
centre of gravity, which introduces a strong yaw, or left/right turning force on the
motorcycle.
Besides reducing turbulence and protecting laminar flow, the third pillar of safe
motorcycle aerodynamics is controlling the center of pressure (CoP). CoP is vital to
maintaining control, as anyone who has ever carried a large flat object on a windy day
can attest. When the wind blows toward you, all is well. When the wind gusts from an
angle, or broadside, not only is the person pushed sideways but is pivoted to a side as
well. If the flat object is mostly behind you, your body acts like an anchor as you go
forward, reducing the amount of effort you need to keep going straight. If more of the flat
object is ahead of you, as in the dustbin fairing motorcycle, the steering effect is much
greater.
Dustbin fairings were banned by the racing authorities on this basis in 1958, and fully
enclosed street motorcycles have similarly remained mostly just a curiosity. With ever
increasing power and speed potential, the repercussions of losing lateral stability in a
sudden gust of wind are too great to risk.
Holes drilled into the fairings reduce the lateral pressure exerted by strong side winds at Philip
Island in Australia.
Even conventionally bodied, full fairing race bikes can experience this phenomenon.
The circuit at Philip Island in Australia is renowned for strong winds coming off the
nearby ocean, which create lateral air pressures significant enough that racers reported
fighting too hard to turn in, as well as unacceptable levels of instability on the straights.
Teams drilled holes into the largest surfaces of the fairings to reduce lateral surface
area. The results are bikes that gain some drag in straight line travel (the holes act like
vortex generators) but are much more manageable in cross winds and during roll
transitions in corners. With motorcycle aerodynamics at least, it is a zero sum game.
You may find gains in one area but have to pay for them elsewhere.
The secret to significant improvement lies in air management around the rider. Since
covering the rider up is not a possibility, then the next best thing is to deploy
aerodynamic devices to manipulate the air flow into behaving as though the rider wasn’t
there.
2016 will go down as the year that aerodynamic advances finally came to motorcycle
racing, because of their sudden popularity in MotoGP. Since the beginning of the
season, Yamaha, Honda and Suzuki have followed long time aero champion Ducati in
the adoption of winglets and vortex generators (VGs) as speed weaponry. The free test
after the Spanish grand prix revealed lots of new aerodynamic devices from many
brands, including strakes, turbulators, and pressure ducts.
The advanced, active and passive aerodynamic devices seen in MotoGP and in past
years are about to disappear again. The governing body for motorcycle racing has
deemed that winglets, VG s and other such devices are to be banned, in the name of
saving money and preserving competition. It is the right decision.
The uppermost winglets are there to generate downforce (or negative lift), the lower black
triangles are vortex generators to extend laminar air flow. Image : .asphaltandrubber.com
Aerodynamics is a science that requires unspeakable budgets to study properly. By far
the most expensive line item on any vehicle development program is wind tunnel time.
The tunnel itself may be rented from any number of national laboratories or university
research centers, but the technicians and engineers required to operate it, gather and
then analyze the data is are hard to find and in high demand.
Then there is the engineering needed to leverage the findings into practical solutions
that can be executed. And then there is the testing, in different places, with different
temperatures, on different surfaces. When aerodynamics is what separates the winners
from the rest, then only the biggest and richest manufacturers will be able to compete.
This is what has happened in formula one.
Motorcycles would certainly benefit from real advances in aerodynamic research, but it’s
just not needed or wanted by the buying public. The best-selling categories of
motorcycle are cruisers and naked street bikes, because people the world over like the
way they look and their functionality is good enough.
The motorcycle is a reflection of the rider’s personality, and very few of us are
desperately seeking efficiency. Until consumers demand a ten fold increase in energy
efficiency from their bikes, don’t expect the aerodynamic advances seen elsewhere to
appear on your next motorcycle