On Tue, 23 Feb 2016 09:39:43 -0000, "TMS320" <
dr6...@gmail.com> wrote:
>"Peter Parry" <
pe...@wpp.ltd.uk> wrote
>> With a push bike rider skill is a far more important factor than with
>> a car Most riders are unable to achieve anything like the best the
>> cycle can brake at. The quality of the road surface also has a major
>> impact. The average rider rarely manages more than 0.35g.
>
>Do you mean that an average rider rarely does more than 0.35g by routine? Or
>has this figure been determined by putting a sample through controlled
>stress tests?
Controlled tests on well maintained bikes with brakes front and rear
on dry surfaces. The riders were experienced "utility" cyclists.
Nearly all applied insufficient braking force as they feared the front
wheel would skid or they would be tipped over.
>Many countries allow bikes with rear brake only - are you sure you're
>not confusing two different things?
Would a rear brake alone be capable of 0.35g retardation: I would
have thought nearer 0.25g?
>If it is 'by routine' then drivers rarely do more than 0.35g.
>
>> However, if we assume the surface is dry and pristine and the
>> pushbike is braking at the best the machine can achieve the limit for
>> the pushbike is not the adhesion of the tyre on the road but weight
>> transfer which can cause pitch over at about 0.6g (the subsequent
>> adhesion of shredded flesh to tarmac is not usually considered to be
>> part of stopping distance).
>
>Pitchover is higher than 0.6g. Although there are techniques of improving
>weight distribution to stop pitchover during deep braking, I expect most
>cases are low speed when the rider puts feet down too soon.
"For an upright bicycle on dry asphalt with excellent brakes, pitching
will probably be the limiting factor. The combined center of mass of a
typical upright bicycle and rider will be about 60 cm (24 in) back
from the front wheel contact patch and 120 cm (47 in) above, allowing
a maximum deceleration of 0.5 g (5 m/s2 or 16 ft/s2).[28] If the rider
modulates the brakes properly, however, pitching can be avoided. If
the rider moves his weight back and down, even larger decelerations
are possible." (Wikipedia - Bicycle_and_motorcycle_dynamics).
0.67 seems to be about the absolute limit using extreme body
positioning (chest on saddle) well beyond what most riders are
capable of doing. The pitchover g force is reduced if the weight of
the rider moves forward due to insufficient bracing against the
handlebars (some authors consider this forward body movement to be the
most common reason for riders going over the front of the bike).
"High Speed Bicycling" (Wayne Pein, Bicycling Matters) says:-
"Four-wheeled motor vehicles have much better emergency braking
capabilities than bicycles, approximately 0.6 - 0.7 g (some cars can
achieve more than 0.9 g), affording motorists a great margin for error
beyond AASHTO’s roadway design specification. In contrast, a typical
bicyclist can be expected to decelerate at 0.35 g on clean, dry, level
pavement which, coincidentally, is AASHTO’s figure for roadway design
purposes as previously noted. A conventional bicycle's theoretical
maximum deceleration is limited to about 0.6 g on level pavement by
weight transfer, which can cause pitch-over. However, only a highly
skilled bicyclist using optimal technique may be able to achieve this
0.6 g; most will be far lower at about 0.35 g."
>> It would appear that the calculator you used at
exploratorium.edu is
>> significantly wrong. For a speed of 24.85 MPH it gives a stopping
>> distance of 7.14m. A test of the Shimano R785 Hydraulic road disc
>> brakes at that speed for review produced stopping distances of 14m.
>> The Campagnolo Chorus calipers and alloy rims produced similar
>> results. At 15MPH a Dutch bicycle (new) fitted with disk brakes
>> could stop in 5m, the web calculator claimed 2.6m.
>
>The retardation for these distances is significantly below even your
>pitchover figure.
>> The latest Highway code braking distances have been reduced somewhat
>> and appear to assume retardation of about 0.65g.This produces a
>> braking distance figure from 60MPH of 54m, a test by Which? on some
>> fairly average cars produced stopping distances at that speed between
>> 34 and 44m.
>
>The difference always looks dramatic on a side by side test but isn't
>particularly real world significant. In the distance a 50's car took from
>30mph, the best modern car can only start from 36mph before using up that
>distance (including driver reaction).
The latest Highway Code figures reduced the braking distance but
increased the thinking distance thus keeping the overall stopping
distance more or less unchanged. I'm only considering braking
distance here so the effectiveness of the brakes can be compared
without confounding factors. There is no doubt that a car can stop
more quickly than a pushbike.
There is also no doubt once braking hard a pushbike riders skill (or
not) is more of a factor than with the driver of a car who simply has
to press the brake hard.
>> Time to brake to stop is the speed in metres per second divided by the
>> deceleration rate. Cars can always decelerate more rapidly than
>> bicycles. There doesn't appear to be any doubt that a car can stop
>> more quickly than any bike at comparable speeds. In the rain the
>> disparity increases considerably.
>If the dry limit for a bicycle is pitchover, in the wet it will be tyre
>adhesion. The disparity reduces.
It is usually brake effectiveness (or lack of) which creates the wet
limit. A TRRL report from 1980 on rim brakes found that using
synthetic brake blocks on chromed steel wheel rims in the dry a
maximum retardation of 0.76g could be obtained, the same
brake/wheel/rider combination managed only 0.21g in the wet. For
alloy wheels the dry braking force was 0.46g dry and 0.39g wet.(TRRL
supplementary report 619). Although the report is old most pushbikes
still use caliper brakes and the results remain relevant. Moreover,
fear of skidding means many riders do not brake effectively in the
wet.