Index
All twenty pieces
The complete roster in one register, section by section. The homepage carries a selection; this page carries everything.
Steering
Section 01- 01
Countersteering
Above walking pace you turn by pushing the bar away from the corner and the machine falls into the turn.
- 02
Gyroscopic precession
A spinning wheel resists being tilted and responds ninety degrees later, which is part of why the bar input works.
- 03
Camber thrust
A leaned tyre generates side force from its own conical contact patch, independent of slip angle.
Geometry
Section 02- 01
Rake and trail
The head angle and the distance the contact patch trails behind the steering axis decide how willingly the machine turns and how hard it resists.
- 02
Wheelbase
Long is stable and slow to turn, short is quick and nervous; almost every other decision is negotiated against it.
- 03
Weight distribution
Front-to-rear bias decides which end lets go first, and it changes with fuel load and a passenger.
- 04
What a number hides
Static geometry is measured at rest; under braking the fork compresses and every figure changes.
The Front End
Section 03- 01
The telescopic fork
Almost universal and structurally poor: it bends under braking and its damping fights its own suspension duty.
- 02
Alternatives that lost
Hub-centre and leading-link systems separate braking from suspension and keep failing commercially.
- 03
Dive
The nose-down movement under braking is geometry changing while you are using it.
Engine as Layout
Section 04- 01
The flat twin
Cylinders in the airflow and mass carried low, at the cost of width and a torque reaction when you blip it.
- 02
The L-twin
Narrow and long, which pushes the wheelbase out and puts the rear cylinder where the airflow is not.
- 03
The inline four
Smooth and wide, and it sits high because the crank has to clear the ground.
- 04
Firing order and feel
Uneven firing intervals change how the tyre is loaded and how the machine feels at the edge of grip.
Chassis
Section 05- 01
The Featherbed
The McCandless brothers' 1950 frame was stiff enough for power that already existed, and the handling difference was immediate.
- 02
Trellis and spine
Triangulated tube against a single large-section beam — two ways to reach the same stiffness with different mass and different access.
- 03
The engine as a member
Bolting the motor in as a stressed part deletes tubes and makes servicing worse.
Measurement
Section 06- 01
Damping the steering
A damper masks an instability rather than fixing it, which is why what it hides matters more than what it does.
- 02
Instrumented testing
Strain gauges, potentiometers and data logging turn feel into numbers that can be argued with.
- 03
What riders report
Subjective feedback is data with a wide error bar, and it still finds things instruments miss.
Named in these pieces
Engineering exemplars, not endorsements