Braking distances - Cars vs Bikes
Discussion
I was having a discussion the other night in the pub with a couple of biking mates who are convinced bikes can stop in a shorter distance than cars. Now obviously this would depend on the car/bike in question, but for arguments sake we compared a Hornet 900 with my VW Polo 16v. I recon the Polo would stop in less distance due to the larger tyre contact patch, but they reckoned the bike, being so much lighter, would be quicker.
Perhaps a more average comparison would be better, say a Mondeo 2.0 and a Bandit 600 perhaps?
Anyone care to settle this argument with some facts and figures
Perhaps a more average comparison would be better, say a Mondeo 2.0 and a Bandit 600 perhaps?
Anyone care to settle this argument with some facts and figures
Surely when braking you haven't got to worry at all about the front wheel being on the ground? More the opposite if the bias is a bit too much to the front, you're gonna end up with one hell of a stoppie going on and the rear lifting off the deck.
Edit: Bah, beaten to it!
Edit: Bah, beaten to it!
Edited by Steve_Evil on Friday 13th April 12:24
mat205125 said:
In the dry, the bike will stop in a far shorter distance than the car.
Do you have any times from 100mph to 0mph ? I've got a few Autocar 0-100-0 challenge issues at home and the bikes were no where near the cars, but then I think it was tricky on the transition from acceleration to braking due to extreme weight transfer on the bikes...
Edited by RichardD on Friday 13th April 12:31
RichardD said:
I've got a few Autocar 0-100-0 challenge issues at home and the bikes were no where near the cars, but then I think it was tricky on the transition from acceleration to braking due to extreme weight transfer on the bikes...
Yep, I don't know of a bike that can beat an Ultima GTR from 0-100-0 but certainly there are bikes that must be quicker from 0-100.
excupra said:
...I don't know of a bike that can beat an Ultima GTR from 0-100-0 but certainly there are bikes that must be quicker from 0-100.
Always thought it a shame that for whatever reason the Ultima factory was not included at these challenges. Don't have the numbers now but remember a litre bike (pro rider) and the time to accelerate to 100mph was just about the same as the time to stop from said speed
What I would think though is that say 150-100mph braking a superbike would brake better than many performance cars just due to the sheer bite and lack of weight ?
The problem with braking hard "on the road" on a performance bike is the shocking state of repair. Although you *can* throw the anchors out hard it's very easy to hit a rut or a pothole and get into big trouble with all that force going through the front wheel. In a performance car with ABS etc you can stamp on the pedal and let the car get on with it. It takes a lot more skill (and balls) to do an emergency stop on a bike on the road.
Yes, cars are quicker at braking simply because they brake with two tyres rather than one, and they're not limited by the vehicle trying to flip over.
I've got some figures from the 27th April 2004 Autocar magazine:
Suzuki GSX-R 1000: 100mph - 0 in 5.63 seconds
Lotus Elise 111R - 4.09 seconds
Peugeot 206 Gti 180 - 4.39 seconds
Porsche 911 GT3 - 4.00 seconds (interestingly, the raw physics suggests that a 911 obtains a 50:50 weight distribution whilst braking fully).
The bike is beaten by everything, including a hot hatch. I'm fairly confident a standard hatch would also beat the bike.
So, the 911 is 1.63 seconds quicker under braking from 100-0. Call that about a second from a typical track top speed to a typical track cornering speed, and it can be seen why bikes often fail to live up to the lap times you'd expect round a race track, especially tight race tracks with lots of braking involved.
I've got some figures from the 27th April 2004 Autocar magazine:
Suzuki GSX-R 1000: 100mph - 0 in 5.63 seconds
Lotus Elise 111R - 4.09 seconds
Peugeot 206 Gti 180 - 4.39 seconds
Porsche 911 GT3 - 4.00 seconds (interestingly, the raw physics suggests that a 911 obtains a 50:50 weight distribution whilst braking fully).
The bike is beaten by everything, including a hot hatch. I'm fairly confident a standard hatch would also beat the bike.
So, the 911 is 1.63 seconds quicker under braking from 100-0. Call that about a second from a typical track top speed to a typical track cornering speed, and it can be seen why bikes often fail to live up to the lap times you'd expect round a race track, especially tight race tracks with lots of braking involved.
I've got limited experience of riding bikes, but I was always under the impression their stopping distances were significantly greater.
Brake discs are remarkably good at dissipating energy, so pretty soon it comes down to your ability to grip the road and of ocurse, not go over the front wheel(s). I know in theory the size of the contact patch doesn't matter, but I'm sure once you've put contact patch distortion and heat dissipation into the equation four bit fat tyres will grip better than two small (cambered) ones.
Brake discs are remarkably good at dissipating energy, so pretty soon it comes down to your ability to grip the road and of ocurse, not go over the front wheel(s). I know in theory the size of the contact patch doesn't matter, but I'm sure once you've put contact patch distortion and heat dissipation into the equation four bit fat tyres will grip better than two small (cambered) ones.
I think that the variance between bikes is quite large. My old Sprint ST had a crap rear brake (as in totally useless), and the front would lock up if heaved on. My new ('03) BMW has servo-assisted ABS, and with BMW's clever suspension there's not much diving going on. It stops like no bike I've ever ridden, much more like a car really. With that system on a lighter bike (K1200S?) it would be, as the Yanks say, awesome.
Ian
Ian
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