Which corners faster - car or motorcycle?

[rcgldr]

Given the high C of G of bike and rider and the forces acting on the bike when braking, there will be a well-defined limit to the braking before lifting the rear wheel. Cornering isn't limited by that, as stated earlier.

That could be an issue, you do see the rear wheel getting light and hopping under heavy braking on racing motorcyles, and a lot of sport bikes can do stoppies. I'm not sure of front to back weight distribution on a racing motorcycle or sport bike. Almost all bikes can do wheelies, but I'm not sure what percentage can do stoppies. Regarding my comment about 1.5 g's under braking, I think that was deceleration from 180mph, with a lot of aerodynamic drag, it was from some video about motorcycle racing.

Getting back to the original question, all things being somewhat equal, a car will have an advantage with cornering grip, since the larger amount of contact patch area translates into a lower load factor per unit area of the tires. The bikes are faster at some race tracks because they have a higher power to weight ratio than all but the high end race cars, and they compensate for slower cornering speeds with faster speeds on the straights.

 

[rhody]

rcgldr,

Almost all bikes can do wheelies, but I'm not sure what percentage can do stoppies.

The answer is all bikes (those without ABS) and an experienced rider can do stoppies, here is a http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qaK1E6BV_0" a wheelie at 150+ in the pouring rain. I checked and it appears Ghostie is still with us, not sure if he is still up to his evil ways however, sooner or later his luck is bound to run out.

Rhody...

P.S. I found this as to the true identity of ghost rider, take it for what it is worth:

Motorcycle news recently revealed the true identity of Ghost Rider as Swedish rider Patrik Furstenhoff (a member of the Swedish Wheelie Team - SWT) when he broke the world wheelie speed record, breaking his own previous record by 14 mph to record 215 mph on one wheel!

Here is a http://www.google.com/images?hl=en&...&aq=1&aqi=g-sx1g1&aql=&oq=Patrik+Furstenhoff" to images of him, if in fact it is him, which I suspect it is because of his height, body type, which closely matches the guy in the photo to the rider in his video's.

 

[mender]

Getting back to the original question, all things being somewhat equal, a car will have an advantage with cornering grip, since the larger amount of contact patch area translates into a lower load factor per unit area of the tires.

As I said earlier, the air pressure in the tire supports the vehicle (mostly) and determines the contact patch area, found by dividing the vehicle weight by the tire pressure. If different vehicles use roughly the same tire pressures, the load/area ratio will also be the same.

The car that I take care of usually comes in at about 35 psi hot all around on the road course; I just talked to my friend and he was saying that their pressures are about the same on the front but around 25 psi on the rear.

That means that those bikes have a lower load/area ratio than the car.

 

[mender]

rcgldr,The answer is all bikes (those without ABS) and an experienced rider can do stoppies, here is a http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qaK1E6BV_0" to the current world record holder for stoppies, 137 mph, by Kane Friesen (note: Kane's parents are watching as he does this !) and one for the fastest wheelie, 214 mph by the infamous ghost rider.

Wow! That's nuts!
Uh, what're the records for an '83 RZ350? I need some reasonable goals!
Actually, no I don't 'cause as I said I race cars, not bikes!