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Comment by Irregardless | Hacker News Reader

> One of the most common accidents for motorcyclists is falling while turning a corner.

Yes, due to loss of traction or excessive cornering speed. But those are both issues inherent to two-wheeled vehicles, and adding gyroscopes won't solve either.

So you gain the ability to ride in the rain without wearing rain gear, but you give up cargo space and visibility. Not to mention the fact that your head will now be in the perfect position to get rammed by a bumper, and the lower profile increases the likelihood that other drivers won't see you.

It's a nifty trick, but I don't see who this would appeal to. Most motorcyclists already have rain-proof gear, and non-motorcyclists will still think it's a death trap.

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I'll address the possible appeal as a diehard daily motorcycle commuter; from 110f down to 20f, anything except ice and snow.

I invested in a decent sport touring bike with ABS and heated grips, plus riding gear. Yes it's warm and dry. There is some irritation where it takes a few minutes to put on all the gear (pants, boots, jacket, gloves, ear plugs, neck gator if cold, and helmet) over work clothes, take them off at work, repeat on the way home. Cargo can be an irritation, needing tying down. A bag of groceries or case of cans is okay but not much more. I need a better way to carry a laptop. Yes, I dropped the bike once, sudden braking at a stop sign. Yes, it's pretty common.

So an enclosed gyro vehicle would improve these issues for me: convenience and cargo. The tippy thing is a minor plus.

The downside: it takes away most of the fun of a bike. The fun is hard to qualify but it involves being outside, connected to the machine, shifting, leaning, braking, and in general micromanaging your outcome.

Am I likely to get one as a commuter? Maybe. A Miyata or Mini would fill a similar bill and buy more utility.

At least it still leans the right way! I think a big part of their pitch was fuel efficiency too, in theory you can get the weight pretty low, although you'll still be in goldwing territory. Also, hard luggage helps a bit on the bike too, but I still spend all winter getting dressed.

My thoughts exactly. Staying balanced on a motorcycle isn't even on the list of things that are dangerous about riding one. Once you get over about 10 mph, it's impossible to fall off one.

That's not exactly true, learning to corner properly on a motorcycle is probably the toughest skill to master. That being said, if you ride conservatively you can do just fine with only a little practice.

But yea, the most dangerous part of riding a bike, once you have even just a few months experience, is the other cars on the road (most of whom don't see you).

Yeah. My point is that balance isn't an issue on a bike. The rider might not be able to hold on, but a bike is perfectly capable of keeping itself upright. Sometimes even to the detriment of the rider.

Low speed accidents where a rider drops a bike isn't enough of a concern to design something like this, so I'm ignoring those for the above statement.

Yeah. I've dropped my bikes three times over 20 years -- every time was at less than 10mph.

> But those are both issues inherent to two-wheeled vehicles, and adding gyroscopes won't solve either.

Did you see the part of the video where they pulled the bike sideways with another vehicle and the gyros kept it upright? If the gyro tech they're using is good enough then the issues you mention are exactly what it will solve. The project still seems to be in its infancy though. They need an investor to come in with some money so they can build more test machines and destroy them with high-speed cornering on slick surfaces and side impacts from larger vehicles.

Are you saying their bike will regain traction in a high speed turn by maintaining the lean angle? It'd be interesting to see how it handles that situation, because it would result in a pretty violent high-side on a normal motorcycle.

In that pull test the straps were attached to the bike below its center of gravity. Regaining traction in a turn would be like pulling it with the straps near the top instead, and it could cause some serious problems if the person inside isn't wearing a helmet when that happens at high speed.

You seem to be stuck with the idea that this would be like correcting a traditional motorcycle in a bad turn. This is not a human knee-jerk reaction to overcorrect we're talking about, it's a computer that is constantly making minor corrections on a very short interval, before, during and after the corner. The bike never gets that far out of balance, so there is no violent high-side.

It would maintain traction by not laying down and skipping across the pavement, keeping rubber against asphalt (likely to be better in the traction department than plastic/metal against asphalt). If the tech works properly the bike would slide in a fast corner similar to a car in the same situation.

I still think the project is really young, and their reported 2013 release date is super optimistic. This machine needs a lot more testing before it can be unleashed upon the roads.

Yes, but you still run wide into oncoming traffic or into that tree. It's not the laying down/sliding that kills you, it's the sudden stop.

I think it's rather telling the video doesn't show it negotiating a corner at a lean angle. Presumably that's quite a problem.

Having said all that, whereas I doubt I'd buy one as a motorcyclist, I might be tempted as a commuter if the price was reasonable (which, to be honest, it isn't).

> I think it's rather telling the video doesn't show it negotiating a corner at a lean angle. Presumably that's quite a problem.

I would expect that it is eventually intended that it leans in a corner, it would just require a controlled reorientation of the gyroscopes, it looks as if they're mounted on gimbals already (to provide reactive counterbalance to any attempt to disorient it). I'm just guessing they need more money/time to research and engineer the right control system to handle the right gyro control for the measured lean based on data from accelerometers.

I can't see why you'd have a profiled (i.e. not flat) rear tyre if it was going to remain upright all of the time.

If they did engineer it to lean then I'd love the chance to terrify myself going down the Corkscrew at Laguna Seca on it...

Running corners too wide into oncoming traffic or trees is a concern, but not more than with cars, etc. If you're driving too fast, you're driving too fast. I don't see that it's more of a concern with this vehicle.

I assumed the same as you that cornering is still a problem since they didn't show it in the video. I think this project still needs a lot of work. The same project was on HN a couple of months ago and it was really no different except for the slightly more polished exterior. Basically they showed that gyros can keep a 2 wheel vehicle upright, but we haven't seen the thing in motion at all. This is why I think 2013 is way too optimistic for a release.

The price does seem a bit high, but it should come down over time.

I think high-siding happens when you, as the rider, try to correct, and end up over-correcting, for the soon to be low-side (you do get a choice at some point to push the bike into a "safer" low side and crash or risk the high side and maybe crash). From what is almost no grip comes massive grip. Over-correcting causes that excess momentum to swing the bike full up and sending you on a short trip in the air to finally make contact with the really hard ground.

I've done this a few times and did the over-correction thing helping me realize just how hard the ground really is (only on the race track - never on the road).

I do think a computer could monitor grip to a much finer accuracy and save the bike from a potential low side. In fact, with the electric motor, the computer could even adjust the spin rate, and thus angular momentum, of the wheels if need be.

A high-side requires chopping the throttle, maintaining lean angle and speed let the bike slide around the outside, and it won't regain traction until the rear is back in line. You can watch the pros drift corners all the time like that.

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