Re: Motorcycle Steering

["Michael N. Monce" <mnmon@conncoll.edu>]

On Fri, 3 Jan 1997, David Thiessen wrote:

> NO ILLUSIONS -=>  Should I respond (in a letter) to the articles mentioned
> above, I have no illusions that more than just a few readers would
> understand what I was talking (or torquing) about.  My order of magnitude
> estimation of the fraction of readers who would understand the correct
> physics of "counter-steering" is 10^-3.


	Sure, why not?  If nothing else it will inform the writers and
editors that they must take into account that there may be readers who
understand the situation better than they do.  I have written similar
letters (just last month most recently) to golf magazines which often get
the physics jumbled.  e.g. "The most influential variables are the
clubhead's force and how efficiently that force is transferred to the
ball."  (USGS Player, Nov/Dec. 1996)  They go on to say since force is
mass times acceleration, one must change the speed of the club quickly in
order that the club have a large force available to transfer to the
ball....sigh.

				Mike Monce
				Connecticut College