How Do Bikes Stay Up? | Neil deGrasse Tyson Explains…

The tendency of a bike to balance itself is partly due to the rake of the front wheel that is, the angle at which the fork holds the wheel. I experimented with my bike by turning the front wheel completely around thereby placing the centre of the wheel directly under the handlebars. This made it practically impossible to ride. Try it!

how can they stand up?.. bikes are are Two Tired..

Have you ever done the "Ghost Bike" experiment before? What happened?

Balancing a bike without a rider has everything to do with the caster of the fork, not the center of mass.

Came as soon as I got the notification popped up and just as a convenience i was just thinking about this very topic. Amazing work startalk team keep up the good work.

Derek has an amazing video on this topic on his channel Veretasium. It explains the balancing of bicycles so well.

Actually, looking at the pictures of the bike with the counter rotating wheel, it does not have the total angular momentum cancelled out. There is no counter rotating wheel on the rear wheel, thus that will still contributes to the bikes stability.

It's the rake and trail of the front end that makes the bike stable while in motion. Draw a line from the front axle to the ground straight down, now draw a line along the angle of the forks to the ground. The angle of the forks to the ground is the rake and the point where the tire touches the ground ( the contact patch) is the trail. As long as the contact patch is behind the rake angle the bike will always self correct! The center of mass of the bike makes it more or less responsive to input. The lower the center of gravity the easier the bike is to handle, especially at high speeds.

Another fun counterintuitive thing about bikes: the weight of the rider is not actually supported by the bottom of the wheels; instead the rider is dangling from the top of the wheels. The spokes are very thin and have very little strength under compression, but they have great strength under tension.

Cool. Next, do one about how cars stand up.