What is the purpose of steering damper? | News

The steering damper that fast people usually use …… seems to be.
It’s also on motoGP machines, and it’s standard equipment on high-powered bikes.If only I could put that thing on, I’d be …… duh.

If you are a speed supremacist or have had a scary experience with a bruising steering wheel, you may have considered purchasing a steering damper.
Even more so if you have experienced a fall.

Shh!
To be honest, it takes a lot of courage to invest tens of thousands of yen in something you don’t really understand.

WebiQ is here to bring you a little happiness and motorcycle knowledge.
In this article, I will explain about steering damper, which is a custom part that works very well and sometimes too well.

What is a steering damper?

Some vehicles are standard equipment from the start, the manufacturerDevice that suppresses unwanted steering movementIt is.

A motorcycle is basically a vehicle in which you should not put any force on the handlebars and leave them to automatically turn off according to the movement of the body and road surface.
The steering of a motorcycle is different from that of a four-wheeled vehicle, which turns by turning the handlebars (or, to put it another way, by deliberately adding a slip angle), and which turns by leaning the body (or, to put it another way, by turning inward with camber thrust). The steering of a motorcycle is designed to cut only as much as necessary so as not to interfere with the “force to turn” generated by the two wheels.

However, this free movement of the steering wheel can swing from side to side at any moment, and in severe cases, the body of the bike can swing enough to shake the rider off.
Wobble is when the swing of the steering wheel affects the body of the car.It’s extremely difficult to turn or go straight.So we have no choice but to wait for the wobble to subside.

That’s not good enough for me.The role of the steering damper is to hold back the violent steering wheel.
Ideally, the steering wheel should be able to turn left and right without resistance, but when it deviates from the ideal, the device is designed to stop the steering wheel before it goes out of control.

Basically, aftermarket steering dampers are general-purpose products, and even car-specific products have only car-specific mounting stays and brackets.
General-purpose products are difficult to install.The steering damper is designed to make it easier to install.

Rear shocks and other dampers have different settings for each model of car, but steering dampers have no difference in settings, and dampers of the same brand are usually interchangeable.

What kind of structure is it?

As the name “damper” implies, it has a structure in which oil is sealed inside and the resistance generated when the piston moves dampens the movement of the handle.

Even if you already have a steering damper, you may not be aware of it, but as it is a damper, it heats up when it generates damping force.
After the race.It’s so hot you can’t hold it in your hand.It can happen!

Now, heat also means that oil in the damper expands.
If the volume of the expanded oil is not absorbed somewhere, the oil will leak and spurt out as much as it expands, so an air chamber is provided to absorb the volume change of the oil.

represented by Ohlins.High-grade dampers have independent air chambersSome shocks have a separate reservoir tank like the rear shock.

Low cost dampers do not have a separate air chamber, but instead do not fill the damper completely with oil, and therefore do not have a separate air chamber.It’s deliberately laced with air.
If you buy a new one and it’s chewing air when you stroke it and making a clunking noise, it’s not because it’s defective.such a designIt is.

There are also two main types of damping force depending on where it is generated.
There are two types of dampers: one with a small passage for oil to pass through the piston as it strokes, and the other with no oil passage in the piston and damping in the middle of the circulating oil passage.
The former is mainly used for low-end products, while the latter is mainly used for high-end products.
In some cases, the latter is differentiated by calling it a twin-tube or twin-tube type.

Why do I have to wear it? How does it work?

As I mentioned at the beginning, a motorcycle is basically a vehicle in which you don’t put any force on the handlebars and leave them to automatically turn off as the body and road surface move.

However, if the front load is released coming out of a corner, the steering wheel may swing violently.
This is an unavoidable part of the bike’s characteristics.
I can steer the car so that it balances the direction of the turn against the lean of the body.Depending on the situation, the actual ground contact point of the tire and the ground contact point that should be balanced are significantly different.There are moments.
For example, when the car is leaning at the exit of a corner and the front tire rises slightly.

When this happens, the bike will automatically try to move the ground contact point of the tyre to find the optimum balance point, resulting in a sudden loss of steering.
Commonly known as kickbacks.
In addition, the movement of the handle to move it to the balance point is so quick that inertia may be attached to it and it may jump over the balance point.

Inertia causes too much cutting → In order to return the excessive ground point to the balance point again, this time cutting in the opposite direction → Inertia causes too much cutting again ……, and this can be repeated at a great speed.
The steering wheel swings violently from side to side.Very scary: ……

Even if you don’t go to wheelies, you may lose your balance if the load is removed from the front tire under acceleration.
This is the bike trying to correct the point where the front tire touches the ground, which is different from the point where it should be balanced.
The role of the steering damper is to damp this vibration so that the vehicle does not swing violently.

Also, it’s purelyThey look so cool with them on!This is important!
It’s easy to look like an idiot when you say you’re cool, but you’re not.
Coolness is part of performance and is very importantThis is my theory.

It’s hard to say what’s cool for each person, but for those who love racing or mechanical appearance, steering damper is the embodiment of their longing, so it should be worth it!

Will it pass inspection?

Even with the steering damper installed.It’ll pass inspection.

Dada! You may not jump out of the vehicle body.
It will not pass if the overall width changes or if it is considered a projection.

Any tips for installation?

First of all, it’s important.
Damper to the body.Securely and firmly fixedIt is necessary to

The purpose of the device is to control the swinging handlebar, but it is useless if the installation is wobbly or if the stay is not rigid enough so that it “bends”.
Car model specific kits are fine as they take this area into consideration (they are supposed to be mounted stiffly with tough machined aluminum stays), but be careful when mounting a generic product with generic stays.

In the case of dampers that do not have a separate air chamber (most inexpensive dampers have this structure), the piston in the damper can be moved without touching the air inside.Keep the air collected at the top of the tube.You need.
Otherwise, when the steering wheel is turned, air bubbles will be mixed in the oil passage, which should produce damping force, and the effect will change.
(Air has less resistance than oil, so the damper will be weaker than you set.)

For this reason, instead of horizontalWhen viewed from the side.Attach at an angle.You need.

The amount of damper stroke changes drastically depending on how and where the damper is mounted.Buy a damper with the correct stroke volume for your vehicle.It is also important to
“Where and at what angle should it be mounted? using a ruler and so on, andMeasure the required stroke volume in advance.That’s very important!
If the stroke is too large, the damper body becomes too long and jumps out when the steering wheel is turned, and if the stroke is too short, the steering wheel cannot be turned to the end, which is very dangerous.
especiallyLack of stroke is a no-no absolute.

Disadvantages.

The ideal steering wheel is supposed to be free to move.The biggest disadvantage is that they dare not move.It is.

When you tighten the damper, it is the same as putting force on the steering wheel, so it is difficult to turn at a normal intersection where the steering wheel does not swing.
At best, it has a “calm and stable handling”, but in other words, it does not move lightly.

In addition, some dampers produce very high damping force (some become so hard that they cannot be moved by hand).If you turn it up to the max, the steering wheel really stops moving and you can’t turn at all.There are some things.

In fact, I’ve seen a number of cases where the damper was set to the strongest setting by a prankster while parked, and the car crashed as soon as it started.
It is that dangerous to regulate the movement of the steering wheel carelessly.

A motorcycle can’t turn if it can’t steer.
If the handlebars were held in place by mere bars instead of steering dampers, the bike would not turn at all, no matter how hard you rolled it.
On the contrary, you can’t balance yourself with the steering wheel, so you can’t balance yourself when going straight and you will fall down immediately.

It interferes with your natural movement. Is that okay?

As mentioned above, the natural movement of the steering wheel being cut is prevented by theNot good.

But even so…It’s not like the handlebars are shaking unexpectedly.Not better.Therefore, it is ideal to be able to suppress only that unnecessary movement.
So the damper is as far as the steering wheel will go without swinging.The weaker the better.It is.
In extreme cases, no steering damper is ideal.

As you can see, it’s not something that you can just put on, and it’s not something that will make you run faster.

The kits that are available from famous brands are designed to avoid such a situation.
So, the recommended manufacturers are popular brands.

The most popular brands are Ohlins, Matris, Hyperpro, and Bitubo for the high priced ones, and NHK and Daytona for the low priced ones.

The story of a special case tends to get bigger.

It’s a component that works in a very specific situation, where “the steering wheel swings (due to heavy driving, etc.)”, so there are many stories about special applications and special situations.
For example, tightening it so hard to keep the steering wheel from cutting in when braking! What a story!

The above example is a story I actually heard as a request from a famous international A class rider, but it is a special case and it just happens that the rider can get a better time by doing so.

Because these special cases are special, they tend to be talked about in isolation, and it tends to be said that to drive fast, it is better to tighten the steadiest to prevent the steering wheel from swinging.
It’s just that there are such riders, so you shouldn’t imitate them easily.

The author is a steering damper denier and would remove the standard steering damper.

最近は車のステアリングダンパーも流行っているが・・・

流行っていると言ってもバイクのステアリングダンパーのように本格的なオイルダンパーをステアリング系に装備するハードな物はジムニーくらいで（非常に険しい地形を進むクロスカントリー用途で発生する急激なキックバックを抑えるため）、
一般的に流行っているのはステアリングホイールの中に「ある程度自由に動く重り」を入れる構造の物です。
It is a type of mass damper and aims to reduce fine vibrations that move from side to side.
I guess the trend started when Toyota adopted it as a genuine product.

Mass dampers do not physically restrict operation like motorcycles do, so it is not possible to say “steering damper for cars is 00, so it must be 00 for motorcycles too! It is not true that “steering damper for car is 0, so it must be 0 for motorcycle”.
Just because his name is Steering Damper.Different aims, different objectives, different structures.It is.

In the first place, the meaning is different from a car that “turns forcibly” by turning the steering wheel, and a motorcycle that “turns automatically as much as necessary” for the body of the car that tries to turn.
Please note that if you think they are the same thing and refer to the article about the car, you will not get the story.