Technical Paper
Experimental Study on Effect of Damper Lag on Motorcycle Ride Comfort
2006-11-13
2006-32-0096
Damper lag and hysteresis are important parameters affecting the dynamic response of the hydraulic shock absorbers. The response of the suspension unit to road excitation strongly influences motorcycle ride comfort. Overall ride comfort of a motorcycle, under various operating conditions, is a result of very complex system dynamics, where the damper dynamics has a major share. This makes it imperative to include damper lag as a critical parameter for ride comfort optimization. Analytical models are available to predict the dynamic behaviour of a hydraulic damper, however their ability in capturing the lag and hysteretic characteristics is limited. Capturing such dynamic phenomenon through mathematical modeling can become very intricate and involved, thus making the task of analysis and simulation of ride comfort further complex. Literature available on experimental research in establishing the effect of damper lag on overall ride comfort is found to be very limited.