Ducati Sporting Club UK > Model Specific - Discussion, Technical Problems and Help > General Motorcycles only > 2 wheel drive

[Steve M]

will it happen for road bikes
will the extra grip be worth the power used to drive the front wheel and the heavier/slower steering
will we see it on GP bikes

any thoughts ??????

[dickieducati]

dont know the ins and outs but i guess it would be quite hard to do due to the significantly different contact patches on bikes. would almost need to be variable depending if you change tyre size/compounds too.

[Steve M]

dickie - it's been developed by Ohlins and uses hydraulic fluid to drive the front wheel, the power is feed to the front when the rear starts to spin.
it's working well on off road bikes.

[BDG]

The tests i've read on the Yam WR450 really rave about two wheel drive in most circumstances, but there is a bit of a weight penalty.

[Steve M]

Ohlins two wheel drive system

[Jools]

Seems a compelling arguement for off-roaders where you need all the grip you can get, but for road bikes?

It seems to go against the conventional wisdom that since what your front wheel is doing is so vital to staying upright that you don't want to it to do anything that loads it up more than the cornering forces already have.

After all, would you even touch the front brake while you're cranked over? I don't, I'm not skilful enough to feather the front brake up to the apex. The reverse applies to putting the power on, would I want to test front end grip and traction even more by putting power down through the front? I don't think I would.

Open minded about it though, it may work even though 4 wheel drive cars tend to handle more like front wheel drive cars and can get a bit understeery, there is no doubting the effectiveness of a well driven scooby. I just can't see that logic transferring to a road bike because the cornering dynamics are totally different. You may have noticed that despite Ohlins claims for what it can do for road bike performance, they don't appear to have conclusive test results for road bikes.

[Steve M]

I think from what I read about Yamaha's tests they were only putting about 15% of the power through the front wheel (on tarmac) and only when on the throttle, by which time the front wheel has done most of it's work so the front is not loaded anymore than usual for braking or cornering. The idea being that should the back start to spin then the power will be transfered to the front reducing the spin and allowing the front to pull you through the turn rather it trying to slow down. Also once on the power the bike should be able to hold a tighter line.
It has been tested on an R1 - don't know how good it was though, but it issupposed to be good in the wet.

[Rattler]

Blimey - more gearing to get wrong!!!!

I can see it for off-road, but wait to be convinced of its use on dry tracks.

Tim