Customer Reviews

Motorcycle Design & Technology: How and Why

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book is all about the general theory behind suspension, frames, and tires. It provides a host of formulas complete with supporting graphics. Great stuff to impress your friends. What this book is not is a how-to manual for setting up a race bike, and/or resolving the likes or real world scenarios you would encounter on or off the track. The chapter on engines is mostly about vibrations, forces of rotations, and how they bolt into frames. The language conversion (Italian to English) is proper, but not smooth-often making it hard to determine if he's staying on the subject. If you want one book to learn the most from, buy Keith Cameron's Sport Bike Performance Handbook (ISBN076030229). If you have money left over, buy this one. However, this book would be a great (okay...excellent) gift item for anyone that rides street or track performance motos. By the way, it equally covers Italian, Japanese and German designs.

...don't take everything as gospel. This isn't to say Mr. Cocco doesn't know what he's talking about, as he obviously does - he just sometimes doesn't make things very clear when he's using English as opposed to Italian. Some of it is rough translation, while some of it is just shoddy editing. In particular, I think whoever edited it didn't do much math or engineering. Some of the equations themselves have typos (an explaination of an equation describes two different variables when only one exists in the equation... but twice), many of the variables aren't explained, and some equations just don't make sense (a force divided by a distance equals another force). And the chapter on aerodynamics needs to be reworked - there are a few times when downforce and lift are used interchangeably even though they're opposing each other, and since those are the key points in the chapter it makes the rest of it harder to follow.
That being said, if you just take this as basic theory and don't try to build any mathematical models or anything off it, it's an excellent source of info. Mr. Cocco is one of the best in the field and does a good job of getting fairly specific in a relatively short book. The illustrations are great in demonstrating ideas that are hard to visualize just based on his writing, and the equations, if not completely accurate/explained, give a good basic idea of how the stuff is looked at analytically. It's also nice to have a book dedicated just to describing the dynamics and forces involved. So if you're looking for anything regarding engine tuning, look elsewhere. The extent to which engines are involved here are their affects on weight transfer, CG height, etc...
If you're looking for the most difinitive and thorough explaination of the subject, get "Motorcycle Dynamics" by Vittore Cossalter. Mr. Cocco did cite Mr. Cossalter as his main scientific source, after all. But if you'd just like to get a general "so that's why that happens" idea of all the little things your bike does, this is the book for you.

This book is very interesting because it helps understanding the physical behavior of a motorcycle. However it contains many errors and imperfections. E.g.: you can't introduce a formula without explaining the meaning of all the symbols or you cannot write "a.tan" instead of "arctan". If you need a more correct and scientific book, I recommend "Cinematic & Dynamics of a Motorcycle" by Vittore Cossalter, University of Padova.

This is a good book if you want to read about the physics of motorcycles and the different technologies but it is not a design book. It has a lot of formulas (know your greek alphabet) but the math is simple. I found this book interesting but now I still need to find a book on design of motorcycles.

This book is very interesting because it helps understanding the physical behavior of a motorcycle. However it contains many errors and imperfections. E.g.: you can't introduce a formula without explaining the meaning of all the symbols or you cannot write "a.tan" instead of "arctan". If you need a more correct and scientific book, I recommend "Cinematic & Dynamics of a Motorcycle" by Vittore Cossalter, University of Padova.

Have you ever wondered why your motorcycle's handling changed from the way you intended? This book will clear up all your misconceptions and guide you towards your desired specific task. This is a book for graduate school designers, but presents information that is easily understood. This is brain food for the technicallly inclined.

I was very disappointed that the detail was so theoretical and not much practical help in tuning a motorcycle chassis. In particular front wheel patter. A very common and reoccuring problem in racing motorcycles.

The content is great for helping anyone with a moderate knowledge of math and physics understand the forces at work in motorcycle dynamics. And while most of us ride and do what we do without understanding why, this book will allow you to add the kind of knowledge that can only lead to more expert riding.

The binding of the book is tragic ... I've not completed reading the book and fully 1/3 of the pages broke loose from the binding. I'm going to have it spiral bound before finishing the book.

* Quite Impressive paper and hard cover quality.

* The right, comprehensive, well defined coverage introduction to design parameters of motorcycles(not so technological)

* Good for display on bookshelves if laid back cover toward the wall.

* Deficient count, detail and sense of realism in examples to demonstrate real world choices of variations in design parameters.

* Arithmatic Formula representations are some what vague because they invoves rather small numbers of factors.

but a must-have if one have any additional interest in mechanical side of bikes not only just riding.

This book is very interesting because it helps understanding the physical behavior of a motorcycle. However it contains many errors and imperfections. E.g.: you can't introduce a formula without explaining the meaning of all the symbols or you cannot write "a.tan" instead of "arctan". If you need a more correct and scientific book, I recommend "Cinematic & Dynamics of a Motorcycle" by Vittore Cossalter, University of Padova. (http://pdmec4.mecc.unipd.it/~cos/DINAMOTO/indexmoto.html).