Isn’t something being overlooked?
Below a certain speed, depending on the vehicle, ‘normal’ steering is required (turn the handlebars in the direction you wish to turn). Above the transition speed, generally five to fifteen mph, ‘counter-steering’ is required.
Bicycles or motorcycles? Or both?
With bicycles, it’s more a matter of turning the wheels in conjunction with leaning in the direction you want to go. Countersteering is nil. Motorcycles are a different matter.
Let me try that again.
At low speeds, you have low momentum. Thus if you just lean to the right, you shift your center of weight off to the side of the line of the wheels. You don’t have the inertia to pull you upright again. Your turn requires a lot of wheel movement and a little lean.
At higher speeds, you have more momentum. That momentum is trying to pull you upright again, so you lean in the direction you want to turn. You also turn the wheels. With positive trail, the wheels will want to turn in the correct direction automatically.
With motorcycles, however, as your speed increases, angular momentum of the wheels wants to keep you upright, and leaning doesn’t work well. Instead, you countersteer, which forces the bike to lean the direction you want to go, then steer back as you lean in that direction. To complete the turn, you lean back upright as your momentum pulls the motorcycle up, and you straighten the wheels. Again, the faster you are going, the more angular momentum the wheels have, and thus the harder it is to turn unless you countersteer first.
Also, if you want to pratice, you can ‘flick’ the bike to the left or right of an small obstruction without really turning much. Your upper body will travel in a fairly straingt line. Low CG bikes do better than tall / high bikles.
Tha actual track of the bike will be, say to the left a foot or so, then back to the right past center line of travel just a bit before you recenter under you. Works good on 6-12 inch chuck holes that appear like magic from under cars ahead of you in city traffic.
see this link for more on this
Irishman, I’m a bicycle rider, not a motorcycle rider, and I can definitely state that I use countersteering, for the reason explained by waterj2. Years ago, I wasn’t aware of countersteering, and found that turns were difficult (I would never turn sharply enough). Since I’ve been aware of countersteering, I can make snappy, sharp turns on my bike.
It’s true that as speed increases, the angular momentum (gyroscopic precession) effect increases, but countersteering still applies at all speeds because of the shifting CG effect.