My Adventures with Direct Steer w/ Torque

[Hawk]

No, it's not only the difficulty to adapt to a different set of controls (which is indeed there and takes some time to be defeated).

It's also (mostly I'd say) the fact that with DS you have no limit on the lean angle: if you keep the stick left, the bike will lean left until it falls. This does not happen without DS, the virtual rider prevents us from falling when we push fully left and we should have not.

Without DS, we push fully left and the virtual rider computes the maximum lean angle for the situation (depending on speed, grip, tire status etc) and tries to achieve this.
That's a lot easier than taking care ourselves of that task

MaX.

Oh yes Max, I agree with what your saying about the difficulty of having no lean limits.

I remember talking to Klax about this and it was said that what becomes important is learning each track visually a lot more than usual, especially the visual angles of lean at each corner must be learned simply because of the limitless lean angles. I guess this visual angle of lean will eventually become a sort of automatic second sense enabling a rider to lean into a corner with DST and mentally/visually know how far the rider can lean the bike before approaching that maximum lean angle.

For myself it would be interesting to eventually learn this way of riding to realise if this would be a more realistic feel and experience from the bike(once mastered) than the normal way of controlling GPB. But to do this will take such a radical reprogramming of my brain after spending so much time controlling GPB as we all mostly do, but I'm going to eventually give this a go... But I think the easier transition would be to learn to go fully manual first(that will be a trial in itself. Lol.  ), after mastering that, then will I give DST a serious try.

Hawk.

[Hawk]

@ Klax: A great insight(your reply #44) into your journey and trials learning DST Klax.... Nice post mate!

Hawk.

[rodney007]

I spent 20 minutes trying to simply take off in 1st gear, once I did get going I lasted 30 seconds -
Am I missing something to play this realistic mode? :-)

[HornetMaX]

Am I missing something to play this realistic mode? :-)

A hella of days of practice, most likely

MaX.

[Klax75]

Am I missing something to play this realistic mode? :-)

A hella of days of practice, most likely

MaX.

Practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, and more practice..

[Diplomat]

I spent 20 minutes trying to simply take off in 1st gear, once I did get going I lasted 30 seconds -
Am I missing something to play this realistic mode? :-)

Hey,
A few tips that weren't obvious to me at first;
- There is a roll forward and a roll backward that you can use to roll out of the pits. Trying to start anywhere but a straight is near impossible. Because you are controlling via torque, the steering will seem 'backwards' when tootling out of your pit box.
- Start on a decent four stroke. Unless you have good manual clutch control, those small displacement 2 strokes don't provide enough torque to get the bike quickly up to a stable speed.
- Using manual control of left-right lean is often more stable than trying to use steering. Most of the time I won't use any steering taking off, but use a bit of rider lean to help the bike start off in the right direction.

It also helps if you subtly hint to Piboso that a low speed balance assist would be very nice. 

Cheers,
Si

EDIT: And ride like your grandmother. That helps a lot.

[Klax75]

Your handle bars will react opposite when standing still. On Victora since I use a Manaul Clutch I always walk the bike out of the garage and turn towards pit exit then I put it in gear and go.

For me when doing turns, I lean my rider, which does pull the bike that direction. Then steer toward that direction, once I get my turn again, I start turning the opposite way to hold the bike at that angle. Also when you first make your turn in, the bike will start to fall, let it fall to help get the turn angle you want. Then use throttle to slow down the fall, the opposite steer the handle bars.

I do the majority of DST practice on the 500cc. I can rider on all the bikes but usually use the 500cc

[Diplomat]

A challenge for all the non-Klax riders out there; I did a 2:01.187 at Victoria with the standard GP1000. I'm sure someone could beat that with a few laps of practice.

The whole 'turning the bars into the corner' to keep the bike from falling into the turn feels pretty strange, and completely unlike I've experienced riding my bike in real life (never been on a track).
Through the powers of google, though, it looks like this is a real thing;
http://www.msgroup.org/Tip.aspx?Num=256 (Second half of that page)

Si

[BOBR6 84]

simple way of discribing counter steer..

sit on your bike! with your right hand put pressure on the right handlebar pushing away from you! (so the bars and front wheel turn left) notice the bike will want to lean/tip to the right..

has the same effect when riding along.. can help pick the bike up coming out of corners too by applying pressure on the left bar!

i think that sub-conciously happens anyway as you move your body around..

[HornetMaX]

It's just amazing how many riders do not know about counter steering. Just proves that the current training and exams for a bike license are mostly rubbish.

Wanna try countersteering ? Take a big parking, run your bike at 40-50Kmh and give a push to the handlebars so that they rotate left (push with your right hand). Then look at where your bike goes ...

MaX.

[Warlock]

It's just amazing how many riders do not know about counter steering.

MaX.

Indeed, i think is something so intuitive when you ride that most people don't even notice it. I have had heavy discussions with people that have been riding R bikes for years trying to convince them that they turn right for a left lean. Theyr reply was like :"WHAT !! are you crazy !!??  , you are gonna kill yourself !"   lol 

[Klax75]

More DST Practice. Here is 4 Laps around Assen on the new M1. With a big high side at the end. lol Also using a brighter sun light source on the track.


DST Yamaha M1 4 laps around Assen:
http://www.youtube.com/v/NwEbymfo1DQ

[Klax75]

DST Practice Videos.


DST Croft Aprilia RSV4:
http://www.youtube.com/v/N0RmvYpWohs


DST Silverstone Ducati 996R:
http://www.youtube.com/v/AlnNFHDCjjE

[rodney007]

Does the bike have resistance at max lean angle? or does it feel like it will drop if you counter-steer anymore?

[Klax75]

I'm not a very technical person so I'll try my best to answer.

When I have it as far as I think it can go without falling over. The front wheel will shake, not the violent wobble, but a kind of shake.  It doesn't really feel like it will fall over if I counter steer to much. But the throttle and counter steering your doing constant adjustments. To much throttle the back whips out from behind you and you fall, to little and you lose to much speed and then you fall. That's on the 1000cc, with the 500cc, the fairings hit the ground first. You might get a little shake in the front wheel but usually the fairing is scrapping first. With the 125cc you have to try to hit the turn fast, since it doesn't have the power to help you lift the bike when using the throttle. The 250cc has more power and it helps you more with the throttle. The 125cc, and 250cc with DST you have to be gentle with the steering they want to turn fast and lean fast. Have to be smoother with the turning and counter steering. The 1000cc, 600cc, and 500cc they feel a lot heavier when giving steering input.

With Beta 5b the tires feel a lot better. With DST and Beta 4b, the more I lean the bike over the less it felt like the tires were grabbing the tarmac. With Beta 5b, when you are leaning really far you still feel like there is grip when hitting the throttle. Not as much as a shall lean but way more then beta 4b.

The brakes in Beta 5b feel better too in DST. You can take a turn using the front brake with a lot more confidence. Where as in Beta 4b you feel like your tires had virtually no grip when leaning and where just sliding a long. This is where Default Steering the virtual rider made up for that. I very rarely ever use the rear brake, if I try to use it in a turn the bike falls over. This could just be me, so I don't really use the rear brake, maybe in a straight. The front brake in Beta 5b catches more when turning and makes you feel like you still have control. If you hit the front brake to hard the bike will want to lift up. Which in some hair pins is nice. But if you are really have on the front brake it will try to lift for a second then fall over. Won't lift to standing completely if you loose to much speed. Or you lose the back since the back wants to go faster then the front. lol

Hope that make sense?