Podcast: Dave Weagle – Ride Dynamics, Missleading Geometry-charts and Linkage forks – Part 1 of 2

If you are somewhat interested in bikes, you are aware of the name Dave Weagle. His initials can be found on many frames from different brands. DW – a logo which stands for decades of tinkering about numbers. Numbers which describe somewhat the ride dynamics of a two wheeled vehicle: The bicycle. In this episode of the TESTPILOT Podcast, we dive head first into the rabbit hole of the science behind bikes. The complexity and flaws of models, which may or may not be able to describe what we feel on the trail.

You may have noticed that some bikes pedal better or easier up the mountain. Some wallow more, some less. Efficiency differs. Why is that? In mountain biking on full suspension bikes, we deal with kinematics and these affect the behavior of the bike on the trail. How we can put power in and how much we get out. Antisquat is the magic word, which describes a counterforce, which is generated via your chain and a specific placement of the pivot points of your bike's suspension design. Newton’s laws may ring a bell. The internet is full of sites explaining the term. If this is news to you, you may want to spend some time first scratching the surface of it, before listening to this podcast.

In this podcast, Dave and Jens talk about not only antisquat, but the overall ride dynamics of a full suspension mountain bike. While we humans love simple answers, we also easily get carried away with cramping these answers in numbers. But bikes are complex regarding what's going on the trail. There are no easy formulas to decide what is better, or just more or less of anything might be superior. Forces from 3 dimensions work not only the suspension. The frame material, tires, wheels, spokes … Everything is flexing and working together. Dave describes the design process of a bike as baking a cake, which is kind of a pretty darn good fitting analogy. 

There is some aftermath of hurricane Helene, which resulted in a blackout during our recording. The second episode of this podcast can be found here. Make sure you subscribe to it, to not miss it. We will dive even deeper into the rabbit hole of wonderland.

CAUTION: This podcast may change your view on how you interpret numbers for kinematics and geometry of a bike. You may become a handful in after-ride-discussions with your buddies about which bike performs how and why. Welcome to the nerd side of bikes.