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Tilting three-wheeler
A tilting three-wheeler, tilting trike, leaning trike, or even just tilter, is a three-wheeled vehicle and usually a narrow-track vehicle whose body and or wheels tilt in the direction of a turn. Such vehicles can corner without rolling over despite having a narrow axle track because they can balance some or all of the roll moment caused by centripetal acceleration with an opposite roll moment caused by gravity, as bicycles and motorcycles do. This also reduces the lateral acceleration experienced by the rider, which some find more comfortable than the alternative. The narrow profile can result in reduced aerodynamic drag and increased fuel efficiency. These types of vehicles have also been described as "man-wide vehicles" (MWV).
As with tricycles that do not tilt, there are a variety of feasible choices of how the wheels are arranged, which wheels are steered, and which wheels are driven. In addition, there are a variety of feasible choices for which wheels tilt and which do not.
Because this is an emerging field with many different vehicle configurations, many different individual contributors, and not yet any clearly dominant technology, there is a great deal of potentially confusing terminology in use:
The potential benefits of tilting, compared to the rigid alternative, include:
The drawbacks of tilting, compared to the rigid alternative, include:
As with tricycles in general, the two main wheel layouts are:
Twinned Wheel Rule: In many countries aligned to EU regulations, an arrangement of two wheels on the same axle [not necessarily maintained co-axial], is treated as one wheel provided they are spaced no further apart than 460 mm (18 in) between contact patch centers. This has the effect of allowing vehicles complying with this dimensional limit to be classified as motorcycles. Therefore, such vehicles would be subject to all the technical prescriptions applicable to motorcycles rather than motorised tricycles or four-wheeled vehicles.
Rear-wheel steering tends to be directionally unstable, and so the vast majority of trikes employ front-wheel steering. A notable exception is the Toyota i-Road. In the case of two wheel steering, some accommodation is usually made to account for the different radii of their paths, such as Ackermann steering geometry.
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Tilting three-wheeler AI simulator
(@Tilting three-wheeler_simulator)
Tilting three-wheeler
A tilting three-wheeler, tilting trike, leaning trike, or even just tilter, is a three-wheeled vehicle and usually a narrow-track vehicle whose body and or wheels tilt in the direction of a turn. Such vehicles can corner without rolling over despite having a narrow axle track because they can balance some or all of the roll moment caused by centripetal acceleration with an opposite roll moment caused by gravity, as bicycles and motorcycles do. This also reduces the lateral acceleration experienced by the rider, which some find more comfortable than the alternative. The narrow profile can result in reduced aerodynamic drag and increased fuel efficiency. These types of vehicles have also been described as "man-wide vehicles" (MWV).
As with tricycles that do not tilt, there are a variety of feasible choices of how the wheels are arranged, which wheels are steered, and which wheels are driven. In addition, there are a variety of feasible choices for which wheels tilt and which do not.
Because this is an emerging field with many different vehicle configurations, many different individual contributors, and not yet any clearly dominant technology, there is a great deal of potentially confusing terminology in use:
The potential benefits of tilting, compared to the rigid alternative, include:
The drawbacks of tilting, compared to the rigid alternative, include:
As with tricycles in general, the two main wheel layouts are:
Twinned Wheel Rule: In many countries aligned to EU regulations, an arrangement of two wheels on the same axle [not necessarily maintained co-axial], is treated as one wheel provided they are spaced no further apart than 460 mm (18 in) between contact patch centers. This has the effect of allowing vehicles complying with this dimensional limit to be classified as motorcycles. Therefore, such vehicles would be subject to all the technical prescriptions applicable to motorcycles rather than motorised tricycles or four-wheeled vehicles.
Rear-wheel steering tends to be directionally unstable, and so the vast majority of trikes employ front-wheel steering. A notable exception is the Toyota i-Road. In the case of two wheel steering, some accommodation is usually made to account for the different radii of their paths, such as Ackermann steering geometry.