Reconstructions of accidents involving motorcycles are often more complex than typical car collisions. A motorcycle together with its rider constitutes a system of two masses, and with a passenger – three. Consequently, it is often impossible to apply typical calculation methods based on the principle of conservation of momentum for two masses.Additionally, it is very often the case that the movement of a motorcycle cannot be considered as a typical planar motion, and such motion is assumed in most software used to support road accident reconstruction.
The described case was not very complex in terms of analysis. The main problem lay in the sparse evidence and the lack of comparative material for analyzing the motorcycle’s movement upon contact with a hedge.
RECONSTRUCTION OF A MOTORCYCLE ACCIDENT
The reconstruction of a motorcycle accident is more complicated than a reconstruction of a car accident. This is because a motorcycle with the motorcyclist are comprising a dynamic system with two mass-centers, or three if there is a passenger involved. Because of this setup one cannot utilize standard dynamics calculation methodology based on the principle of the two mass momentum conservation – the motorcycle movement cannot be described as a plane motion, which is by default used in most of the accident reconstruction software.
This paper describes a reconstruction of a motorcycle accident and extra steps needed vs the analysis of a car accident.
Although calculation involved in the analysis of the given motorcycle accident was not particularly complicated, the main problem was poor accident documentation and lack of comparable data describing the case of a motorcycle hitting a hedge. (…)
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Source: Logistyka Magazine
Reconstruction of a motorcycle accident – PDF file for download