On a modern motorcycle, you have plenty of information at your disposal - engine speed, road speed, temperature, possibly even your location, if you use GPS.

However, you don’t have any information about cornering. This is especially strange as the way a bike corners is one of the unique and fundamental aspects of motorcycling. For many, it’s where the greatest pleasure lies.

For ordinary riding, this doesn’t much matter - you use your experience. However, what if you want to know more about cornering? What if you’re a track day rider who wants to improve lap times? What if you want to be smoother and more confident on the road?

Until now, advanced training has been the only way, but even this doesn’t give you actual information. We developed Leanometer specifically to do this.

Click on the tabs above for real-world uses, and more detail about cornering.

Leanometer gives you really useful information about your riding - information that you can understand, that is relevant, and presented immediately so that you can act on it. In standard SafeDisplay mode it’s completely safe too, as there is no need to look at the display until you choose to do so. And if you do miss that vital piece of information, Leanometer keeps it in memory for playback or download.

Here are a few real-world uses for road and track riders:

  • Experiment with different riding techniques
    Do you prefer to square off corners, or do you take a gradual line? You know what feels best, but now you can see exactly what you’re doing. The same goes for different tyres and suspension settings.

  • Try different lines through the same corners
    For maximum margin of safety you’re looking for the lowest lateral g figure at a given speed.

  • Body position
    For the same speed and same cornering force (lateral g), what happens to the lean angle figure when you hang off the bike? Getting this right can make you safer and quicker.

  • Throttle control...
    ...is one of the most important aspects of cornering: you can use the sidebars to see how smooth (or not!) you were with the throttle after every bend. As you become better, try increasing the display resolution of the sidebars to give you a more critical overview.

  • Find out how much you have in reserve
    Learn how much of your bike’s cornering potential you use in normal riding: you may find you ride with a lot of lean angle in reserve. When you’re confronted with something unexpected, this knowledge could be vital.
  • Use with a tank-mounted camera
    If you have a GoPro or similar you can record your ride and evaluate your cornering technique frame-by-frame afterwards. This is the safest way to use Leanometer in Live mode.

  • Use the logging function
    Analyse logged data with the PC software to gain in-depth knowledge of your cornering style. How smooth is your braking and throttle control? Do you control the weight distribution well, or are you prone to overloading the front wheel? Does the bike have enough time to settle during cornering moves?
These are just some of the ways that Leanometer can help you. Click on the tab above to find out more about what it measures.

Leanometer measures the various forces acting on the motorcycle, and uses this information to display or make further calculations. Leanometer shows:

Lateral cornering force in g
This is the force pushing the bike towards the inside of the turn. Only the grip of the tyres on the road is providing this force, so it is a measure of how hard you are cornering. As cornering force increases (or available grip decreases), the tyre will eventually break away from the road and the bike will slide. Safe, smooth riding is about minimising lateral g for a given speed, and this where good choice of cornering line is invaluable.

Lateral g is displayed in graphic steps, each one being 0.1G by default.

Frame Lean Angle in degrees
This is the angle between a vertical line and the centreline of the motorcycle. To counteract the centrifugal force in a corner, you instinctively move the weight of the motorcycle to the inside. However, the motorcycle is inherently less stable when leant over, and there is a finite amount of lean angle available. Many riders move their weight to the inside of the bike in order to keep the bike more upright.

The diagram to the right shows an interesting aspect of lean angle - there are in fact two measures of it! The width of the tyre causes the lean axis to be offset, which means the frame lean will be rather greater than the ‘system’ lean angle. The wider the tyres, the greater the difference.

This has important consequences, as there is only so much available lean before something touches down, or the tyre runs out of grip. Move your mouse over the diagram to see how the rider can reduce this difference by moving body position.

Leanometer measures Frame Lean because it’s actually how far the bikes is leaning, and you can learn something from it. Note: GPS-based devices like smartphone apps cannot measure this, and only display theoretical system lean.

Frame angle is displayed numerically in whole degrees.

Deceleration force in g
This is the force along the axis of the bike created by deceleration or braking. Smooth braking is vital for keeping the bike stable at the start of a corner. Uneven, peaky braking causes a high proportion of self-inflicted road accidents.

Deceleration force is displayed in graphic bars on the left, with full scale being 1.0g.

Acceleration force in g
This is the opposite of braking. Timing and rate of acceleration are critical for safe corner exit, and this is down to throttle control.

Acceleration is displayed in graphic bars on the right, with full scale being 1.0g.