Data Loggers

[Superdunc]

I'm currently building up a Ducati track bike, I would like to analyse my riding a bit more so some basic form of data logger would be nice.

My Question. Is there anything on the market that will log speed revs and throttle angles that won't cost more than say £500.

Not after anything elaborate like measuring damper movement, or tyre temps.

I know there's a few people on here who know of such things.

thanks Duncan.

[RonniB]

I'm currently building up a Ducati track bike, I would like to analyse my riding a bit more so some basic form of data logger would be nice.

My Question. Is there anything on the market that will log speed revs and throttle angles that won't cost more than say £500.

Not after anything elaborate like measuring damper movement, or tyre temps.

I know there's a few people on here who know of such things.

thanks Duncan.

http://www.xtracing.com/en/gpxpro/index.php

Take a look on this, does what you want and some more for the money. A friend of mine just got one of these and seems well impressed for the money

Ronni

[Devon]

there was an article a few months ago in the mag, i will see if i can find it and pick out some of the good bits they come up with

[Mark/Foggy]

Cougar

These boys know what's what, small and good pricing.

[Superdunc]

My experience is with AIM, Marelli and MoTeC kit (which is out of your budget and will provide too much sophistication and require too much looking after) so I can't comment on the makes and models that others have reccomended.

What I can offer is some practical advice....

Ignore GPS based mapping and lap times and the like - it just creates meaningless, misleading and confusing data for the level you are operating at.

You need to recognise that data logging and interpretation is a time consuming exercise in its' own right, before you start making changes to riding style, lines, chassis set up or engine management based upon the logged data and then undersatnding the impact - +ve or -ve - the change has made. And it takes experience and understanding to know whether the data you are looking at is indicating a problem. Split sector timing or GP based track mapping is useless if you don't know what the "answer" should be before you start asking the "question".

I've seen it over and over again where teams with more money than sense and "it's shiny so we MUST have it" mentality set up loggers with anything and everything logged and then dissapear under a sea of data that is meaningless because they don't know whether 124psi peak front brake pressure at the Bombhole or being 25mm further to the left at the braking point for Druids or getting from intermediate 1 to intermediate 2 in 23.789 seconds is a good, bad or indifferent piece of information.

You need to log RPM, lambda, throttle position, front wheel speed and coolant temperature. With this data you can place the bike anywhere on the track accuratley enough (by looking at the peaks and troughs in wheel speed you can identify the apex's) and know enough about the engine and chassis performance to diagnose problems or understand where time is being lost or gained.

This level of logging and interpretation is enough to win national championships.

HTH

I thought I might hear from you on this subject Mike.

You've confirmed my reservations with GPS based systems, the rest I agree with 100%. Maybe I should confess that I have been working with data analaysis on single seater race cars for the last 6 years, so I do have a bit of an idea, and as you say if you know what your looking for you don't need a lot of info. I've seen a lot of people at a very high level using their £40,000 systems as ornaments, strain guages fitted but not plugged in, damper pots not calibrated, and one so call hotshot data engineer logging his dampers at 2hz and water and battery voltage at 100hz!

However I do understand that bikes are different. i.e with the cars the analaysis software generates a circuit map using the G sensor and wheel speed channels. Can you do this with a 3 axis g sensor on a bike or do you need a gyro ? in fact am I going to get any meaningful data from a g sensor without a gyro?

Any way I'm going to have alook at some of the stuff people have suggested. I'm sure I'll have morew Questions.

Thanks Duncan.

[David W]

I'm not being funny, but IMO you need to be going really fast and have a very good reason to have to go even faster to make this a worthwhile investment. Datalogging is great if you are good enough to be consistently hitting the same piece of tarmac on every lap but most people aren't that accurate in their riding.

[Superdunc]

I'm not being funny, but IMO you need to be going really fast and have a very good reason to have to go even faster to make this a worthwhile investment. Datalogging is great if you are good enough to be consistently hitting the same piece of tarmac on every lap but most people aren't that accurate in their riding.

Fair Comment, But at least I'll have evidence of how shit I am

I'm interested in doing this to broaden my knowledge as much improving my riding.

[Superdunc]

Thanks For the reply Mike, some useful info in there.

Re-reading my previous post I think I've mislead you with regard to my GPS and g sensor Questions.

(Note self don't post technical stuff on internet while half way through a bottle of red.)

As you say, there is no way a comercial GPS system is going to have a high enough resoloution to give any meaningful data on track position with reguard to line etc. in fact I doubt the sytems MotoGP teams use are either. On board cameras are far more useful for this anyway.

The only reason I want to be able to generate a track map is for reference when looking at the data on screen, both systems mentioned in this thread can do that.

With regards to g sensors. When I'm analysing car data I use the g sensor to see wether a driver is getting the maximum out of the tyres. i.e. if a driver is pulling X g at one corner, why are they only pulling 70%of X g at another. Is it because there is less grip or are they driving like a girl.

On a bike of course you have lean angle which buggers things up completely with lateral g. so will a maths channel generated with data from a three axis g sensor be any use?

Secondly As you've mentioned throttle application on corner exit is where a lot of time can be won an lost.

In a car How and when you apply the throttle depends on the amount of steering lock you have on, on a bike it would be how much lean angle you have.

Did you look at lean angle against throttle aplication? Again can you use a 3 axis g sensor to extrapolate this or do you need a gyro? And even then I guess it depends how far the riders leaning of the bike?

Sorry for all the questions, it's a complex subject to dicuss via a forum, and I know alot of this is getting away from budget loggers but interests me all the same.

As you say you can gain a lot from just wheel speed revs and throttle, and that is what I wil probably stick with start.

Thanks Duncan.

[Weety]

From a total beginners point of view the GPS based lap timers are rediculosly easy to use. As in turn it on and away you go. No beacons or any of that rubbish.

I use a Starlane GPS-2. Purely as a lap timer really, it has track mapping too but I agree it doesn't provide much use. Fun to piss about with though.

The next Starlane model up does all the inputs the OP mentioned:

http://www.starlane.com/vedit/15/cronometr...eter~shiftlight