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Regardless, how professional would it have been, and how confused would non-moot viewers been if RC said, “We’ll Ralph, actually.... before proceeding into a five paragraph TFS/Vital essay.”
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Pulling up on the handlebars on a dirt bike is fruitless, in comparison to a pulling up on the bars of a bicycle. Seat bouncing is in essence a Motocross technique to get the bike trajectory going upward at a steeper angle (eg., 45 degree trajectory as opposed to 35 degrees).
By sitting with hard throttle and increased traction which compresses the rear of the bike more,, you actually aim the front of the bike higher and this makes a steeper angle of attack off the face of the jump.
You go higher and further.
Gary Bailey showed us how to do this in the 80's. It does work.
Not sure how some of you guys are convinced there's no "rebound" action helping the bike go higher. It might not be a lot but it's some. It has to be more than if the suspension was soaking it up ? When the shock gets pre-loaded by bouncing on the seat it compresses and goes into the stiffer part of the travel, less "soaking up" means more "pushing off" Simple physics. It has too. Plus why would guys who can do it call it a seat bounce if the bike didn't bounce ? They don't call it "Pre-load assisted take off angle adjustment"
Anyone that wants a science lesson from Ricky, or any other rider (for the most part), on the exact science behind seat bouncing is gonna have to realize he isn’t the greatest of all time. We need to ask James Stewart.
it is not seat bounce that makes the difference. It is the hard acceleration up of the jump with all the weight on the rear wheel it makes the shock absorber collapse completely before leaving the jump and all the energy from the jump turns into airtime / distance. if you don't seat bounce but jump normally you won't comprese your suspension as much and it will absorb energy all the way up the jump
English is not my first language
Edit: Endos occur when a rider doesn’t bring the bike with him.
The last things that happens when you leave the jump face is that the shock rebounds faster then normal since you also move the weight from the seat and forward (unless you want to loop out).
Pit Row
Lots going on in a seat bounce, but the springs pushing you up isn't one of them. Or it's a negligible part at least.
The only thing you are doing with the springs in any of this, is removing their function from the equation - not using their bounce to add to it. You collapse them, so then they don't have any of their natural capacity to absorb energy left as you hit & run up your take off, so all the upwards take off force can go into your bike and make it go higher. Rather than being absorbed by the springs. Which also has a trajectory changing effect. Get your weight behind it by throwing some body english into it too and away you go, onward & upward. Throw your english the wrong way or not get your forward momentum right (a combo of trajectory & speed) & hello endo.
If you took your motorcycle and four (4) tiedowns, and compressed your bike's suspension as far as possible, and were able to simultaneously release all four tiedowns, all at once....
Will the bike leap up off the ground several inches, actually getting "air," or would the shocks just rebound the bike to its standard position?
It is a combination of loading the suspension with body position and throttle, as well as taking weight of the seat just before wheels leave the jump face and lifting the bike a bit since you move fwd in the process.
If seat bounce does not work, neither does scrubbing or absorbing suspension travel with legs since it is the direct opposite of seat bounce.
Two persons going up a jump face all things being equal, one will seat bounce I promise you that bike if going higher then the other.
Extra height is typically what you want when seat bouncing, so you don't run the front wheel to short coming into landing or next jump.
The primary cause of pneumatic tire rolling resistance is hysteresis:
A characteristic of a deformable material such that the energy of deformation is greater than the energy of recovery
You're changing the attack angle
On take off, you're changing body position, creating more forward energy/momentum
You're on the throttle, which is important, because if you chopped the throttle at that point, the forward momentum you've created would take over and make the front drop out (endo)
Angle, body position shift, throttle
The shock begins to rebound once you have left the ground, making it ineffective on any rebound "lifting" the bike up
"It is a combination of loading the suspension with body position and throttle, as well as taking weight of the seat just before wheels leave the jump face and lifting the bike a bit since you move fwd in the process."
Look at the photo of Eli, he is not taking his weight off of the seat just before the wheels leave the ground. No one seat bounces that way.
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