Efficiency
The numbers in this section apply to the efficiency of the drive-train, including means of transmission and any gearing system. In this context efficiency is concerned with how much power is delivered to the wheel compared with how much power is put into the pedals. For a well-maintained transmission system, efficiency is generally between 86% and 99%, as detailed below.
Factors besides gearing which affect performance include rolling resistance and air resistance:
- Rolling resistance can vary by a factor of 10 or more depending on type and dimensions of tire and the tire pressure.
- Air resistance increases greatly as speed increases and is the most significant factor at speeds above 10 to 12 miles (15 to 20 km) per hour (the drag force increases in proportion to the square of the speed, thus the power required to overcome it increases in proportion to the cube of the speed).
Human factors can also be significant. Rohloff demonstrates that overall efficiency can be improved in some cases by using a slightly less efficient gear ratio when this leads to greater human efficiency (in converting food to pedal power) because a more effective pedalling speed is being used.
Read more about this topic: Bicycle Gearing
Famous quotes containing the word efficiency:
““Never hug and kiss your children! Mother love may make your children’s infancy unhappy and prevent them from pursuing a career or getting married!” That’s total hogwash, of course. But it shows on extreme example of what state-of-the-art “scientific” parenting was supposed to be in early twentieth-century America. After all, that was the heyday of efficiency experts, time-and-motion studies, and the like.”
—Lawrence Kutner (20th century)
“Nothing comes to pass in nature, which can be set down to a flaw therein; for nature is always the same and everywhere one and the same in her efficiency and power of action; that is, nature’s laws and ordinances whereby all things come to pass and change from one form to another, are everywhere and always; so that there should be one and the same method of understanding the nature of all things whatsoever, namely, through nature’s universal laws and rules.”
—Baruch (Benedict)
“I’ll take fifty percent efficiency to get one hundred percent loyalty.”
—Samuel Goldwyn (1882–1974)