Calibrating (correcting) a Motorcycle Speedometer

Data Analysis Report

Name: Krittiya Sagaekhao (Gift)

Purpose
Motorcycles and cars show their speed using speedometers. These devices are factory calibrated, but
how do you know if they don’t lie to you (i.e. show you the wrong speeds)? In fact, most of the
speedometers will overestimate the speed that you are going with (show you higher speed than it really
is), primarily for legal liability reasons.

As the owner (me) of the Honda CRF250L doesn’t believe its speedometer, he hired you to ​develop a
recipe for correcting its readings​. Previous research team, fired for procrastinating, has recorded ​a
short video that compares the motorcycle speedometer readings with the speed reported by the GPS
unit as the bike drives at different speeds

To help you do the analysis the please note these suggestions:

● Motorbike speedometer may be inaccurate, but its readings are almost instantaneous (i.e. there
is no delay).
● GPS-reported speeds are much more accurate (assume they show the true speed), but they
suffer from the ​delay as the motorcycle accelerates - they need a few seconds as the motorcycle
accelerates to catch up (show you the actual speed).
● You need to analyse the video intelligently and carefully and extract a set of at least 10 different
data pairs spanning a range of speeds.
● You need to plot the scatterplot of GPS (true) speeds vs. Speedometer speeds. You’re welcome
to do it by hand, but computers are better at that (see the set of carefully-selected data ​analysis
tools​ selected for you at RyzykFizyk.com for your convenience)
● You need to look at the plot, see what kind of relationship it shows (e.g. linear, exponential,
logarithmic) and then plot the best fit line through it.
● If the relationship is linear, deduce the equation of it - this is your recipe for speedometer
correction.
Data Summary and Reduction
Please insert a properly designed data table of measurements that you’ve extracted from the video. It
needs to include at least 10 carefully selected and defendable data pairs, spanning as large a range of
speeds as possible (including zero).

Speedometer reading / km/h GPS reading (true) speed / km/h

14 13

20 19

30 26

31 28

40 37

50 46

51 47

60 55

70 64

80 74

82 76

90 83

100 93

Graph: ​Graph

Please insert a properly labeled graph of GPS-determined speed (which you assume is the true speed of
the motorbike), vs. the speed reported by the motorbike speedometer. The graph needs to include the
line of best fit. Computers are best, but you’re welcome to do it by hand on graph paper and paste the
scan of it here.
Data Analysis
1. Determine the slope of your best fit line (computers can do it for you if you know how to
 convince them). Report it below, including proper units.

Slope: 0.93

2. Determine the y-intercept of your best fit line. Report it below, including proper units.

Y-Intercept: -0.524

3. Use the slope and the intercept to ​develop the equation (this is your recipe) the would allow
the user of the motorcycle to calculate the correct (true) speed knowing the speedometer
readings. Use ​your equation (not the video) to calculate the correct speed when the motorbike
speedometer reads 20 km/h, 70 km/h and 100 km/h. Go back to video and compare those 3
speeds predicted by your equation with those reported by the GPS unit. Comment on how good
your predictions are.

Variable
- V​Speedometer ​ = Speedometer reading (km/h)
- V​GPS​ = GPS reading (km/h)

Equation: V​GPS​ = 0.93*V​Speedometer​ + (-0.524)

20 km/h
V​GPS​ = 0.93*V​Speedometer​ + (-0.524)
V​GPS​ = 0.93*20 - 0.524
V​GPS​ = 18.6 - 0.524
V​GPS​ = 18.076 km/h
70 km/h
V​GPS​ = 0.93*V​Speedometer​ + (-0.524)
V​GPS​ = 0.93*70 - 0.524
V​GPs​ = 65.1 - 0.524
V​GPs​ = 64.576 km/h
100 km/h
V​GPS​ = 0.93*V​Speedometer​ + (-0.524)
V​GPS​ = 0.93*100 - 0.524
V​GPS​ = 93 - 0.524
V​GPs​ = 92.476 km/h
 4. Comment on what changes would you make to either the data collection (i.e. video) or data
analysis that would make your recipe even more useful for correcting the inaccurate
speedometer readings.

If it is possible, I would like to change 3 things:

● Firstly, I would try to maintain constant speed on the motorcycle to find the definite
difference between the speedometer readings and GPS reading. As there is a slight delay
in the GPS reading, it would be better if each level of speed can be maintained until the
GPS reading becomes stable.
● Secondly, I might try to collect the data more than once and record it on the video.
● Thirdly, to eliminate random error, I would try to write down more data from the video to
add more detail to the scatter point graph. With more scatter point, the linear regression
can be more accurate.