In a motorcycle, why is the neutral position typically above the first gear and below the second?
In: 1946
A bike needs to have some speed to not topple over. First gear is the safest gear to handle slow speeds without stalling the engine.
So when both starting up and slowing down finding 1st is pretty important. Since it’s the bottom gear, you can simply keep kicking down a gear until you find the lowest one.
As you gain speed the bike stabilises itself. At that point a firm press takes you from first to second – skipping neutral.
It’s actually quite hard to accidentally engage neutral, and that’s perfect for always being able to power the wheel.
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This does not mean 1N234… is the only way, it’s just one way that mechanically easy to implement and least likely to go wrong in the scenarios considered.
So it was made the standard.
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