Comparison of Comfort Level using Air Suspension with Electric
Control 2.5 Bar and Factory Standard Hydraulic Suspension on a
2011 Vario 110 cc Motorbike Unit
Ruspita Sihombing, Hidayat, Samen Lolongan, Rizky Sulvika Puspa Rinda, Rakhel Lia and Darwin
Mechanical Engineering, Politeknik Negeri Samarinda, Jl. Cipto Mangun Kusumo, Samarinda, Indonesia
Keywords: The Comfort, Suspension, Hydraulic, Factory Standard, and Air.
Abstract: The comfort in driving either by motorbike or car is the most important factor for drivers and passengers.
Motorbikes or cars always experience vibrations or shocks due to the engine or the passed road. To reduce
the vibrations and shocks, motorbikes or cars are equipped with suspensions. This initiated the authors in
conducting the study about the Comparison of Comfort Level Using Air Suspension with Electric Control 2.5
bar and Factory Standard Hydraulic Suspension on a 2011 Vario 110 cc Motorbike Unit. This study used
experimental method by testing the both types of suspensions on a rocky road. The aim was to find out how
big the ratio of the vibration speed using the two types of suspensions. The result indicated that the ratio of
the average acceleration of the vibrations produced by the Air Suspension System using the Electric Control
2.5 bar and the Factory Standard Hydraulic Suspension at each rotation was 1:1.6 at 3500 rpm; 1:2.5 at 4500
rpm and 1:2.1 at 5500 rpm, which meant that the air suspension using electric control 2.5 bar had a higher
level of comfortability and stability compared to the factory standard hydraulic suspension.
1 INTRODUCTION
Suspension is one of the parts on vehicle system that
plays an important role in vehicle stability in
addition to the engine system, steering, drive line,
brake system, chassis and vehicle body. The study in
increasing the comfort and safety by improving the
quality of comfort in the vehicle suspension system
that encourages researchers to continue carrying out
various research and experiments in order to create
various suspension system innovations which have
more effective performance with a higher level of
comfort compared to existing suspension.
Air suspension or Pneumatic is one of the
innovations in a vehicle suspension that offers higher
performance and comfort compared to previous types
of suspension. According to (Ka’ka et al., 2018), using
a pneumatic actuator instead of the real dynamic load
of the vehicle provided the characteristics overview
of the connection between working pressure and
dynamic load. If the working pressure P2 (bar) given
is greater, then the vertical dynamic load Ft (N)
which
burdens the road structure will also increase
(Ka’ka et al., 2018). This
was added by (Handriyanto,
2014) who stated that
mass response and energy
generation from the spring
constant from their test
results indicated that the
higher the load, the greater
the damping value
produced (Handriyanto, 2014).
In addition, (Fernandes et al., 2020) claimed that
geometric nonlinearity induces changes in the springs
and damping forces due to the different slopes of the
spring-damper assembly during expansion and
compression, resulting in changes in the acceleration
amplitude and resonant frequency. This effect lies in
the effect of the asymmetric damping coefficient
only, which ultimately affects the acceleration of the
suspension mass. Therefore, these two effects must be
carefully considered when designing a suspension
system with comfort criteria (Fernandes et al., 2020).
Vibration is a factor which affects comfort due to
engine performance and road ruggedness. Based on
the above analysis there are two factors, namely
internal effects related to vibration intensity and
external effects related to frequency, amplitude,
direction and duration of vibration. ISO, which
evaluates the effects of vibrations used on humans,
provides a limit value for vibration transmitted to
humans in a frequency 1:8 Hz for longitudinal
vibrations. The comfort limit in the ISO 2631
standard is expressed in terms of vibration
514
Sihombing, R., Hidayat, ., Lolongan, S., Rinda, R., Lia, R. and Darwin, .
Comparison of Comfort Level using Air Suspension with Electric Control 2.5 Bar and Factory Standard Hydraulic Suspension on a 2011 Vario 110 cc Motorbike Unit.
DOI: 10.5220/0010948400003260
In Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Applied Science and Technology on Engineering Science (iCAST-ES 2021), pages 514-517
ISBN: 978-989-758-615-6; ISSN: 2975-8246
Copyright
c
 2023 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. Under CC license (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

acceleration whose value is influenced by the
frequency and time of vibration.
Comfort is basically a subjective thing. However,
some research has been conducted to solve this
problem. One of them was a study that introduced an
understanding of the discomfort experienced by the
drivers or motorists toward vibrations. For this study,
the standard of comfort was used to analyze the
comfort and stability of the air suspension with
electrical control and the factory standard hydraulic
suspension, using ISO 2631.
ISO 2631 standardization is a convenience
criterion that is given by the International Standard
Organization. Thus, there is a standard for whole
body vibration. This standard is recommended for
evaluating the effect of vibration on a vehicle or
industry. This criterion describes three different limits
for whole body vibrations in the 1 to 80 Hz frequency
ranges. The limits are: (1) reduce comfort boundary.
It is related to the comfort. While in transportation
vehicles, this is related to activities being done in the
vehicle during the trip, such as reading, writing, and
eating. (2) fatigue or decreased proficiency boundary
which is related to preservation of work efficiency,
such as driving a vehicle. (3) exposure boundary is
related to the preservation of safety or health which
should not be exceeded without special provisions.
(
Shen et al., 2016) stated that ISD suspension has
superior damping performance than passive
suspension. Besides, it can solve the contradiction
between comfort and handling effectively Shen et al.,
2016). Then,
(Nugroho et al., 2018) said that the
effect of the type of
two-wheeled vehicle suspension
system on the
vibration of the vehicle was very
significant
according to the level of the road bumps it
passed and
the type of suspension system (Nugroho et
al., 2018).
(Prastiyo e t a l . , 2021) conducted a research in
two
types of suspension. They stated that the type of
linear
double wishbone suspension and the type of
progressive suspension did not show superiority in
terms of vehicle suspension system stability and
driving comfort. However, conventionally, a linear
suspension system will be the best choice to be
applied to the rally class (Prastiyo e t a l . , 2021).
(Yatak et al., 2021) on their research entitled
“Ride
Comfort-Road Holding Trade-off
Improvement of Full Vehicle Active Suspension
System by Interval
Type-2 Fuzzy Control” said that
it is possible to
simultaneously increase the ride
index and vehicle
stability with a hybrid fuzzy
controller (Yatak et al., 2021).
2 METHOD
This study carried out experimental method by
testing the both types of suspensions on a rocky road.
The tools used were vibration meter, tachometer, and
measure tape. Vibration meter was used to measure
the vibration of both types of shock absorber when
the testing was conducted. The tachometer was used
to measure the engine rotation speed which calculates
the rotation speed of the 2011 Vario 110 cc motorbike
engine. Measure tape was used to measure the length
of the field that would be passed by the 2011 Vario
110 cc motorbike unit to conduct experiments in the
process of analysis and data collection.
This study used a 2011 Vario 110 cc motorbike
unit, factory standard hydraulic shock absorber, and
pneumatic suspension with electric control 2.5 bar.
2.1 Procedures
The preparation and testing steps were conducted in
this study. They are explained as follow:
2.1.1 Preparation Steps
▪ Prepare 1 unit of 2011 Vario 110 cc motorbike unit
and the driver. The empty mass of the 2011 Vario
110 cc motorbike unit is 99.3 kg and the mass of
the driver was 50 kg so the total load received by
the suspension was 149.3 kg.
▪ Assemble and prepare a pneumatic suspension
system with electric control and factory standard
hydraulic suspension on a 2011 Vario
110 cc
motorbike unit.
▪ Ensure the tools used for the testing worked and
functioned properly.
2.1.2 Testing Steps
▪ Attach the vibration meter to the pneumatic
suspension type with electrical control.
▪ Turn the ignition key to the engine starter
position.
▪ Turn on the compressor.
▪ Wait for the air tube to be fully filled as needed.
▪ Start the air filling process on the pneumatic
shock, on low position (2 bar) and high position
(2.5 bar).
▪ Adjust the engine speed using a tachometer with
variations of 3500, 4500, and 5500 rpm
on rocky
terrain. The reason for taking the
maximum rpm
Comparison of Comfort Level using Air Suspension with Electric Control 2.5 Bar and Factory Standard Hydraulic Suspension on a 2011
Vario 110 cc Motorbike Unit
515

was 5500, because the vehicle could only run with
a maximum rpm of 5500
on a rocky road.
▪ Run the motor in a predetermined field while
pressing the vibration meter button. After the
vehicle ran stable at a distance of 30 km and at a
predetermined rpm, stop pressing the
vibration
meter button and the maximum value
of vibration
acceleration would be obtained.
▪ Record the vibration acceleration of the pneumatic
shock absorber with electrical
control using a
vibration meter. Each test for
each rpm was
repeated for seven (7) times.
▪ Replace the vibration meter stick on the factory
standard hydraulic suspension material.
▪ Repeat steps.
3 RESULT AND DISCUSSION
Based on the measurement results of vibration
speed using air suspension with electric control 2.5
bar and factory standard hydraulic suspension on a
2011 Vario 110 cc motorbike unit on a rocky road,
the result was shown on Table 1 below.
Table 1: Vibration Speed using Air Suspension with
Electric Control 2.5 bar and Factory Standard Hydraulic
Suspension on A 2011 Vario 110 cc Motorbike Unit.
No
Rotation
(rpm)
Vibration Speed (m/s²)
Air Suspension
with Electric
Control 2.5 bar
Factory
Standard
Hydraulic
Suspension
1
3500
(25km/h)
7.8
13.1
7.9
12.7
8.3 12.7
7.8 11.5
8.4 13.4
8.9 12.8
8.1 13.2
Average 8.2 12.8
No
Rotation
(rpm)
Vibration Speed (m/s²)
Air Suspension
with Electric
Control 2.5 bar
Factory
Standard
Hydraulic
Suspension
2
4500
(35 km/h)
7.8 19.4
7.6 19.5
7.1 18.6
7.2 18.3
8.1 18.9
7.3 19.3
7.7 18.9
Average 7.5 19.0
3
5500
(45 km/h)
10.0 20.4
9.7 21.0
10.1 19.9
9.2 20.8
9.5 20.2
10.4 19.8
10.5 21.1
Average 9.9 20.5
From the Table 1 Vibration Speed using Air
Suspension with Electric Control 2.5 bar and Factory
Standard Hydraulic Suspension on A 2011 Vario 110
cc Motorbike Unit above, it was obtained averages of
vibration speed which then explained in the following
graphic.
iCAST-ES 2021 - International Conference on Applied Science and Technology on Engineering Science
516

Figure 1: The Graphic of the Vibration Speed Averages Using Air Suspension with Electric Control 2.5 bar and Factory
Standard Hydraulic Suspension on a 2011 Vario 110 cc Motorbike Unit.
From the Figure 1 The Graphic of the Vibration
Speed Averages Using Air Suspension with Electric
Control 2.5 bar and Factory Standard Hydraulic
Suspension on a 2011 Vario 110 cc Motorbike Unit
above showed that the averages of vibration speed
using air suspension with electric control 2.5 bar on
Vario 110 cc 2011 motorbike unit on a rocky road to
all rpm testing variations were lower than factory
standard hydraulic suspension. The comparison of the
vibration speed averages using air suspension system
with electric control 2.5 bar and the factory standard
hydraulic suspension at each rotation was 1:1.6 at
3500 rpm; 1:2.5 at 4500 rpm and 1:2.1 at 5500 rpm.
4 CONCLUSIONS
Based on the results, it can be concluded that: (1) The
comparison of the vibration speed averages using air
suspension system with electric control 2.5 bar and
the factory standard hydraulic suspension at each
rotation was 1:1.6 at 3500 rpm, 1:2.5 at 4500 rpm, and
1:2.1 at 5500 rpm, (2) Pneumatic suspension system
with electric control 2.5 bar has better comfort level
than the factory standard hydraulic suspension
system.
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Journal of Sound and Vibration, 361, 148-158.
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Comparison of Comfort Level using Air Suspension with Electric Control 2.5 Bar and Factory Standard Hydraulic Suspension on a 2011
Vario 110 cc Motorbike Unit
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