I signed up to stumble today and my third stumble led me to this, and it got my attention big time, a wheel, capable of omnidirectional movement.

Mecanum Wheel



The Mecanum wheel is one design for a wheel which can move in any direction. It is sometimes called the Ilon wheel after its Swedish inventor, Bengt Ilon, who came up with the idea in 1973 when he was an engineer with the Swedish company Mecanum AB.

It is a conventional wheel with a series of rollers attached to its circumference. These rollers have an axis of rotation at 45° to the plane of the wheel in a plane parallel to the axis of rotation of the wheel. As well as moving forward and backward like conventional wheels, they allow sideways movement by spinning wheels on the front and rear axles in opposite directions.

(taken from its Wiki Page)

this is a fantastic demonstration of the Mecanum Wheel in action, on a wheelchair


I've seen people have so much trouble getting on and, in particular, off a bus with their wheelchair, this would help so much in similar tight situations, I reckon it would be absolutely sweet if we could get cars with Mecanum Wheels

There's a bunch of Mecanum Wheel robot videos on youtube, but I found this wheelchair video to be far more impressive

Thats pretty cool.

I however dont think they will be appearing on cars any time soon or in the future for that fact, unless they can be made for much less than a car wheel (rubber + rim) (which i doubt).

They might include some prototype cars with them just as example, but I would have a feeling that there would be a max speed for them before they get dangerous - and not a high speed at that.

Yeah I think I remember reading something about a lack of traction in the mecanum wheels that would, as you say, make them dangerous on cars, which is a shame, something cool like that might make me really want my liscence

A wheel would make you want your licence? That is almost as stupid as kesha's new video...