The Brilliant Engineering of Mecanum Wheels!

Mecanum wheel-fitted robots or industrial machines can make a 180 degree turn without taking much space, whereas a normal forklift takes a lot of space and time to achieve the same task. Consider this perfect sideward movement of Mecanum wheeled machines. This would be tedious to achieve using normal wheels. Mecanum wheeled machines achieve all these crazy movements, but their wheels never tilt. Let’s see how Mr. Bengt Erland Ilon came up with this brilliant design.

[fnet]

This movement system works as long as each wheel has a perfectly equal coefficient of friction for each wheel. When dirt appears on the surface or the wheels wear out, the direction of movement is unexpected.

[thejman]

I've seen these wheels being used on BattleBots. The robot that uses them is "Shatter" and the wheels are used to always stay squared up to their opponents during combat. It's a pretty cool design.

[fernandop]

*But if the load is greater at the front than the back (due to the lifting), then chances are that the 2 front wheels will carry greater friction than the ones in the back resulting in slightly unexpected shifting of the vehicle, specially on uneven surfaces of slight differences of friction. It seems promising, but I wonder if this was practically tested in real life under these explained circumstances.*

[Watchyn_Yarwood]

One of the best video productions you have done! Having spent 40+ years managing warehouse and freight operations, I can see how Mecanum wheeled forklifts could have made us so much more efficient.

[makeapathpresents]

I was a fork lift operator for years, ours turned A LOT tighter than this example, lmao. Did you pick the worse fork lifts on the market or something?

[deltagbeta]

Clever, but as you can see from the vector forces, there is a lot of forces cancelled, which mean not energy efficient. Also small contact patch means high weat or expensive materials. That is why some way smart ideas dont get to thrive. These videos will benefit if they present the limitations of anything new and the barriers to adoption. Furthermore, for the people that bring the example of no work being done when one pushes against a wall where the forces cane out please consider that in the example of pushing against a wall, work is not done with regards to wall being moved, yet one does waste muscle energy into thermal energy via pushing in vain. Same for example if a car or machinery that is stuck against a practically immovable object. They do not move the object, yet they burn fuel or electrical energy to thermal waste instead of useful work in moving said "immovable" object.

[KiraSlith]

There's so much wrong with the mecanum in practical terms though, namely maximum load bearing, extreme susceptibility to friction loss leading to accidents, and inefficient (or outright destructive) conversion of energy to motion.

Maximum load bearing for a mecanum wheel based vehicle relies on the axels of the rollers and their mount points, so in practical terms, a forklift capable of lifting 1 ton with mecanum would require solid steel axels on all of the rollers and thick 2 part milled block steel locking rings for the inner diameter and mount points of the rollers. Under ideal conditions mecanum wheels for industrial applications would be incredibly expensive compared to just using a forklift friendly warehouse layout.

Due to their significantly reduced contact area, mecanum wheels are much more susceptible to dusts and dirt causing slipage, even just one wheel slipping can turn a lateral movement into a rotational movement, in the forklift scenario described that leads to slamming into warehouse shelves with a product laiden fork, and on cars it's a fast track to an accident.

Finally, the creation of two opposing angles of movement creates extra stresses on the frame and wastes rotational energy, leading to early breakdowns and wasted potential energy. Both a financially and ecologically unfriendly prospect, all to fit a single shelf of additional storage per 10, 000ft of warehouse.

[stanimal]

We tested this type of forklift at my company ~15 years ago. The technician that was supporting the trial let me operate it. It was so intuitive to operate even an untrained engineer like myself was able to control it precisely within a few minuets of practice. I would have love for us to adopt this technology, however, I was later told that the forklift was unreliable (nothing to do with the Mecanum wheel system) and we chose to stick with our tried & true electric forklifts.

[GravitasZero]

Took “reinventing the wheel” to a whole new level

[john-onyy]

These wheels are being Used on airfield highloaders, being able to maneuver freight containers Into an airplane without needing to use muscle. Pretty cool Tech👍

[OscarzProductions]

We used these in our FIRST robotics robot. They were super interesting to watch in person

[harikishore]

They legitimately reinvented the wheel.

[keldonlemon]

The design and thought process of this concept and then final product is absolutely sensational.

[insync]

Haters will point out how ineffective is it, but u gotta acknowledge the guy who made it, such a imaginative and brilliant engineer he is. They are so intelligent

[dallenhaven]

I think the best part isn’t that it can spin in its center, a tank or anything with treads can do that. What’s amazing is that it can move sideways or diagonally without changing which way the vehicle is facing

[AftabAlam-yweq]

Its a good design but the wear and tear on the tyres is significantly larger than normal tyres. Hence it runs out of tyres quickly and also each tyre is operated by a separate driver/motor.

[zeke]

Most forklifts have rear-wheel steering, and some forklifts have all wheel steering, so yeah while these wheels can turn in place, I'll bet that they are much more expensive than your typical forklift and wouldn't be very likely to be put on applications like this (else, everywhere would have them by now since mecanum wheels have been a known thing for many years).

[clementross]

That kind of wheel is found in aircraft cargo loaders. They often have to rotate ULDs 90 or 180 degrees. You can clearly see the wheels turning in opposite direction to achieve this.

[heskenfuhrer]

Thank you for what you do. The world needs this

[DontWatchProductions]

I've driven forklifts most of my life. Some can even turn a circle in their own length. If I used that much room to turn, my rear would've been out the door.