Octocanum Drive/ Mecanum Suspension Designs?

[Electronica1]

Originally Posted by dougwilliams

As an off season project for our team we are looking at creating an Octocanum drivebase. We have experience with our own custom chassis, and have been using Mecanum drive for the last many years.

We have seen a few designs around (1086 / Blue Cheese, 3847 / Spectrum, 488 / Xbot, and 1540 / Flaming Chickens).

From my research, I can only find one example of an Octocanum that provides suspension when in the Mecanum mode (team 1540). It seems like with this drivebase we wouldn't want to miss that opportunity. Does anyone have any experience with that? And can anyone point me to any CAD designs around that are set up like that?

Mecanum wheels apply force to the side when in use, so it is generally safer to be mounted to the frame rather than on a module. Plus, you tend to spend most of your time on mecanum, only using the traction wheels when you are interacting with the opposing alliance. In the event you are low on pressure, you can still use your main drive mode without issue.