pic: Cone-Wheel Concept

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by JamesCH95

How does the wheel get traction? It appears that as the wheel is driven forward or backward the rollers will spin and not generate any tractive force.

Originally Posted by 548swimmer

Those rollers aren't mounted perpendicularly, so they will just free spin. If you want a sort of omni-directional drive, I suggest investigating mecanums. There's no need to re-invent the wheel.

They aren't perpendicular but they won't free spin. They aren't mounted on an axis parallel to the floor. If the whole thing is in contact with the floor there is no way it will spin since the two points touching would try to go different speeds. Picture it as 2 wheels that are different diameters fixed to a common axis but both touching the ground, if you move it they will need to be moving at different rates and since this isn't possible they SHOULDN'T free spin.

Are there reasons to do something like this? Possibly. Will this give the desired motion? Not likely. (I haven't sat down and really thought about it enough to say definitively)