A common question I often hear about swerve drives is.
When a swerve drive is moving and turning, what is actually happening with the wheels?
This can be really difficult to explain, and the typical explanation of adding vectors often relies upon previous knowledge of how vector math works.
Because of this, I created a Desmos that shows the swerve drive movement in a sort of unique way. It shows the swerve drive moving throughout various time steps, and shows the direction each module moves throughout that movement.
As you can see from the image, it shows the movement of the swerve drive and it moves and turns, and has 4 vectors named “Module Speeds” that show you the direction and velocity each wheel should move. The math in this desmos is slightly different than typical swerve drive kinematics, but it yields similar results.
I’m really interested to hear what you guys think of this!