Wheel assembly with multi-sphere omniwheels and omnidirectional devices including the wheel assembly

摘要

An omniwheel is presented that may be included with additional omniwheels in a wheel assembly, which can be used in nearly any omnidirectional device such as a robot, a park ride or other vehicle, and the like. The omniwheel includes a wheel support or frame, and a first roller pivotally supported on the wheel support. Further, the omniwheel includes a second roller pivotally supported on the wheel support. The first and second rollers are each generally spherical in shape and have equal outer diameters. The first and second rollers each has a pair of recessed contact surfaces at opposite poles. Each of the first and second rollers is supported in the wheel support for freewheeling about a rotation axis passing through the opposite poles, and the first and second rollers are oriented in the wheel support to have their rotation axes offset relative to each other by an offset angle.

主权项

1. An omnidirectional wheel assembly, comprising:
a wheel support frame; and a plurality of omniwheels mounted to the wheel support frame, wherein each of the omniwheels includes at least two spherically-shaped rollers of equal outer diameter, wherein each of the spherically-shaped rollers is pivotal both about a minor axis extending centrally therethrough and a major axis extending orthogonal to the minor axis, wherein each of the spherically-shaped rollers includes a pair of recessed contact surfaces at opposite poles, and wherein the spherically-shaped rollers in each of the omniwheels are angularly offset from each other by at least 45 degrees as measured between the minor axes of adjacent pairs of the spherically-shaped rollers.