Ball wheel sketch 1

thingiverse

I wanted a simpler way to move my drum kit around my room, so I came up with one idea. Since I wanted to get some feedback, I decided to share my current progress here. Any feedback is welcome, so if you have any ideas, please join in! The most obvious choice would be to use "shopping cart wheels," but the problem is that they need to align first before starting to roll smoothly. So, the first 10 cm is quite tough, and they also don't work well with carpet. Using balls to roll around a wooden board has the advantage of minimizing friction in any direction. However, the disadvantage is that the ball would move around under the board. (Still, this works fairly well with a bunch of tennis balls if you get the ones that pop out underneath and put them back on the other side of the board.) This ring prevents the problem. Note that the little red rolls are not supposed to touch the ball at all times. The ball rolls around freely until it encounters one roll on the opposite side of the board's direction. Then, the roll will go "between" the ball and the board, lifting the board slightly. This allows (hopefully) the ball to roll freely from the board but not from the roll. If you change direction, after a few cm another roll will take over. This is not my best scripting. I had to be pragmatic in some places to remain printable. The thin "walls" blocking the pivot openings are intended as supports for printing and should be cut away afterwards. It's designed to print upside down. I also don't intend to 3D print the rolls or the ball.