Omnidirectional wheel

thingiverse

I made a better version of this, but it has three parts, so if you prefer one part, carry on; otherwise, check the link https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4770024 This is a type of omnidirectional wheel. The structure allows balls to return to the front of the moving base. Regardless of the direction the unit is moved, there will always be balls to roll on, providing you have filled enough balls into it. I have used marbles of approximately 16,2mm. I discovered that the size of the marbles I had access to varied a lot and that they where not perfectly spherical, so you can expect smoother operation with ball bearings, or at least balls that are more uniform in size. The design is made for 16,2 mm balls, so if you are going to use other size balls, you have to scale the model accordingly. Approximately 25 balls are needed for it to work. Please post a make if you enjoy the thing :-)