Wheels are usually just simple cylinders, although fans of I, robot (2004) may appreciate the beautiful car with ball wheels driven by the protagonist. YouTube [brick technology] decided to evaluate the application of spherical wheels in LEGO car design.
The advantage of ball wheels is that when driven on different shafts, they can rotate in multiple directions, so as to improve mobility. The 52 mm DUPLO ball is pushed by a set of drive rollers equipped with rubber belt, and the ball wheel can be rotated back and forth and left and right. This gives LEGO a fairly neat shooting ability, as well as the ability to rotate on site or drive in a more traditional way. The car is controlled by a smartphone, thanks to the fact that the buzzz module can remotely control the LEGO motor.
Ball wheels are unlikely to become popular in mainstream cars; The mechanical complexity required to drive them makes this design impractical for cars. However, omniwheels and similar designs have found applications in forklifts and other low-speed applications where the ability to move in any direction is very useful. Video after break.