Hubless wheel in form of sphere contained in envelope - includes roller driven body, turning in interior of envelope which has opening in its lower part permitting this body to contact ground, with body maintained at distance from envelope walls by rollers or ball bearings

摘要

The main spherical body, which is compressible, is situated inside a rigid envelope (2,3) which follows its contours and is held from the inside walls of the envelope by satellite spherical rollers (5,6,7). The sphere (1) is driven by a roller (10) mounted above it on an axis (11) which is at right angles to the vertical axis (13) of the sphere (1). By rotating the drive roller (10) about this vertical axis (13), the spherical wheel (1) can be driven in any direction along the support surface (9) of the wheel. Use/Advantage - A hubless wheel that can be driven if required for the support and steering of any sort of vehicle where the drive mechanism is simple and the unit is made up of a minimum number of parts.