Design Optimization of a Mecanum Wheel to Reduce Vertical Vibrations by the Consideration of Equivalent Stiffness

Mecanum wheels are capable of moving a vehicle to any direction instantaneously by the combination of independent wheel rotations. Because the mecanum wheel is composed of a hub and rollers, however, it has unavoidable drawbacks such as vertical and horizontal vibrations due to the sequential contacts between rollers and ground. In order to investigate the dynamic characteristics of a mecanum wheel, we made a prototype and performed experiments to measure the vertical vibrations. Interestingly, it was observed that the vertical accelerations were asymmetric with respect to the average value of signals; the vibration signals of upward and downward directions show quite different shape. This asymmetric phenomenon was confirmed through the dynamic simulations performed by RecurDyn. In addition, the peak-to-peak and RMS values of the displacements and accelerations were calculated to investigate the effects of the curvature of rollers on the vertical vibrations of the vehicle. Furthermore, we proposed a mecanum wheel having a spring to attenuate the vibrations. It was also noted that the significant reduction of the vertical accelerations was observed due to the absence of the spring. Finally, considering the equivalent stiffness of the mecanum wheel for several different fillet radii, we found the optimal geometric design which minimizes the vertical vibration of a mecanum wheel.