| Castors and wheels are everywhere on all our cars, | | | | All of these impressive castors can be fixed with a |
| planes, machines, trains, machinery, equipment, and | | | | locking mechanism making braked castors. However if |
| even if you look down now, they may even be on | | | | you still want uni directional castors, they are still |
| your office chairs. It's probably a component that you | | | | available and are called fixed castors. |
| have never spent much time thinking about. Nor should | | | | As there are so many choices between fixed castors, |
| you! Castors and wheels are a part of every day life, | | | | swivelling castors and braked castors, one is often |
| and experts agree that the invention of the wheel in | | | | faced with a dilemma? What is the most optimal |
| Mesopotamia in the 5th Millennium BC, was one of the | | | | combination of castors? There are two extremes on |
| most important developments ever made. In the late | | | | the scale. At one end imagine four swivelling castors |
| Neolithic period, they could never have imagined the | | | | on a shopping trolley, making the trolley out of control, |
| importance of wheels and castors to their future | | | | moving in all directions and hard to manage! The other |
| ancestors every day life! | | | | extreme is having four fixed castors, with the option of |
| Castors are simply wheels, usually in a metal housing, | | | | going either forwards of backwards, offering no ease |
| easing the attachment to machinery and equipment. | | | | of movement or flexibility! So in between these castor |
| Without the castor housing wheels would need to be | | | | extremes there is a variety of castors combinations. |
| attached via an axel, and would therefore be fixed | | | | As always this will depend upon your specific |
| directionally. For example, imagine a cart, with the | | | | application, the load to be moved and the floor surface. |
| wheels on an axel; movement is restricted to either | | | | Castors are available in a huge variety of sizes and |
| forwards or backwards, with a very wide turning circle. | | | | designs. From the smallest twin wheel castors used on |
| The invention of the swivelling castor enabled the | | | | office equipment up to the largest heavy duty castors |
| wheel to move in a 360 degree direction, and not to | | | | used in manufacturing processes carrying several |
| be restricted to the singular forward backward | | | | tonnes of weight. Not only are there varieties of sizes |
| motions. This simple invention has revolutionised the | | | | of castors, but also a variety of wheels housed in the |
| movement of equipment and machinery in our every | | | | castors. To simplify the mind blowing array of options |
| day life! | | | | you may be faced with, the best rule of thumb is that |
| The castor housing is essentially a mini axel, housed in | | | | hard wheels are easier to push, having less resistance |
| a metal casing. The metal casing has then a ball | | | | with the floor. The downside is that castors with hard |
| bearing head, which has either a square top plate for | | | | wheels, such as nylon castors, may be noisy and |
| fixing, or a bolt hole fixing. Top plate fixing castors have | | | | damage the floors. Alternatively castors with softer |
| four bolt holes enabling attachment to the underside of | | | | wheels have more resistance against the floor and |
| a trolley or machinery that is to be moved. These are | | | | they may take less weight. Their benefit is they are |
| one of the commonest types of castors, as it allows | | | | less noisy and do not wear the floor surface. So next |
| the spread of the load over the top plate swivel head. | | | | time you are sitting at your desk on your moving office |
| Bolt hole castors, on the other hand have a single bolt | | | | char, or shopping at the supermarket, have a thought |
| fixing, which by design may carry less weight. Bolt hole | | | | for the castors and wheels, that over the years, have |
| castors can be fitted with wither a threaded stem or | | | | enabled the world to be in motion! |
| expanding adaptors to fit into square or round tubing. | | | | |
