Castors Wheel Applications

A wide range of rigs and yokes, wheel materials, swivel offsets, and wheel combinations are available for casters. Often times, selecting the appropriate caster for the task can become very challenging. It’s crucial to take into account a few aspects in order to assist the user in choosing the appropriate caster to utilize, which include:

Read More: medium duty caster wheel

Automotive and industrial

In an industrial or automotive plant scenario, where the floor conditions might vary from quite clean to having some waste, casters can be configured to fulfill ergonomic considerations. A range of wheel materials, including as polyurethane, soft rubber, and thermoplastic elastomers, can be used to construct casters for various applications. For easier rolling for plant equipment on smoother concrete plant floors, harder wheels like polyurethane and elastomer can be utilized; softer wheels, such rubber ones, can be used on other floor surfaces that have dirt on them. To lessen the swiveling force of casters—that is, the force needed to turn a caster in the direction of travel—many rigs have higher swivel offsets built into the caster itself. A lot of industrial casters are also made with numerous wheels, which increases the equipment’s ability to support heavier loads.

Applications for multi-wheel swivel casters in heavy industry

Heavy industrial

Many different industrial applications necessitate moving big, heavy things. One such sector is aerospace, where big airframes or engine components are transported between manufacturing facilities. These plants have large capacity castors that can support loads of several tons or more. Strong caster wheels are often made of metal, nylon, or forged steel and have a polyurethane tread. There are instances when the casters can be multi-wheeled, meaning that each caster has two or more wheels, and they can be pneumatic or solid rubber.

High degree of heat

Extreme heat tolerance is required for casters used in and around furnaces and ovens. Due to the potential failure of vital components such as lubricants and tread materials, general purpose casters are not meant to withstand extreme heat. Common robust tread materials, for instance, are at or over their working temperature limitations at 200 degrees Fahrenheit. Special lubricants and heat-resistant materials are used by high temperature casters. Furthermore, special sleeve bearings with no oil at all may be utilized for extremely high temperatures.

Medical

In the medical field, casters are frequently utilized for IV poles, hospital beds, equipment carts, and surgical tables. Medical casters have to be able to withstand being among the many cleaning and disinfection solutions used in hospitals. Most hospital beds and stretchers include a central caster locking mechanism that enables one person to lock all of the casters at once. Medical equipment casters are required to support heavy patients or equipment while maintaining ease of operation over various floor types and in narrow places. This generally requires high load capacities, low profiles, and swivel resistance.

Health and safety guidelines

The main advantage of utilizing casters is that they lower the user’s risk of industrial accidents, especially from overexertion. When a caster is operated improperly, mostly because the wheel material or setup is inappropriate, overexertion happens and the operator is hurt.

The Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety (CCOHS), the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), and other health and safety bodies police and regulate the permissible forces and noise levels that casters can create on a factory floor. For instance, 50 lbf is the maximum horizontal force that is advised by CCOHS. Additionally, Liberty Mutual has created a Snook Table that shows the percentage of the population that is male and female and capable of pushing at a specific horizontal force. With the correct caster wheel material and setup, this force may be reduced to a safe level.

The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and the Institute of Caster and Wheel Manufacturers (ICWM) collaborated to produce the ANSI ICWM: 2012 in order to guarantee the design integrity of casters. A uniform framework for assessing the safety, robustness, structural suitability, and technical specifications of group-specific casters and wheels is meant to be provided to manufacturers, specifiers, and users by the ICWM Performance Standard for Casters and Wheels.