Future Wheels

Now it’s possible to turn your usual bicycle into a speedy electric bike in a blink of an eye! GeoOrbital Wheel is built with an aerospace-grade aluminium frame, brushless DC motor, Li-ion battery, motor controller, and flat-proof tyre. This one wheel is all you need to transform your bike into an e-bike! It takes only one minute to install GeoOrbital Wheel and you’ll have a vehicle that can run up to 50 miles on one battery alone if you choose to do some pedalling to go further. With almost no pedaling you can expect going for 30 miles using one battery. Recharge takes up to 3 hours and wheel’s weight is 17 pounds. Make sure you share this amazing invention.

Back in 1951, Brooks Walker came up with a design that should have made parking a whole lot easier. Cadillac adopted the new ‘Parccar’ mechanism and installed it on a few of its popular models. It was basically a special spare wheel that got lowered when parking was required. With all other wheels positioned perpendicularly, these fifth wheels helped the car move sideways and shorten the parking to no more than 9 seconds in any conditions. There was only one problem with this invention – the mechanism took almost the entire space of the Cadillac’s trunk!

Honda is also no stranger to omni-directional wheels – the company has already released Honda U3- X, a one-wheeled vehicle that fully incorporates the first omni-directional driving wheel system in the world. This personal vehicle provides absolute freedom of movement and a smooth, although a relatively slow, ride with Honda’s Asimo balance control technology. You can make this unique device move wherever you want it to – forward, backward, left, right, laterally, and diagonally. It’s like walking, only faster and more fun! Honda U3-X’s one large-diameter wheel consists of smaller motor-controlled wheels that allow the mechanism moving side-to- side. The next wheel design is even more mind-boggling!

Can you imagine a 3D-printed tyre that uses AI to adapt to the surface and terrain it is driving on? Well, apparently the engineers from Goodyear can! Their new ‘bionic skin’ spherical tyre is part of the firm’s Eagle 360 Urban concept that incorporates cutting edge technologies and the use of artificial intelligence. This concept tyre should be able to decide, sense, transform, and interact with the surrounding world. Individual sections of the tyre can re-shape themselves with an electrical input, similar to human muscles. And of course, it would be able to connect to various devices to provide maximum efficiency. It is a truly exciting invention, but the next one is even more striking!

Meet the new Visionary Concept tyre from Michelin, which acts both as a tyre and a wheel. It’s 3D-printed, bio-degradable, airless, and packed with a bunch of useful sensors. The Michelin tyre/wheel can be optimized for certain weather conditions and it can be re-layered once it begins to wear down. This type of cutting edge wheel will never go flat, so there won’t be any break-downs and you won’t need to change the tyre ever again. Experts argue that if this wheel does break down, it will be really expensive to replace, but it is still an amazing breakthrough in engineering that will definitely change the way we operate our vehicles.

Sam Pearce, the founder of the Jelly Products Company, has completely reinvented the bicycle wheels we’ve all grown used to. New LoopWheels not only look cool without the usual forks, but they also come with a built-in suspension system that provides the most stable ride you can imagine. Replace your standard bicycle wheels to enjoy a more comfortable ride, or better still, put LoopWheels on your folding bike, which usually doesn’t have much suspension at all. This way you’ll have full-fledged suspension and mobility without any extra-weight. These 20-inch bicycle wheels can be installed on any bike at all! If you think these wheels are amazing, let your friends know all about them!

Also known as the Mecanum wheels, Ilon wheels were designed by Bengt Erland Ilon, a Swedish engineer, back in 1972. This simple, yet unique design allows vehicles moving in all directions, not only back, forward, left, and right. It’s basically a conventional wheel that was upgraded with built-in rollers that can be operated separately to make a car, robot, or any vehicle at all movie in any direction without turning. It seems like the machine is gliding on ice effortlessly! Diagonal movement is also possible due to the rollers that are set at a 45˚ angle to the chassis that helps produce a sideways motion. These wheels will definitely change the future of all vehicles, but the next set of wheels will completely turn the world upside down!

William Liddiard, a Canadian inventor, came up with a truly incredible concept of omnidi-rectional wheels that can turn any vehicle into a real dancer. How so? Well, with these hi-tech tyres parallel parking turns into a piece of cake that requires only a several minutes of your time (and much less planning and sweating). This set of wheels can make a car move in any direction, even slide horizontally! Turning a full circle on the spot? You can do it using Liddiard wheels. They are the first ‘bolt-on’ omnidirectional wheels that don’t require a special vehicle being built around them – you can put them on any car at all. The next invention is even more striking!

The inventors of Shark Wheels came up with a truly unconventional idea of a wheel – they created square wheels! If you think that square wheels provide a ride that’s any less comfortable or fast than that with usual round wheels, we’ll have to disappoint you – square Shark Wheels are so much better! They are usually used by skateboard and longboard riders as Shark Wheels go faster, create better slides, have a better grip with the surface (especially wet one) and ride smoothly on gravel and uneven surfaces. Shark Wheels are actually square, but they are also circular and create a snakelike sine wave that helps them move in such a smooth way. In the end you’ll have less rolling resistance and much faster ride!