Basics of mobile robot design have been introduced here. This is a basic part of the robotic design.

1. Mobile Robot Design

2. Single Wheel Drive
• Having a single wheel that is both driven and steered is the simplest
conceptual design for a mobile robot.
• Two passive caster wheels in the back.

3. Differential Drive
• The differential drive design has two motors mounted in fixed
positions on the left and right side of the robot, independently driving
one wheel each.

4. Differential Drive

5. Tracked Robots
• A tracked mobile robot can be seen as a special case of a wheeled
robot with differential drive.

6. Synchro-Drive
• Synchro-drive is an extension to the robot design with a single driven
and steered wheel.
• The three wheels are rotated together so they always point in the
same driving direction.

7. Ackermann Steering
• The standard drive and steering system of an automobile are two
combined driven rear wheels and two combined steered front
wheels.

8. Omni-directional robot

9. Omni-directional robot
• Above robots cannot drive in all possible directions.
• For this reason, these robots are called “non-holonomic”.
• In contrast, a “holonomic” or omni-directional robot is capable of
driving in any direction.
• They are capable of driving in any direction in a 2D plane.

10. Mecanum Wheels
• This wheel design has been developed and patented by the Swedish
company Mecanum AB with Bengt Ilon in 1973

11. Omni-Directional Drive
• 3-wheel and 4-wheel omni-directional vehicles

12. Omni-Directional Drive
Mecanum principle, driving forward and sliding sideways;
dark wheels rotate forward, bright wheels backward (seen from below)

13. Omni-Directional Drive
Mecanum principle, turning clockwise (seen from below)

14. Omni-Directional Drive

15. Omni-Directional Drive