CALL 021 762 8610
Which castors should I use for heavy application?
Heavy loads and equipment can be a burden to move. Whether you need to outfit a piece of machinery, furniture, dolly or cart with castors, Castor King has you covered. For heavy applications you want to ensure the castors you use won’t be a weak point in your assembly. We’ve made it easy to understand our different grades of castors and what applications they are best suited for, allowing you to feel confident that the castors you select will be able to handle the load you need them to.
To best understand castors, it’s important to understand how they are different from wheels. While a conventional wheel might need an axle to attach to, the solid plate fitting of a castor can simply be fixed to the flat bottom of an object. Within castors, wheels are the solid piece that rolls and fits into the whole construction. Castor King offers a variety of wheels if you are looking to upgrade the wheel in an existing castor.
Wheels used in castors have an advantage over conventional wheels for a few reasons. Castor wheels are constructed as a solid unit, offering fewer weak points for pressure caused by weight to result in a failure. Wheels are composed of materials ranging from cast iron to solid rubber.
When selecting castors for heavy application, it’s necessary to ensure your castors will be able to support the weight of what they are being attached to. For wheel material, cast iron and polyurethane are recommended for heavy duty uses. Cast iron wheels have a high capacity and low rolling resistance but may be prone to damaging more sensitive floors due to the hardness of the material. Polyurethane is very quiet wheel with high capacity. Their elastic properties allow them to perform well on floors they might have debris. However, polyurethane must not be left in extremely hot conditions due to their tendency to deteriorate in the heat.
Something else to consider for heavy duty applications is whether swivel castors or fixed castors will be a better fit. Swivel castors use ball bearings that allow wheels to rotate 360 degrees, making them more mobile and agile when maneuvering tight spaces. Heavy loads with swivel castors do take a little extra energy to get all castors aligned in the direction of travel and in motion.
Fixed castors are best for settings in which a load is commonly moved in the same straight line of travel. Fixed castors take minimal effort to get into motion and allow for consistent placement before and after each move. Some users prefer a combination of fixed and swivel castors, allowing just the front of the load to steer, and the back to have stability. Castor King offers most of our castors in a fixed and swivel variety, so you can be sure to get the best match for your heavy application.
For industrial, heavy application, Castor King recommends Heavy Duty Towing castors from Tente and Red Dot. These castors combine a strong cast iron center with polyurethane wide tread wheels. They have capacities of 2200 and 2500 KG, respectively.
If you are still unsure of what castors will be the best fit for your heavy application, then do not hesitate to reach out to Castor King for an assessment.
More recent posts
