The Caster thread

[Eddo Rogue]

Welcome to the wonderful world of casters

My work is basically a travelling circus of construction crew. Everything is temporary, and on wheels, including the giant table saws. I've seen a variety of Casters, and learned the value of them. Now my goal is to have everything in my garage on wheels as well.

There's a million different types of casters out there, and anything decent is not cheap. Even the HF ones, which surprisingly are not terrible, are relatively spendy.

I have come to the conclusion I need two main types of casters, ones that steer easy for short distances and tight turns in the garage, and larger, more stable ones for carts and things that will be rolling across the yard and driveway. Both need to handle a lot of weight

I have noticed the 6" or bigger poly on steel casters would be good for the latter, as they dont steer as easy but that would actually help stability if all four swivel, and handle rough floors better.

I'm thinking 4" domed full poly casters for stuff in the shop. they steer nice, changing direction easily, even when loaded down.

What are your thoughts and opinions on casters? and pics if you got em....

 

[Roert42]

For work benches and things that I do not want to move a bunch when in use I prefer the kind with the pop down foot. Something like this. That way it can be leveled when in use as well.

I like pneumatic tires for anything not in the shop, but that doesn’t work that great for work benches, but works nice for moving equipment around.

 

[sgtsandman]

Just don't use the ones they use on floor jacks. A zip tie or small pebble will stop them dead.

 

[ericbphoto]

So, this isn't about front end alignments?

 

[Uncle Gump]

I bought one of those 5 drawer HF tool carts probably 15 years ago. It actually came with with 4 swivel casters back then. Those casters even have grease zerks on them and I've rolled that box all over the place. We use to wheel it into the race trailer on race weekends and all over the shop. I even took them off and built a cart to put my Skamper on and it moved pretty good... even to roll it outside when I sold it. They are back under my tool cart and are still the smoothest casters I've ever owned.