Hi all,

For fun and Halloween, a buddy of mine and I are building a Spidora illusion from the Paul Osborne book. Coming along nicely.

Anyone who builds illusions knows about using casters. I've also found www.CasterCity.com. But there are a ton out there to choose from.

We need to put casters on the legs. Looking to support a person in the illusion up to a weight of 350 lbs just in case. Hey, we don't use no little pixie assistants!

We would like them to be locking casters. CasterCity.com has a type called "TotalLock" which locks the wheel so it doesn't roll and so it doesn't swivel. Sounds good. For us, the end of each of the four legs is 1.75" square. I could not find a "plate" caster that had the plate small enough to accommodate a 1.75" square leg. But they also have "stem" casters. We could bore a hole vertically in the leg and install it there. Again, sounds like what we need. But again, we don't know much about what it takes to install a stem caster either.

So my questions are...

1 - What does the weight rating tell me? How do you choose a caster with the appropriate weight rating?
If I have 4 casters that each can handle 250 lbs does that mean with 4, it can handle 1,000 lbs.?
(FYI I highly suspect not. But I want to throw this out there for discussion...)

2 - Are any commonly used for illusions? What are the basic specs? Why are they used/preferred?

3 - Is there a common source for them in the illusion world? Where can you get them? Any other sources for casters?

4 - How to install a stem caster? Is there some type of hardware that goes into the hold in the leg and the caster goes in there? Or just directly into the wood of the leg?

5 - How to avoid the situation where you install them and now the table wobbles because one leg is slightly smaller than the others? Are there casters that can be individually adjusted/lengthened after install?

6 - Anything else that might be helpful to understand about use of casters?

Any and all help is very much appreciated!

Thanks!

John

Well, there are more qualified people to answer the bulk of your questions, but here's number 1. 4 250 lbs casters will take 750 lbs securely. 3 casters for the weight plus one for safety. A guy at an industrial caster company told me that over 20 years ago, and it has worked well so far.

You will need a large diameter caster on a trick that heavy especially if you will be pushing it crossed rough surfaces. Here is a link with helpful calculations on how to determine the capacity of a caster. The basic idea is if your trick weighed 400 pounds and you had four casters each casters capacity must be at least 100 pounds provided the weight would be distributed evenly across the four points. Check out the site it will help you with specific calculations. http://www.shepherdcasters.com/caster-basics.html
Good luck
Rodney

The important thing is to oil your casters. I recommend CASTER OIL! Ha! (Sorry, I couldn't help myself.)

In apology, stem casters are reasonably easy to install in a wood leg. You drill the proper size hole and install a tubular metal insert in the hole, then pop the stem into it. The advantage is that you can remove the caster rather easily if necessary. The downside is that you have to make sure that whatever wood is used is sturdy enough to receive the insert without cracking or breaking over time, so a hardwood is recommended. And yes, some casters are modestly adjustable in height to prevent wobble, but casters such as this usually have a threaded stem that screws into a receptacle rather than a snap-in stem.

Hope this helps as little.

Hi all,

Thank you all for your help. It is most appreciated and helpful! I did narrow down what I was looking for and was able to get to the important specs. I found the best selection for my needs at Rockler.

While doing some research on the topic, I found it interesting to note that some casters are made to hold multiple TONS of weight. So if anyone wants to build that rolling elephant vanish, have at it!

Although not exhaustive research by any means, I hope the remainder of this post helps others who are looking for this same type of info in the future...

I found the weight calc as MVMagic mentions above to be spot on. The "N-1 caster rule" - If you are using 4 casters and each caster's weight rating is 100 lbs each and the load is evenly distributed across 4 casters, then you should consider the max load to be 300 lbs for safety (4 casters - 1 = 3 x 100 lbs rating), not 400 lbs.

Things to consider
Weight rating
Operation (locking or not, etc.)
Plate vs. Stem
Size of wheel - I'm thinking most homemade illusions will use 2"-4" wheels.
Ball vs. Wheel
Wheel Material (for expected surfaces you will roll your creation over) - Rubber, hard plastic, stainless steel, etc.
Overall color and look
...interesting - http://www.rockler.com/acme-ball-casters-stem-style

Some Sources
www.Rockler.com
www.HomeDepot.com
www.CasterCity.com
www.Casters.com
www.HarborFreight.com
www.ServiceCaster.com
www.ShepherdCasters.com

Short videos on caster concepts
http://www.servicecaster.com/service-caster-video.php

Thanks,

John

If you want "furniture" style ball casters you can't go wrong wth Shepherd, they've been around a long time:
http://www.shepherdcasters.com/products_ball.html
(Nothing I know of wrong with Rockler, I'm just a lot less familiar with them.)
If I wanted "industrial" style with brakes and such I'd definitely take a look at McMaster-Carr:
http://www.mcmaster.com/#standard-casters/=tq0y59
If you aren't familiar with a category called the "ball transfer" you should be, they come in handy A LOT:
http://www.mcmaster.com/#ball-transfers/=tq0xca

(Note: I don't always BUY PRODUCT fron the McMaster online catalog, sometimes you can figure out who THEY bought them from,
but as an online "idea book" they're PRICELESS)