Blog - Castors: how to choose them and how to replace them

Castors: how to choose them and how to replace them

All office chairs are equipped with castors. They play a crucial role because they allow the employees to do alle the necessary movements during the working activity.
They avoid continuous standing up which would compromise the quality of the work, would distract the worker and would waste precious time.

The castors and the different types of floor

When buying a chair with castors, however, you need to keep in mind to where the chair will be placed and take into consideration the type of floor that there is.

In effect, on the market there are many different types, made of different materials. They are usually chosen  on the base of type of flooring.

For soft floors, with rugs or carpets, it is better to choose plastic castors (made of soft polyurethane), in this way the chair can slide better when necessary.

While for hard floors or parquet, laminate, tiles, stone or PVC flooring, it is preferable to opt for rubber castors.

Rubber ones are perfect for any type of floor because they limit scratches and damage and leave the floor clean. So if we are not sure of the type of floor, it is surely better to be on the safe side and choose rubber castors!

The self-braking mechanism

Usually all best quality castors are equipped with a self- braking mechanism.

The braking mechanism is another fundamental system for the usability of the chair as it activates as soon as the person gets up from the chair and prevents the chair from moving involuntarily and as soon as the person sits down the braking mechanism is unlocked.

Thus, the self-braking castors prevent the armchair from sliding while taking “long walks” around the office and slamming against walls or desks.

Different sizes

Office chair castors can also differ in size, both in terms of width and diameter.

They are mounted on different products (operating armchairs, semi-executive, executive and presidential armchairs).

The castors can also vary depending on the quality and aesthetic finiture. They can have plastic, wood, chromed metal details or be equipped with inserts of different colors.

Sometimes there are also perforated ones on the market and this detail allows the armchair to have a modern design. The castors are subject to wear and, often need to be replaced.

It is important, however, to buy quality castors which are silent and strong.

How to replace the castors

All office chairs castors are equipped with a metal “cylinder” which has a groove on its top and where a retaining ring is inserted, this “cylinder” must be inserted into the spoke base with a little bit of pressure.

To extract them, simply overturn the armchair and pull them firmly from the spoke base.

To insert the new ones, press the castor cylinder with pressure inside the special place in the spoke base, the metal sealing ring, placed in position, prevents the cylinder and the castor from leaving its place.

Grendene never underestimates small details that make a big difference.

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