Surveyor's wheel
distance-measuring device
A surveyor's wheel, also called a clickwheel, hodometer, waywiser, trundle wheel, measuring wheel or perambulator is a device for measuring distance.
Origin
The origins of the surveyor's wheel are connected to the origins of the odometer. While the latter is derived to measure distances travelled by a vehicle, the former is specialized to measure general distances.
In the 17th century, the surveyor's wheel was introduced and used to measure distances. A single wheel is attached to a handle and the device can be pushed or pulled along by a person walking. Early devices were made of wood and may have had an iron rim to provide strength. The wheels themselves would be made in the same manner as wagon wheels and often by the same makers. The measuring devices would be made by makers of scientific instruments and the device and handles would be attached to the wheel by them. The device to read the distance travelled would be mounted either near the hub of the wheel or at the top of the handle.
In some cases, double-wheel hodometers were constructed.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Surveyor's wheel” as distance-measuring device. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 2, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q351704.
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This entry incorporates text from “Surveyor's wheel” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.