Imagine being able to use a golf buggy all year round.

Retired engineer Brian Wilson has patented the design of a golf buggy that can drive over a waterlogged fairway without leaving tell-tale ruts and upsetting the green keeper.

He dreamt up his solution after seeing a disabled golfer struggle across a fairway to play a shot because he could not drive his buggy on the soft ground.

Mr Wilson, who lives in Crowborough, said: "I've devised a way round the problem but because of pressures of time and a lack of the right facilities I can't take the plan any further.

"What is needed is someone, or a business, to take up the plan and develop it into a commercial reality."

On most golf courses the use of golf buggies or golf trolleys, powered or hand-pulled, is confined to prepared hard tracks, especially when ground conditions are poor and during the winter season.

This is a precaution to prevent wheel damage to fairways.

Mr Wilson said: "Unfortunately, the ban limits the use of golf courses to active players and excludes the majority of elderly golfers, particularly those with disabilities.

"Because retired players frequently use the course mid-week when the majority of regular players are at work, restricting their usage can mean that the course is not maximising its potential.

"An all-weather powered golf buggy capable of oper-ating during wet weather conditions without causing damage to the playing surface would seem an ideal solution."

Golf courses have a combination of greens, fairways, rough and prepared tracks of concrete or gravel and buggies must be able to operate safely on all of them.

Conventionally-powered buggies have a tendency to damage fairways and greens, especially in wet weather. This is primarily because their wheels leave imprints and ruts.

Powered buggies are often restricted to specially prepared tracks running along one or both sides of a fairway.

This means golfers need to carry their clubs from buggy to ball and back again, which significantly reduces the role of buggies.

Lightweight buggies usually have a narrow wheelbase and are only wide enough to accommodate the vehicle driver.

They are clearly less stable than wider, more conventional vehicles over un-even ground.

Mr Wilson has thought of these problems in his design for the Rollerbuggy, a patent-ed concept for a lightweight recreational golf vehicle.

It is fitted with a dual-traction system comprising four wide-tyre wheels for operating on hard surfaces, such as the tracks running outside of fairways, combined with front and rear cylindrical rollers for running on soft surfaces, such as fairways.

At the press of a switch or the pull of a lever, the buggy can be adapted for the type of ground it is on.

Mr Wilson said: "If this takes off it will benefit both golfers and golf clubs."