The enveloping mechanical characteristics of new mechanical elastic wheel (MEW) were studied using the finite element analysis and test method in this paper. According to the analysis of vertical mechanical characteristics of MEW under the effect of plane and obstacles, the influence of types of cleats on variation regularity of vertical mechanical response was revealed,moreover, the reliability of the finite element model was verified. The MEW-enveloping characteristics while traversing the three different cross-section obstacles at low speed were investigated by the nonlinear finite element model and the bench testing. The vertical and longitudinal dynamic mechanical response while traversing different obstacles were illustrated, and the influence of load and types of cleats on enveloping characteristics were analyzed. The results showed that the vertical force curves were from a parabola to a camel back shape with the increase of load. The longitudinal force response increased with the increase of the load, and the curves were similar to the sine shape. And the vertical and longitudinal force response increased with the increase of the height of the obstacle. Furthermore, the vertical and longitudinal mechanical response peak was relatively low, changed slowly, and the MEW had the typical enveloping characteristics under the certain load.