Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Robust Robot

(Video Link) The RHex robot has six spinning legs and a bulldog determination. It can keep on going even after it gets flipped over. It can tackle rocks, fallen logs, and shallow water, and has the good sense to turn around in a narrow cave.


It's hard not to think of the pendulum-style walking leg movements as the ideal design concept for legs, because natural analogues provide the default setting for our imaginations. Same problem for early airplane designers who kept thinking of flapping wings.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Utterly Cool! I loved it when the little fellow flipped over and paused just for a second as if taking his bearings!...

Antonio

jeffkunze said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
jeffkunze said...

That is so cool!
You mentioned bulldog but I couldn't help thinking about that honey badger video when looking at this little robot!

video if you don't know it (language warning!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4r7wHMg5Yjg

Mathias Kollros said...

Big Dog falso rom Boston Dynamics is still the most impressive in my opinion. like a deer without head, kinda creepy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNZPRsrwumQ

H4lfM4d said...

BD is awesome. Fast forward the future of invitationally anthropomorphicised robotics!

Janet Oliver said...

Bless his heart!

Meera Rao said...

totally cool:)
Thanks for sharing!

Rod said...

It's definitely a simple and robust solution. Still, actual animals get over rocks much faster, so I don't think robot-makers will be resting on their laurels just yet.

Gregory Lee said...

The cameraman in the cave must be about as robust as RHEX.