Category: Robots

BattleBots on ESPN in ’08?

Looks like the sound of gnashing gears and grinding steel may once again grace the television sets of America. Noted sports cable network ESPN has been talking to BattleBots about a possible hook up later this summer. I for one am looking forward to it, nothing quite like seeing two hundred plus pound remote controlled cars beating the crud out of each other. Ah, technology…

(page might be down, last I looked the server’s log files are filling up its hard drive!)
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Rise of the Exoskeletons

robo soldiersSoon you may be seeing squads of power suited troops on your evening news reports from international hot spots. Or at least that is what the Utah based start up company SARCOS wants. The exoskeletons amplify the strength of the operator enabling them to lift 200 pounds with no effort without sacrificing agility and speed. Even as these early tests were all tethered to a power supply, building a backpack sized power supply should be right around the corner.

[via futurismic]
Soldiers To Become Super-Human Mech Warriors

DIY Drones

DIY UAVI’m sure this is going to end up like the guy that has had a site about building the DIY cruise missiles.This

is a resource for all things about amateur Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs): How-to’s, links, videos, images and a discussion group. Among other things, this is where we’ll be listing all the parts, software and instructions to build each of our UAVs.

I know that I’d like to have a plane with a camera built into it. An autopilot would make lining up a good photo a lot easier. How cool would that be? It’s simply amazing what you can do with off the shelf stuff and some brains. Oh yeah, and LEGOS. Yes, one of these planes has a servo actuated camera mount that is built from LEGO parts. That in mind your not going to be loitering over your target all day looking for the guy that has been stealing your newspaper every morning. These UAVs get about 20 minuets in the air and can only go about five miles. Still, it is very cool.
DIY Drones

Production Line Built From Legos Builds Lego Cars


This is a wholly amazing example of what can be done with LEGOs and their line of microcontrollers. It’s a production line that creates little LEGO cars, you can even choose the colors of the bricks.
But can someone make a LEGO machine that builds production lines and in turn builds more production lines?

Constructigasm: Production Line Built From Legos Builds Lego Cars – Jalopnik

Robotic People Sweeper

Now I’m all for robots helping in our lives but this is kind of weird. These are apparently photos of a series of robotic rescue devices. The idea is that they can gently (I hope!) remove people from places that firefighters can’t get to due to smoke of heat. I’m sure that there are newer versions that don’t look like something that is out of some sci-fi ‘robots are going to eat all humans’ kind of movie. At least I hope that is the case.

[via Tokyo Times]
Unmanned rescue robot ([robokiyu]) translated page via Google

LEGO Gear Ratios

Gears and Drivetrains in LEGO MindstormsAnother useful tool for getting all creative with your LEGOS. A handy tutorial showing you common ratios for the gears that are common to the LEGO Mindstorm kit. You can also find these gears in a variety of other LEGO sets. And if your totally flummoxed about what gears are just having a look around should answer some of your questions.

Gears and Drivetrains in LEGO Mindstorms

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