Piston powered Robot

Getting robots into areas not previously possible is what the researchers at National Robotics Engineering Center in Lawrenceville, Georgia have been musing over of late.

Six years later and about $1.2mn lighter of wallet (Boeing’s contribution to the experiment) they have a prototype of their pneumatic piston powered bouncing robot which makes its way around in a surprisingly controlled manner although the noise is akin to a hundred cap guns firing off every minute.

The rolling robot pushes out its pistons to give it both forward projection and upward projection, “The good thing you get from hopping is access to places you cannot get any other way,” said senior systems scientist Dimi Apostolopoulos, head of the project.

Even if these robots never make it outside the lab, the ex Sci-Fi illustrator said “field testing” with his two young daughters has convinced him the machines would be hit toys.

J.C. Schisler/Tribune-Review

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