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'Robonaut' Designed To Perform Spacewalk

Posted by Hemos on from the purty-robot-does-good-in-big-city dept.

Adam Blake writes "CNN reports that NASA has designed a robotic spacewalker called the Robonaut which will perform satellite repairs and other duties typically performed by spacewalking astronauts. It is controlled remotely via a virtual reality interface and bears a small, apparently 'coincidental' resemblance (in the face) to intergalactic bounty hunter Boba Fett."

6 of 67 comments (clear)

  1. Needs some additions, like 2 more arms by anticypher · · Score: 3

    This looks like a great design. Nothing too radical to confuse astronauts controlling it. Learning curve should be fairly shallow.

    But it could benefit by adding a couple of arms designed for a limited grasp and hold function. An operator could position one of these extra arm to hold an object in place, hit a freeze button, then go back to using the two prehensile arms.

    I wish I had one of these for work around the house. So many times I wished I could have 4 or 5 arms to get a quick and dirty job done :-)

    the AC

    And are we forgetting the chainsaw and BFG hand attachments, sold separately :-)

    --
    Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
  2. Space hijinx by gad_zuki! · · Score: 3

    Oh I can't wait to see the first time the astronats use it for some silly prank, and they will its great PR. Here are some possibilities:

    "Who's piloting the shuttle!?!"

    A close up of a robot arm putting a human hand in warm water.

    "Who's been in the bathroom for so damn long?!"

    The first outer space robot human back massage.

    A very synchronized dance routine when NASA springs for 2 of these.

  3. About the bot by Money__ · · Score: 3

    Subsystems
    Hand| Arms| Head| Controls| Avionics| Telepresence|
    Videos (.AVI)
    Hand (5.3 M)| Telepresenc e (3.3 M)| Arm motion (2.9 M)| Grasping (2.1 M)| Tether hook (1.9 M)| Velcro (2.7 M)|
    Tools
    Analysis tools| Software development | Telepresence Laboratory
    ___

  4. Virtual Reality Interfaces by Dungeon+Dweller · · Score: 3

    I remember when the arms outside the spacecraft were supposedly going to be controlled by VR. Does anybody know if this ever really came to be? It would seem to me, that precision is much better with a multiview interface. You can always misjudge distance with VR, but multiple viewing (like in high school drafting class, kids) forces you to look at the actual orientation. Just a thought.

    On a side note, applications like this are one of the few areas that I see vr interfaces as being truly useful. I don't really see the point of VR chatting, it's fun for games, OS's that use it make little to no sense to me however. I think that sometimes, VR is a solution looking for a problem. A neet glossy toy that everyone wants to take credit for being the first to do something truly useful with it. There is SOME serious research, but the majority of it seems to be the fluffy and filler and eyecandy of computer science (not that I don't love every tasty morsel).

    --
    Eh...
  5. More Information by adastra · · Score: 4

    I work for one of the contractors on the Robonaut project. It's coming along nicely, with more automation of repetitious tasks and intelligent responses to failures (such as lost communication) planned for the next few years. Here's some more information.

  6. Direct NASA link by Money__ · · Score: 4

    http://vesuvius.jsc. nasa.gov/er_er/html/robonaut/robonaut.html
    ___