Slashdot Mirror
Scaling Walls With Suction Cups
tedtarg writes "What will those clever Germans think of next? The BBC has a story
on a cool device called a gekkomat. Basically a set of suction cups that let u crawl up the side of buildings... Definitely a good tool for Batman to emulate Spiderman." Scaling walls is a good super power. Now lets get on scaling buildings in a single bound.
Sorta brings a whole new level of meaning to the term Blue Screen Of Death, doesn't it?
Hang from the celing of your boss's office. Spy on meetings.
Hang from celing of womens bathroom. Find out why they always take so long.
Hide from/ambush DBA's who want to work you to death 5 minutes before you leave.
Get a extremely large set of these, attach entire desk to celing. Work inverted all day long. pass out.
attach to airplane before takeoff. Free trip, anywhere. Hint: dress warmly, carry a parachute, just in case..
Climb buildings, save kitties, become hero of many young children.
Climb kitties, save buildings, $%*@* off PETA.
paint body like lizard. spend entire day on wall, sticking tonge out at people.
I loved this part:
"If irregularities should occur despite intensive safety measures
which are built into the machine, error codes are displayed and alternatives
to solve the situation are offered by the computer."
I can see it now, halfway up the Empire State Building: Poor suction detected. Please shutdown and perform a check-disk.
Seriously, when you're halfway up a building and not generating enough suction, what suggestions can the computer offer other than "pray!" ???
It would have been much cooler if instead of using a vacuum approach, they'd tried to replicate a real gecko's (almost fractal) micro cillia. The reason gecko's can walk on walls (and ceilings) is that it's feet are covered in microscopic fibres (covered in even more microscopic fibres, branching to every more microscopic fibres).
So in other words they should have used technology that doesn't suck.
Promote proofreading. Don't mod up sloppy posts.