Slashdot Mirror
AT-ATs Coming to a Forest Near You
Audent writes "Not strictly speaking anything any of us should classify as work related, or even open source, but holy shitbags! I want one of these.
Plustech, a subsidiary of tractor maker John Deere, has built a six-legged walking logging machine that just has to be the prototype for an AT-AT walker. Imagine parking this puppy at the mall!"
It does look like a giant mechanical ant though. From the videos, it looks SLOW and LOUD.
Still, I want one.
All movements for social change begin as missions, evolve into businesses, and end up as rackets.
I noticed that in one of the videos is walks with three legs at a time, keeping a tripod, and in the other it moves one leg at a time. Is there a specific reason for this? Perhaps something to do with the terrain?
Watch out, or I'll have the penguins eat you.
Oh...and, I'm liquid talent
the harvester advances forward and backward, sideways and diagonally. It can also turn in place and step over obstacles
Good. Maybe then those pesky forest rebels will have a harder time wrapping thier grappling hooks around me when I'm out logging.
,
faeryman
WANT ONE!!!!
--------
Bleah! Heh heh heh... BLEAH BLEAH!!! Ha ha ha ha...
I wonder if anyone else will take a look at this for other all-terrain applications? On the other hand, they appear to move very slowly.
(BTW, I feel the use of language in the main article is a bit innappropriate. Don't tell me there's anything holy about them either.)
I think with the interesting people, their lives can't possibly be wrapped up into a nice little package.
Because of course the world certainly needs newer, bigger, and better ways to cut down even more trees.
...a little bullet-proof glass, some armor & weapons...the little bitch is made for close-quarter urban demolition zone warfare.
I'm not really a web designer, I just play one on the Internet.
I imagine someone's already working on a hack to make this bad-boy dance the funky chicken. It'd be cool to watch a bunch of them dancing in sequence...
Code, Hardware, stuff like that.
Now all we need is to put the friggin laser (the high powered laser mounted on a jet) and mount it on the friggin 6 legged logging machine.
rm -rf sig
Cool -- Nice to see the underpinnings of BattleMechs are coming along nicely. I'll be flying my Phoenix Hawk LAM any century now!
you should read everything on the internet as if it had "but I'm probably talking out of my ass" appended to it.
MAN those things are loud. At least the operators at a nice interior with their 120 decibels of pain. (Though noone else will ever know quite how loud the videos are, once the first thousand people try to download the 7 megs of mpegs off of their site within the next 3 minutes. :)
In the movies it lifts its feet like a cat. This is the cool ass machine of the year.
Yeah, that would rock, until I see an old lady with a cart full of soda cans pass me at full speed on the mall's perimeter road. ~sob~
If this company wants to make a go of this, they're going to have to make a military version. I don't know about you, but if I saw one of these things comming at me, I'd run for the hills!
There is no spoon or sig.
The submitter is probably one of the people you see out on the road who drives a huge fucking gas-guzzling SUV and acts all fucking tough to make up for that they have a fucking tiny penis.
We must be careful with our Star Wars nomenclature. Both in tactical operation area (um, the woods), size, and appearance, this wood-cutting thingy most closely resembles an AT-ST, not an AT-AT. I think this may invalidate the numerous rebel grappling-hook jokes I see popping up. Unless that rope they used to trip 1 or 2 of the walkers in Return of the Jedi were grappling hooks....
Those pictures look like they were rendered in 3DMax or so. I cannot view the videos, since I run Linux (Linux forever!), but I'm skeptical...do they have a prototype, or just some pretty animations?
Karma: Good (despite my invention of the Karma: sig)
I give it 2 years before it makes it into the military.
Does anyone else think this looks like one of Dr. Seuss' worst nightmares?
Somewhere, a Lorax is crying...
.. they'll throw in a free Chewbacca custom.
Live web cams
Trooper: Sir, small green AT-ATs approaching!
... Its that loud "lawn-mower" sound... Kind of like a trash-compacter...
Rebel Officer: Damn! Are you sure?
Trooper: Yes, can't you hear it?
Rebel Officer: Oh yes... Whats the ETA?
Trooper: Well, given their current rate of speed, I would say 2... no make that 3 weeks.
Rebel Officer: Good work Trooper - We had best begin to pack up the base and move out by no later than... noon tomorrow.
Trooper: Roger roger.
my religion lies somewhere between buddhism and super monkey ball - pamphlet?
Didn't you know? All diabolical, evil genius' have one of these. Duh.
why run from Vincenzo?
What kind of idiotic, insensitive and utterly pointless comment is that? Wow, we've got some true pricks on this site
would probabbly look a lot like the "tank" in [Ghost in the Shell]. which would make sense, IMO, because the manuverability would be *so* superior to track-driven tanks.
well, with a couple decades of engineering work to make it move faster and more adaptable, anyway.
at the mean time, i want to see a consumer version for *real* off-roading. and the crane thing can be used to grab hot women out of their convertables while dozing around downtown LA.
My life in the land of the rising sun.
Yeah, sure, I'd run for the hills, too. And would pray to find no horny hillbillies trying to fuck my ass, like they did to Jon Voight in "Deliverance"...
I belong to the Holy Shit Church, and that robot there is *exactly* what we need to handle the bags full of the Holy Shit. We are getting one as soon as we can find a patron wealthy enough to finance it.
Let one of these these suckers on a crowd of rowdy drunken students or, after equipping it with 3D trackball controlled armament, wrapping it in titanium and Kevlar, on a throng of maniacs and religious zelots enacting scenes from "Palestinians VS Jews, Episode 28,000"
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
The goal of product development was a machine that has the best
possible working stability and minimum impact to the terrain.
Yes, chopping down hundreds of trees is def. minimal impact.
Where are the wacko's complaining about deforestation? Our "dwinding" tree supply is almost run out here in America! WHERE IS THE UPROAR? I CAN ONLY SEE A MILLION TREES IN MY BACKYARD! SOMEONE HELP US!
er... sorry.. just figured any article that mentioned trees should have some misinformed idiot complaining about the 3 trees we have left in the world due to evil Americans. Just helping keep the community stay alive...
HAIL ANTS!!!!
This thing needs pneumatic claws so it can grip the sides of mountains and buildings. Walking a cliff face or wall vertically or horizontally would be a requirement for any kind of urban deployment of this technology
Also, it should look more like an actual giant armored space ant.
turret with high powered water/foam/fire cannon would be a nice option. Perhaps with harpoon/grappling hook gun with high test line on gear reduced winch. That way it would be able to swing from building to building and fight fires, mothra or those angels from evangelion.
"Let him go, Ralph. He knows what he's doing." --Otto Mann (simpsons)
I think we've found the perfect replacement for those boring Mars rover designs. I'd like to see this think hobbling around the red planet taking mass spec measurements of things.
And when the Martians come to investigate the lander, it'll be alien stompin' time! Ka-krash!
The angel in the oatmeal.
Slashdot's "journalistic integrity" just seems to be getting better and better.
I have to go shower now... I just used "Slashdot" and "integrity" in the same sentence.
My ten-year-old is in love with it. Oh, cool! will it ever be seen at state fairs in the NW?
I wonder if we can convince Deere to have one at the state fair in Iowa.
Woohoo!
Awesome! Now I'll never be bothered by speed bumps, I can just step over them!
Oh wait...
Slashdot is like Playboy: I read it for the articles
That is it, mankind has officaly gone to f*cking far.
Yee freakin gads folks, this is like something out of a science fiction horror movie, big ass machines going around eating up trees? Well fuuuck, all we need is some slave labourers to be pushing it along rather then using gas and we'd have ourselves a nice dim bleak ass future.
I repeat.
fuck
Need help treating your acne? Come here!
Excuse me if I'm totally off base here, as I know nothing about logging. This machine seems to be more friendly to the environment, and that's its selling point or whatnot. But isn't logging like destroying the habitat anyhow, thus making this machine's eco-friendliness moot?
Loomis
"The television is the retina of the mind's eye" - Videodrome
I cannot view the videos, since I run Linux...
Dude! Get MPlayer or Xine. There are others, but those two seem to be pretty well done.
shitbag? isn't he talking about you chrisd?
Great... yet another mechanism to destroy the Pacific Northwest's (formerly) vast forests, after "buying" them from the corrupt US Forest Service.
Considering that these things burn some kind of fuel, and that they harvest wood which can also be used as a fuel (or turned into methyl alcohol to create fuel), what do you suppose the ratio of fuel spent to fuel harvested is for these puppies?
I'd bet it leans heavily to one side, specifically the spent one.
(sniff sniff) "Sir! I think your car stepped in something on the way to work this morning."
Table-ized A.I.
Star Wars introduced that AT-AT twenty years ago, and ALIENS the CAT walking forklift 15 years ago. Back in reality we have seen walking machines in labs for decades.
So after decades of research, the only commercial walking machine you can buy is an AIBO, and you can only lease a Honda ASIMO.
Is the walking lawn tractor slow and noisy? Yes, but so were IBM 360s and Ford Model Ts.
So congratulations to a company willing to do the hard R&D. With luck they will have a commercial machine on the market in a decade.
And then we can start hacking!
I'm so glad I saw this article here before I ran into one while hiking and found myself wishing I had brought a change of underwear. Not only that, but I'd probably never, ever again eat those funny mushrooms.
Thanks Slashdot!
Everything in the Universe sucks: It's the law!
What's the point of creating a machine that has minimal impact on the terrain of the forest? It's cutting down the damn forest, freakin' idiots. The forest is going to be a god damn barren field when they're done with it. Who cares if there are tread marks in the ground? Does anyone think the logging industry is concerned about environmental impact of the forest they are destroying? Yeah, I thought so...
Umm... this is hardly news. Me and my roommates built a few of these over spring break freshman year. We had some interest from a few of the local loggers, but not enough to mention it on Slashdot. Maybe this should be classified in the "Been there, done that Dept.?" or perhaps just wait for something new to come around before posting to Slashdot.
Have you ever even been around any construction/industrial equipment or machinery in your life? That thing is not loud by any means. In fact, until I watched the videos, the impression I was getting from all the loud comments was that this thing sounded like a jet engine or something (kinda like my comp sounds, heh). This thing is suprisingly quiet. I mean, if you listen closely as it walks, you can even hear the chains on its feet dangle and clank as the feet pads move. Sure, it isn't museum quiet, but your typically lawn mower is probably louder than this thing. I'll agree that it isn't all that fast, but I think the speed is almost just right for walking through forests, you don't wanna run into trees going too fast now.
And next you're going to tell me that NO nuclear reactor can produce energy? Or that pumping oil from the ground takes MORE energy than we get out of the oil?
You may think that you know thermodynamics, but you DON'T!!!
All bow to his Noodliness!! His Noodle Appendage has touched me!
If you're interested large scale mechanized walkers, check out www.mechaps.com They have a facility in California for building 2 legged mechs. Their site is kind of lax on the details, but their forums have more information.
Is wrap the legs of these things with cables a few times, and *CRASH* the walkers come tumbling down... Come on, haven't they ever seen Empire Strikes Back?
Whoever stated that signature sizes should be limited to one hundred and twenty characters can just go ahead and kiss my
You're obviously not clued in on how the logging industry works. These advancements will in NO WAY WHATSOEVER reduce logging. It will, however, increase profit, but don't think for a second that logging companies are going to log any less of their "purchased" parcels of land.
Heh. I replied with a link about this device in an older article. I believe it was the build your own battlemech posting. Wheee!
6 25 3&mode=nested&tid=159
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/07/26/121
if you think the logging machine is cool, check out the Spiderplow http://www.spiderplow.com
/left independently, plus about a dozen controls for the fiber burying blade.
:)
I worked on a crew that used one of these, installing fiber optic cable down the median of an interstate. The frickin' thing can go through the legs of highway signs, climb off of an 18-wheeler trailer SIDEWAYS, and stand on 1 leg while it's ripping.
The controls seem to be a little more involved than the logger, though. It's got a panel of about 30 two-way levers to control all of the motions. each leg can extend/retract, swivel forward/back, raise/lower, rotate each wheel right
Spiderplow = more bandwidth.
John Deere Forester = toilet paper.
It's ovious which one is the high-tech toy for the nerds
I think I need a new sig here.
OK, now that is just sweet.
march around blinding people left and right...
Can't wait to see one of these at the Henty Machinery Field days here Down Under.
Those legs are way too vulnerable.
Imagine rope or netting looped around a couple. I doubt they have much power for moving, simply strength for holding up. Think of your own legs when someone tied your shoelaces together. A puny little shoelace and you couldn't break it with your legs! One of the few things I believed in whatever Star Wars episode that was (New Hope?).
The legs need armor, but trying to armor them individually and completely would add way too much weight and bulk.
Consider a tank -- all that armor on the sides and some on the top. Battleships armored the individual turrets, but almost all the rest was on the sides and under the deck. Individual compartments were not armored. Not even magazines had their own armor, they were simply buried as deep as possible within the armor.
Infuriate left and right
They also built its body closer to the ground, making it harder to wrap with a harpoon line.
"You saved 1968." - Ms. Valerie Pringle to the crew of Apollo 8
Most environmental groups either worry about the effect of logging on local wildlife, or the rampant destruction of trees in south america.
The fact that a cool-ass tree-cutter comes along really doesn't bother them too much. Its more of the parking lot thats gonna replace the tree they hate more.
| - | - |
If you don't want to see them set your preferences above 0 or so. However there is some pretty good stuff that gets missed or occasionally suppressed at 0.
Degaussing scares the bad magnetism out of the monitor and fills it with good karma.
First thing that came to mind was a prototype chavline, a la The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson. Granted, the chevaline had four legs and no enclosed cockpit, as I recall. Still, that's the first thing that sprang to my mind. Wow. I want.
Why isn't it green?
It is a John Deere after all. (well it's from a subsidiary anyway)
think what a mess cars, bikes and motorcycles were at first..... i'm sure in time it will destroy the forest like nothing else...... if anything else is left to destroy by the time they perfect it.
actually when you consider the time they probably spend accessing logs by building roads and what not......
NO WAIT! SCREW THIS! they should only be logging forests they planted to log in the first place. if the forest floor is rough and messy, then it is meant to be left alone. i hope the Army takes this project over and uses it to shoot rebel scum. please leave the trees alone. thanks bye!
I watched the videos, and I can't imagine this thing hauling logs around and keeping balanced. What would this actually be used for in a logging operation?
Brant
Actually, if used wisely (which as always is a big if), something like this could be quite good for helping to stop deforestation. No roads need to be cut into the forest, and no clearcutting; instead a couple of guys with these could pick out a tree here, a tree there, and still leave the forest basically intact. It's like plucking a few hairs from your head here and there, vesus shaving one spot.
Oh, and the question is not "tree" supply. It's forests. A forest is more than just a bunch of trees, ya know.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
I see something like this.. I get inspired..
That doesn't mean I accomplish anything useful...
That just means I'm destined to spend the next year attempting to one up that thing.. just because I know I can....
Until the next project comes along....
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
According to my Windows 2000 "System Properties" dialog, my PC is already AT/AT compatible! I guess I won't have to buy a special interface card now.
Go to the John Deere home site http://www.deere.com/en_US/deerecom/johndeere_worl dwide/index.html - no mention of "PlusTech" at all.
If you look closely at the photo's of the machine and the video you'll notice they look 'artificial' -- a little too clean and crisp compared with the background. Also, if you're going to video your state-of-the-art vehicle wouldn't you get a better location for your camera than back behind a boat-load of trees and bushes?
Funny how the web site is unfinished (i.e. the boaring elements to fake up havn't been done -- but the fun graphics have).
Well executed mind-you, but someone should tell the guys (or gals) who did this that it's "April 1" they should have been shooting for, not "August 1"
Rich people are eccentric. Poor people are strange. Me, I'd be happy with odd.
I want to see them make one that can go as fast as a Zoid.
With weapons to match.
MrCreosote Meow!Thump!Meow!Thump!Meow!Thump! "You're right! There isn't enough room to swing a cat in here!"
NekoBus
If you don't want to repeat the past, stop living in it.
I knew it would happen. Someday big corporations would gain the strength they need to crush the forests. Huge behemoths would walk the forests leaving a swath of destruction with their mechanized chainsaws and huge claws. The stench of diesel fuel would replace the sweets smell of pine.
I knew...
Someday they would come to Fern Gulley, and all that could stop them was a 4 inch man and a bunch of HOT pixies.
the actual pictures make me think Terminator, one of these coming out of the foggy woods, on a hunting day....hilarity is bound to ensue :)
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
If anybody has read anything about the history of the Battletech universe, WorkMechs, the predecessors to BattleMechs, were developed in the 21st century. Only 900 years until total Mechwarrior happiness!
Condemnant quod non intellegunt.
NO, NO NO!! *This* is how to do a PROPER /. "how-to":
1. John Deere forestry machine
2 AT-ST
3. ???
4. Profit!!!
Look, in Tasmania the forestry industry is pretty fucked for lots of reasons. Yet "they" still come out with the same crap that you've just spouted. Chain logging may reduce the impact on the soil due to wheeled and tracked vehicles. However, it also means that the idiots can also log some of the steepest slopes, that is those that they would have never been able to log before. They (the logging companies) don't give a rats ass about the ecological implications of what they are doing, they are simply trying to subdue the public (and Government in many cases) long enough for them to screw us all over. I only feel a bit churned up over this because in Tasmania we have 400 year old 70+ metre tall Eucalyptus Regnums (the tallest hardwoods in the world) being sold for chips at just over AU$1000 a pop - it makes me sick
I'm sold, do they have any color other then Deer Green?
I just about dropped my Jedi training ball when I read that!
Infuriate left and right
By Eru! That has got to be the coolest vehicle I've ever seen! How come that doesn't get much publicity? I didn't think any commercial/industrial grade walking vehicles existed! Flippin' Dustpuppies, you bet Thinkgeek should carry these!
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity.
IT'S A GIANT COOTIE!
Seriously, remember the game "Cootie" when you were kids? (Those of you who aren't kids anymore anyway.)
He looked at me and said, "Kid, we don't like your kind, and we're gonna send your fingerprints off to Washington."
As anyone who read the article knows, this isn't a new new invention nor is it made by John Deere company.
;)) and later a small company (Plustech I think) was formed to continue the project.
The sig-legged bugger was originally designed at Helsinki University of Technology (at which I am conincidentally studying
This beast is really a interesting product, but I've heard that no customer wants to be the first to use for real-life logging and pay for the huge development costs...
So just how is that trottle lever marked?
-- Walk --
-- Trot --
--Canter--
--Gallop--
Do not fold, spindle or mutilate.
These walking machines are great for reducing damage while logging by reducing the need for road building and reducing the tracks they make on the ground.
All present walking machines share one big problem though, they are inefficient. This one needs a big diesel to generate constant hydraulic pressure, most of which is used just to keep it standing. Hardly any is left to propel the machine forward.
Animals typically use almost no energy to stand, and get most of their locomotion energy back through tendons etc.
Another problem is that bugs fall a lot. The six legged gait is not particularly stable at speed. Fast bugs switch from six to four leg gait when they speed up, and even two leg gait for sprints.
So this machine is stuck with the dead-slow one-at-a-time gait or the tippy six leg tripod gait, which is still pretty slow, and it has to have a big ass engine because of the inherent inefficiency.
I guess JD figures all of the above are worth it to silence the whining Greenies who cry over every tree. I'd say this year's fires are a pretty good argument in that direction. I expect to see a bunch of these things running up and down in the next few years, thinning the over grown bush.
Hope this works out for JD, as in a few years these things will hit the used equipment market. Then we can hot rod 'em!
If it was a lil bit quieter...and a lil faster it would be awesome for scaring the crap outta ppl.... put some lights or neon flow strips or something on the legs... i can just see it now...... wee!!!
"an eye for an eye only makes the whole world blind"
For several millennia humans have consumed longer-lived trees and forest habitat at higher rates than they have been replaced. Forest resources may be able to be renewed, but they are not being renewed at sufficiently high rates to stop or reverse their age-old consumption rates. Civilization generally, and advanced society in particular, is so dependent upon various levels of technology that are not well-integrated with nature that it seems unlikely that the biosphere can continue indefinitely to support humankind without more human concern for biospheric stability and continuity. The question of the next few millennia may be whether or not humankind can learn how to put the essence of humanity into some reproducible non-biological form before the biosphere is no longer able to support biological human habitation. Whether or not it would be easier, in the long run, to plant trees, create forest habitat, and live as humans in better harmony with the terran biosphere than to attempt to embed some subset of human characteristics into non-traditional materials in order to be able to live in radically altered terran or non-terran environments is a moot question if humans continue to resist living in sustainable harmony upon the only planet we are sure can sustain us.
Why doesn't the government pull the money out and then we can all go straight to growing hemp for all our pulp needs?
And you could use the zero THC varieties, so don't go crazy with the "evil weed" bullshit, ok?
i've always thought of HTML as
<foo> <!--this is where foo begins >
this sidebar is foo'd
</foo> <!--this is where foo ends >
so, should i take a real course or is my conceptualization too far removed from reality to benefit from guidance?
united states nuclear device terrorist bioweapon encryption cocaine korea syria iran iraq columbia cuba
Don't worry. In Finland (the originating country of that contraption) we have at least three million and three trees.
I'd like to have one of those for our summer hideout. Just to get those damn firs out of our otherwise nice forests.
Seriously, I do not think that deforestation is not that serious of a problem, at least in temperate areas. If Americans and Canadias manage somehow to hack down every tree in the subcontinent: do not worry, there's plenty in Russia. And they probably wouldn't mind selling it for dollars. (Or even notice, in case one went in with a C-130 on a out-of-the-way abandoned airfield).
Where the heck are the night elves when you don't expect them?
In some areas it might make sense to consider draft horses and sledges and drag the trees to the nearest road. They're probably cheaper to operate and less impact on the terrain. Certain types of soft terrain or areas where you may not build roads are examples. If the cutting is done when the ground is frozen, movement is easier. Adding modern materials or design (tracks?) to the sledge could reduce the number of draft horses used.
Six legged walking machines definitely have a hi-tech coolness, but are a young technology. Four legged walking machines have been refined by us for thousands of years for the specific task of dragging heavy things.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
With regard of Yesterday's news a better title might have been:
Talibans: AT-ATs are Coming to a cave Near *!You!*
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
I was able to get to the site using links from www.deere.com through www.timberjack.com
r e_ const/docs1/affiliated_companies.html?sidenavstate =00001
e ve lopment.htm
http://www.deere.com/en_US/cfd/construction/dee
http://www.timberjack.com/development/concept-d
So they made a machine that would replace .5 humans traditionally sawing a Weyerhauser Weed and let it roll down the mountain. The vehicle is something I'd like to use to take to the bar, but it didn't seem like it was anything that would revolutionize the logging industry. Humans are built perfectly to chop lumber at an extreme angle.
~S
It's like the paragraph tag. Your browser shouldn't complain if you close a paragraph you never officially opened (like this one).
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
I always wanted to be... a LUMBERJACK!
Leaping from tree to tree, as they float down the mighty rivers of British Columbia! The larch! The redwood! The mighty Scotch pine! With me
best girl by me side, as we sing, sing sing!
Oh, I'm a lumberjack and I'm OK, I sleep all night and I work all day.
(He's a lumberjack and he's OK, he sleeps all night and he works all day.)
I cut down trees, I eat my lunch, I go to the lava'try, On Wednesdays I go shopping, and have buttered scones for tea.
(He cuts down trees, he eats his lunch, he goes to the lava'try, On Wednesdays he goes shopping, and has buttered scones for tea.)
I'm a lumberjack and I'm OK, I sleep all night and I work all day
I cut down trees, I skip and jump, I like to press wildflow'rs, I put on women's clothing, and hang around in bars.
(He cuts down trees, he skips and jumps, he likes to press wildflow'rs, He puts on women's clothing... and hangs around in BARS?!?!)
I'm a lumberjack and I'm OK,
I sleep all night and I work all day
I cut down trees, I wear high heels, suspenders and a bra I wish I'd been a girlie, just like my dear Pappa!
(He cuts down trees, he wears high heels... suspenders and a BRA?!?!)
Oh I'm a lumberjack and I'm OK, I sleep all night and I work all day Yes I'm a lumberjack and I'm O-K... I sleep all night and I work all day!
Someone could easily disable it by flying an aircraft with wire around its legs!
Ciryon
It's a bit hard to tell from the videos, but it looks as if the cabin moves around a bit as the legs walk. I wonbder how this compares to driving a caterpillar-tracked vechile over the terrain? Would the cabin movement be more prone to induce "sea-sickness" motion effects?
----------------------------------- My Other Sig Is Hilarious -----------------------------------
Instantly when seeing the vehicle I noticed it was the same that made the news here years back. Glad to see it's making progress.
Can't wait to have the "civilian" version: never mind parking problems - just step over 'em!
Finland, Finland, Finland; the place I want to be
freezing, drunken, paid and prized for innovative anarchy
I think, therefore thoughts exist. Ego is just an impression.
In the Star Wars: Magic of Myth exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, I learned that the AT-AT's gate was modeled after that of an elephant. And distorted elephant noises mixed with slick highway traffic sounds were used to create the TIE Fighter sound effects.
--
http://www.macboy.com
Cartoons for Mac Geeks
If you want to go faster through the woods you could still use the imperial speeder-bikes, right?
- mipe -
A believe in one of the books (the Timothy Zahn trilogy), there was mention of a six legged AT-MT walker developed for mountainous terrain.
*NERD!!!*
Oh, how much time until I can drive my Patlabor? I just can't wait!
Cryogenics NOW!
I realize that the purpose of this device is to lessen the impact of vehicles on the forest, which is great, but is anyone else freaked out by its resemblance to the rapid forest destroying machines in Dr. Seuss's "The Lorax"? Maybe Hollywood can make a live action version now.
Syntax error: loose != lose, affect != effect, then!=than
Is a logging company paying you to post in forums?
"but if this machine costs too much to opperate, it won't sell. Margins are EXTREMELY important to logging companies."
Really now, you think John Deere might have some concept of how much they can expect to sell logging equipment to logging companies for? Is it really too much to think that they just might have actually considered that when they designed the frigging thing?
These companies really are lucky to have Slashdot Geeks here to catch their mistakes. I'm sure they're extremely grateful to you, for pointing out that they have to be careful how they price it or they might not sell any.
Thank you, Captain Fucking Obvious.
Dean Ing wrote about a similar machine in his 1976 story Malf
It's a good man-machine interface story, if you can hunt it up. No spoilers :-)
a level 4 turbo or something. yea, parking it is a bitch, but damn, come on...at least get me there quickly...
reminds me of the scene in office space where the old man w/ the walker is kicking all the traffic's ass. i would put $5 on the old man vs. that thing..
These are fun...made w/ muscle wire... nitinol
how about incomprehensible equations?
Works for me! When I get upset, I tend to yell "Tangent of 90!!!"
3. Profit!
2. ???
1. On Soviet Slashdot, a Beowulf cluster of alien Natalie Portman overlords welcomes YOU!
OK, that's disturbing.
A giant cat with an internal carrying capacity?
That's as sick as gigantic, long-legged insects with their carapace hollowed out, and...
Uh, never mind.
3. Profit!
2. ???
1. On Soviet Slashdot, a Beowulf cluster of alien Natalie Portman overlords welcomes YOU!
Is Slashdot now just a memepool retread?
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
i wonder if they've considered a version of this vehicle for fighting forest fires?
Jeez- now I just have to read one site a day
...the cutter mechanism on the end of it's boom. That is REALLY cool. I saw a show on TLC (I think it was Modern Marvels or something) that showed how this cutting head works. It grabs onto a tree trunk, cuts it off, rolls the length of the trunk stripping off the branches, and then rolls back over the trunk cutting it into pre-determined lengths. It estimates these lengths by determinig the tree's length by using the tree's diameter and stored "tree data" based on tree type. Seeing this thing in action leaves your eyes glued to the TV and your jaw glued to the floor!!!
My mom always said, "Jim, you're 1 in a million." Given the current population, there are 7000 of me. God help us all!
n/t
Nothing perambulates like a Deere...
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
This is very geek. It is an engineering masterpiece. MechE's around the world are rejoicing.
-- Probability does not dismiss possibility --
The Hills? NONONONONO! That's where they are most effective. You need to run to the flat wide open spaces. That way you could out run and out manouver it on your trusty tricycle.
There is nothing so silly as other peoples traditions, and nothing so sacred as our own.
It's more like the AT-TE witch can be seen battling the Trade Federation on the ground on Geonosis in Attack of the Clones. AT-TE even got three legs!
n de x.html
http://www.starwars.com/databank/vehicle/atte/i
- Henrik
- when the Shadows descend -
Okay... yeah... this thing just eats trees for breakfast. I'm pretty sure someone could put one of these to good use on a battlefield, but forget guns man. Just convince this Tree Mech here that those Taliban guys are just really funny looking trees (eg). Seriously, I'm sure that it could be set up for some serious combat, but until we get into fighting in rough terrain (Forest, really rocky areas, maybe Jungles... but that might be a stretch), this big guy just isn't going to be very helpful. Except of course as an intimidation thing. You know, you've got a gun, you've got tanks backing you up. But they've got a giant metal spider walking towards you with a really big gun aimed at you. Just don't tell them how much better the tanks that are following it are in this terrain. Laters
I think it's more like an AT-PT. Still damn friggin' cool.
-------
People are great... When they don't come near me.
If the walkers in Star Wars were equipped with close weapons, they would have a) been able to dispatch the Ewoks/rebels that cast the nets or set the triplines and b) been able to destroy the entaglement device. In Mech Warrior, close quarter armements would have been able to hit mechs that were below the range of the main weapons, eliminating the "save zone"
A real-world waling weapons platform would be able to use a rapid-fire projectile weapon to the same effect. Small belly-mounted turrets would be able to fill this niche.
science is a religion
Like any Slashdot readers go hiking. That means actually going outside and being with Nature!
Modern tank main guns, when used in the anti-armour role, don't use an explosive projectile. Instead, they fire a dart of dense metal (like tungsten or depleted uranium) at very high velocities. The pure kinetic energy drives the penetrator through the armour, and the sudden pressure rise within the fighting compartment superheats the air inside, killing the crew and (usually) cooking off any ammo inside the turret in a secondary explosion.
The muzzle velocity of these projectiles ranges from 1400 m/s to 1800 m/s.
Typical engagement ranges in open country extend from 5000m at the very outside, down to about 1000m Ranges in close country are correspondingly closer.
That means in the best possible case (a 5000m engagement in open country) you will have roughly 3 seconds to realize you have been fired upon, attempt evasive action, and get the vehicle clear of the space that will be occupied by the penetrator.
At more typical ranges, you have 1 second to accomplish same.
Not going to happen. Sorry.
DG
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
Sadly people like him can not see the Forest for the Trees.
There's two more disadvantages to consider - gun platform stability, and ground pressure.
A legged vehicle is probably pretty stable while stationary, but what happens if you fire a 125mm main gun while walking, with legs up in the air?
The other consideration is ground pressure. Tanks weigh between 40 and 70 tons. They spread all that weight over the large surface area of the tracks, and get the ground pressure down to a more reasonable level. What happens if you move from the high-surface-area tracks to 6 low-surface-area legs, especially in muddy or soft terrain?
Kinda embarrassing to get your AT-AT stuck in the mud....
DG
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
I think you missinterpret. I think that the paragraph tag is an opening tag which should use a closing tag with a slash, but most browsers will not complain if you never close it.
my father has long substituted "square root" for "fuck all". Not an equation per se, but in same ball park.
That was classic intercourse!
Back in the old days, the great teak wood forests of Northern Thailand were logged using elephants. Very nimble, incredibly strong, elephants could drag giant logs across the worst of terrain, with minimal damage to the ground or to the surrounding ecosystem. Sure they left around large piles of manure, but that at least helped fertilize the soil.
Then American-style mechanized logging came in, the great forests were indiscriminantly clear cut, and the elephants were replaced with 10-wheeled trucks. The elephants and their mahout masters were left unemployed, and now roam Bangkok, beggers, to be hit by cars and gawked at by tourists.
I admire this mechanized logger as a good way to log with less damage to the forests, but aren't we developing technology where environmentally friendly four-legged solutions already exist?
Patiwat Panurach
patiwat@sloan.mit.edu
I have a 38" penis!
... I would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
So what do you estimate a cargo plane load of hardwood logs would fetch on the open market? I would assume that Japan would be where to get top dollar, da?
So it works for the [story], but not in the replies, right?
This is kind of funny-- In the war game/novels/cartoon/Video Game BattleTech, they attribute the battlemechs conception to robots just like this used in Mining and construction. :)
:)
Maybe someday I'll finally be able to buy myself a Locust.
I've noticed that my browser does not complain when I close paragraphs that I never explicitly opened (like this one).
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
How long until the Ewoks start battling the Empireal forces?
Oh GOOD! Finnaly, a machine that can cut down 1 tree per hour! Just what we need! And to think, it only cost millions of dollars in researching and developing. Ah, the marvels of modern technology. We've got a speed demon on our hands here - fire the cutting crews and buy a dozen of those babies. What? We don't have enough money and our revenues would go down the drain?! WHO CARES! It's new and "improved"! We've GOT TO BUY IT!!! (sheesh)
Ever notice how fast Windows runs? Neither did I.
That's one of the coolest machines I've seen in a while. The videos show two gaits: Going down the hill, it moves one leg at a time -- walking. On flat land, it moves three legs at a time, always keeping a tripod on the ground -- trotting. I wonder if it has any other gaits? Galloping would be something to see...
Mike van Lammeren
It will challenge your head, your brain, and your mind.
I saw a very similar machine on a tv logging special a while back. And while you would assume that the 'AT-AT' would be a very stiff and rigid machine, it wasn't. To view video of it (and i'll once again point out, it wasn't the same machine) in hi-res @ 30fps was stunning. The arm just seemed to have a life of it's own as it wildly swept in to grasp, trim, and cut it's next victim. It by no means seemed precise in it's movements, but the randomness and looseness it had really gave it charm. I know it seems out to talk to passionantly about a logger, but it was just crazy.
Only the meek get pinched. The bold survive.
The tree people are not complaining because they (understandably) are scared to death of the evil walking insectile death-robots that the foresters now possess .
We are helpless to resist their untippable tripod-balanced might.
A more efficient weapon to finally destroy what forests we have left. Any doubters remaining, try flying form L.A. to Portland or Seattle sometime and look at all the bare patches out the window.
The only thing lethal about it is that the operator's sillouette is available for all with an AK47 to sight in on. If you ever talk to any engineers who have worked in a combat zone a common complaint about heavy machinery is that sometimes the operator is a perfect target, often an experienced combat heavy machinery operator will choose a crappier machine for the job if it makes them less of a target. If someone can see your sillouette .. they'll take a shot at you.... especially if you owe them money.
The best defense sometimes in combat is a good shovel.
Otherwise there wouldn't be time for the dramatic snowfield battle, they'd just walk up and blow the generators.
1984 was supposed to be a warning, not an instruction manual.
As a forester, I can call that toy work-related, so I'll have a shot (12 gauge - not!) at it. Though it may look like a tech leap, it's not much more than the last evolution of the "spider" wlaking excavators (4 fulcrums, 2 wheels, 2 articulated arms) that have been around since the 60s. It sure may go on harsher slopes than tracked and wheeled ones but it's only a harvester, which means you still have to get skidders and loaders on the field, or get the logs evacuated by cable or throwing (don't do this at home.) I don't think this system will be stable enough for a skidder anytime soon. Actually, I'm not sure it could even be used with the heavier harvesting heads, hence limiting its usefulness to small softwood. That's ok as long as there's a market with large scale mining-like logging operations, but hat won't last for long, as it's already being abandoned for most of the tropical logging, and Northern America won't be able to sustain it much further either. That you need to keep some degree of forest cover to avoid turning the slopes to badlands defeats its purpose. And ecocertification is becoming a must have to sell the logs and derivative products, which will make clear cuts less frequent... On the other hand, it can come handy on rough, uneven land. Armour was mentioned earlier. Most of the thick steel plating is underside to limit damage from stumps, rocks and unexploded canon and mortar shells. The best destination I could think of to this system is a multipurpose tractor for stump shredding, soil preparation and planting in small mountains areas to limit soil erosion. I'm not expecting anything like that from John Deere, as they mainly make ultra-specialized tools (harvesters and feller-bunchers for that one, I guess), but another manufacturer may do it. Of course, you'd still probably do better with a walking excavator most of the time. A distant second best use would be on WW I and II battlefields, though this case is in unheard of in the USA. All in all, this probably won't be much more than some offside experiment for the marketing guys to tout around, not the logging mainstream. Yet, I have to agree it would indeed look good on a parking lot.
"When will you be back?"
"I can't tell you that. It's classified."
whuppy enjoys smelling like diesel fuel
excerpt:
Protection -- According to the Army report, 8 Abrams crews reported being hit by fire from the Iraqi T-72 , but there was no damage. Later reports claimed that 100-mm rounds fired by T-55 tanks simply glanced off. 125-mm rounds from the T-72 dented the M1A1's armor, but did not penetrate. Of the over 1,950 M1s and M1A1 tanks in the Kuwaiti Theater of Operations (KTO), only four suffered catastrophic damage and four were damaged but repairable, the Army report stated. Later analysis revealed that of the four that caught fire, three were hit erroneously by US AGM-114 Hellfire missiles. No crewmen were injured because the bustle doors and blow- off panels worked as designed to vent the explosions upward.
please note that US army post a more serious threat to itself than any enemy shells, due to the advances in armor technology
2) a tracked tank makes an easy (easier) target because you have *zero* lateral movement. a tank's position can be predicted with reasonable accuracy and simplicity. add side-back movement, however, aiming becomes much more of a pain in the ass. that's why you run zig-zag to lessen your chance of being hit by bullets (if you are a lowly infantry unit).
3) one other reason for legs is the ability (i am not sure on this as per the current state of technology, but hopefully this is something they would strive for) -- sudden and fast acceleration. the time for you (as a person) to run, stop, hop sideways, etc is minimal compared to if you wan to do similar things with the best of tanks. hence making the dodges (if you are concerned about those still) possible.
i firmly believe that legged battle vehicles will be the future; i could be wrong, of course. but in my view there are simply too many benefits to pass up by sticking with current sort of technology.
My life in the land of the rising sun.
Dean Ing wrote a short story called "Malf" in which he describes a legged vehicle designed for logging. One of the walkers gets stolen by a Mafia-linked guy who uses it to rob a bank (!) and the good guys have to chase it down with another walker.
The story isn't online anywhere, but it can be found here.
To a Lisp hacker, XML is S-expressions in drag.
There is already a bioengineered solution to this problem- it's called an elephant.
________________________________________ History Must Not Fall Into The Wrong Hands ___________________________________
You should see one of these things cutting trees. The arm grabs the trunk, auto-locates at the selected stump height, cuts the tree like butter, and immediately strips all the branches. It's impressive. :)
Working at Deere is cool. We get to play with all the cool "big boy" toys.
Serving your airship needs since 1995.
I wanna see that thing sprint!
Imagine parking this puppy at the mall
Forget that! Imagine a beowulf cluster of these!
Yea, I know what trolling is. I'm not new to the 'net world ... either way, this is tasteless and pointless ... I ignore a bunch of troll, but this one I could not hold back
Uh huh, it looks almost just like a Super-Axe-Hacker
Reality is finally catching up with the classic Thunderbirds TV show.
f ab/TB/si dewinder.jpg
Separated at birth?
http://pioneer.crc.paragould.ar.us/~adam/
My God I'm so sad that I know what that is.....
Keep in mind that I'm a retired tank troop commander, so I sorta know what I'm talking about.
1) Modern armour can stop APFSDS rounds
Under the right circumstances, yes, but consider what the "right circumstances" are.
Firstly, any data from the Gulf war vs American tanks is data that describes second or third line equipment vs state of the art equipment. In case you didn't know, the digits in the designation of Soviet-era equipment represent the year it was first identified by NATO - so a T55 was first encountered in *1955* and a T-72 in *1972*
Related to this is that the Soviets never sold their top-line equipment to client states. They kept the good stuff for themselves, and sold derated stuff to customers.
Secondly, the price of all that armour protection is a great deal of mass. While the exact composition of the M1's armour is still top secret, it is known to have at least one layer of depleted uranium in it (the same stuff used in the penetrator) It also has a bunch of ceramics to defend against HEAT warheads, and an anti-spall layer to help the crew.
On a legged vehicle, you have to not only move this mass forward, you have to LIFT it too.
On a tracked vehicle, the tank rolls over its tracks much like a train. There is suprisingly little friction there - ask anyone who ever made the mistake of trying to change both tracks at once, and had the tank roll away from them.
The idea of 65 tons JUMPING straight up in the air is just ludicrous. Work out how much energy that would take! And then work out the ground pressure when it lands, and figure out how far it'll be driven into the soil.
2) Tanks are very much more manouverable than you seem to realize. They can spin in place at very high speeds, and then squirt out in unexpected directions. The first time you actually see a tank in motion, it'll scare the crap out of you. These are not giant lumbering monsters, they are 65 ton sportscars.
3) Even if you somehow manage to find a power source that could drive a legged vehicle, even if you can solve the ground pressure problem, you still have to deal with the fact that you're still completely dependant on crew reaction time to recognise you're being shot at, assess the incoming tradjectory, and then make an appropriate evasive action. The incoming round is supersonic, so no help there. Radar and other active sensors give away your position, so that's no good. You're down to the Mark I eyeball picking up the muzzle blast... and at an average of 1 second from firing to impact, you'd have a better chance at dodging a bullet.
Not gonna happen.
DG
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
In tasmania there is quite a solid and well established greens movement that has had a string of major wins (and losses) over the past few decades. And yes, I've gone and sat in trees and spoken at ralleys and written to the government. But the logging is so strongly entrenched with the government that it's a complex social and political problem - as it is everywhere no doubt. Anyways, the news is somewhat good as we just had an election and the greens party went from 1 seat to four (out of 25) so the battle shall continue.