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OmniTread: A serpentine robot

Posted by samzenpus on from the crawl-anywhere dept.

karvind writes "Physorg is running a story about OmniTread: a serpentine robot designed to traverse extremely difficult terrain, such as the rubble of a collapsed building. The 26-pound robot is developed at the University of Michigan U-M College of Engineering. It moves by rolling, log-style, or by lifting its head or tail, inchworm-like, and muscling itself forward. Link to videos. Check out there other robots as well."

8 of 150 comments (clear)

  1. Clarification of how this works by MobyDisk · · Score: 4, Funny
    From the article:
    These treads prevent the snakebot from stalling or becoming stuck on rough terrain because, similar to a tire touching a road, t the treads propel the robot forward like a tire touching a road.
    Well, that sure made it clear!
  2. Ooh, snake! A snake! by FlyByPC · · Score: 5, Funny

    Badgerbadgerbadger... (C'mon -- *someone* had to say it...)

    --
    Paleotechnologist and connoisseur of pretty shiny things.
  3. Re:Spheres with tentacles are better by schwatoo · · Score: 4, Funny

    "Any sufficiently tentacled sphere is indistinguishable from the Great Cthulhu".

    --
    I have trouble with passwords among other things.
  4. At least we haven't slashdotted the server yet... by carpe_noctem · · Score: 3, Funny

    ...but I'm sure we will soon. Everyone should check out this rad 7min video of this thing in action. Very cool. =)

    --
    "Quoting famous computer scientists out of context is the root of all evil (or at least most of it) in programming." - K
  5. Obligatory bash.org quote by dracken · · Score: 4, Funny

    what does your robot do, sam
    it collects data about the surrounding environment, then discards it and drives into walls

    -Dracken

  6. Re:Spheres with tentacles are better by Have+Blue · · Score: 3, Funny

    Thanks. Now I'll never look at Koosh balls the same way again.

  7. Slick. Wonder if.. by bunhed · · Score: 5, Funny

    you can program it in python?

  8. Re:cool by Jeremi · · Score: 3, Funny
    Or, perhaps "smart" cars that "know" how to handle obstacles and avoid collisions.


    Great, just what I need... SUVs crawling over my house at night.

    --


    I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.