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NASA Fashions Mountain-Climbing Robot
coondoggie writes "NASA researchers today said they had built and tested a robot that can rappel off cliffs, travel over steep and rocky terrain, and explore deep craters. The prototype rover, called Axel, might help future robotic spacecraft better explore and investigate foreign worlds such as Mars. On Earth, Axel might assist in search-and-rescue operations in locations where people might not be able to reach.
Axel can operate upside down and right side up and uses only three motors: one to control each of its two wheels and a third to control a lever. The lever contains a scoop to gather lunar or planetary material for scientists to study, and it also adjusts the robot's two stereo cameras, which can tilt 360 degrees, NASA said."
NASA's write-up with pics.
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
IANANE (I Am Not A NASA Engineer) but, IMHO, it will be powered by using the tether as a power cord, using stationary rover's solar cells, who stays on the edge of the crater (not sure about mountains...), as in the image:
http://www-robotics.jpl.nasa.gov/systems/systemImage.cfm?System=16&Image=414
Or maybe rechargeable batteries and periodical recharging from the main rover ?
A video of the system can be found here
Oh honey look... How cute... an angry slashdotter!
If you're interested in Axel, you should check out the Axel Homepage at Caltech. It has more information about the hardware, more movies, etc.
Slashdot might also be interested to know that Axel currently runs a stripped down version of Debian.
We are using lithium polymer batteries to power it right now. One of our current batteries will power Axel for about 20 minutes. With the current design we could easily fit two of these batteries inside, giving a running time of ~40 minutes.
It's important to note that Axel wraps the tether around it's own body. There's no winch at the top, just an anchor point. That anchor point could be a larger rover/lander or just a rock.