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New CASMOBOT Lawnmower Controlled By a Wiimote

Posted by timothy on from the cars-are-next dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Researchers at the University of Southern Denmark have modified a Wiimote so that it can control an industrial lawn mower. The project is called Casmobot (Computer Assisted Slope Mowing Robot). 'The Casmobot project is about making grass cutting more efficient,' said Kjeld Jensen, a robotics researcher at the University of Southern Denmark who developed the system. It uses a standard Wiimote that communicates via Bluetooth to a computer and robotics module built into the mower. Actions of the mower are matched to tilt actions of the remote. For example, if you tilt the remote down the mower moves forwards; tilt it up, and it moves backwards, and so on. The Wiimote can be used to control the mower manually or in computer-assisted mode, where the mower uses autonomous navgiation based on RTK GPS positioning to cut larger areas."

19 of 81 comments (clear)

  1. I heard by BronsCon · · Score: 3, Funny

    It's a cut above the rest!

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  2. interestingly enough by circletimessquare · · Score: 4, Funny

    mowing your lawn this way is just as exciting as your average wii game

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    1. Re:interestingly enough by motek · · Score: 3, Funny

      Especially if you factor in the racing aspect.

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  3. Really useful? by dremspider · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Does it make it more efficient? First of all I am pretty sure it is going to take longer. Second, for the cost to make one of these I am pretty sure you can make one of those lawn mowers that cut grass BY ITSELF with NO HUMAN INTERVENTION. I don't care if it takes 5 days for the machine to do it, if it is automatic and I don't need to be there. Finally, all this does is requires a human to still attend to the grass, but not get the side benefit of exercise... While this invention is cool, don't pawn it off as something useful when their is clearly little to no market for something like this...

    1. Re:Really useful? by PitaBred · · Score: 2, Insightful

      This is for industrial mowers. Not your lawn. Think more like the mowers for sports stadiums or parks or fields. Those are very noisy, and the constant vibration can be unhealthy. I'm all for it.

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    2. Re:Really useful? by ChinggisK · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Does it make it more efficient? First of all I am pretty sure it is going to take longer. Second, for the cost to make one of these I am pretty sure you can make one of those lawn mowers that cut grass BY ITSELF with NO HUMAN INTERVENTION. I don't care if it takes 5 days for the machine to do it, if it is automatic and I don't need to be there. Finally, all this does is requires a human to still attend to the grass, but not get the side benefit of exercise... While this invention is cool, don't pawn it off as something useful when their is clearly little to no market for something like this...

      According to the video all you have to do is use the Wiimote to guide it around the perimeter of the area you want it to mow, then it mows the area inside of that on its own. I'm not an expert but I think for those other mowers that do it by themselves, you still have to set up some kind of barrier of some sort (buried wire for example). I could maybe see this being useful for someone who goes around and cuts grass in a lot of different areas that they can't set up a wire or whatever. Maybe.

    3. Re:Really useful? by fractoid · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It's a remote controlled lawnmower. It's exactly like a frikkin Jet Hopper except (a) it has swirly blades, and (b) it connects using commodity hardware with a commodity controller over a popular, well known interface.

      Sorry to sound sandy, but to quote my honours superviser at uni: "Where's the science"? This isn't even as cool as if he'd stuck a Basic STAMP on it and internet-enabled it.

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    4. Re:Really useful? by Pinckney · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You can buy a robotic lawnmower from Walmart. It's about $1600. For much less than that, you can pay a landscaping crew or the kid down the street to mow the lawn. This is one of those tasks that doesn't make sense to automate. It can be done cheaply by willing humans without putting them at unacceptable risk.

      This lawnmower? The one that requires a wire be placed around the lawn, and is intended for lawns of only about a 5th of an acre?

      You don't seem to get the point of this at all. It's not for mowing small lawns. This is for large fields or parks for which a tractor-mower was the most practical option anyway. I suspect that after a year or two of not needing to hire someone to drive around mowing on that expensive tractor, you can save quite a bit.

  4. Slashdotted - cache. by edlinfan · · Score: 3, Informative

    First, the obligatory Google Cache link.
    http://74.125.95.132/search?hl=en&q=cache%3Ahttp%3A//www.casmobot.dk/

    There's not much on the main page except a link to the YouTube video, here.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhMl7a3wJvQ

    Anyway, I wonder how easy it really is to control this thing. Holding a WiiMote level for a long time is harder than it sounds.

    The GPS-autonomous mode is really cool, though. Last time I checked the progress of robo-mowers, many of them required a buried cable, fence, or other tangible barrier. This thing is orders of magnitude more convenient.

  5. Web-controlled robot by PIPBoy3000 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I recently put together a Mindstorm NTX based robot that's controlled from a web page. It's been lots of fun, and it even has its own blog (which I'm specifically not posting so hordes of Slashdot users don't try to drive it around terrorizing my daughter).

    My son and I joked about making it do something useful and buying a URL called "cleanmyroom.com" where total strangers will go around cleaning up your room. In this case, I'd go for "mowmylawn.com". It's like Tom Sawyer charging money to whitewash a fence.

    1. Re:Web-controlled robot by rhsanborn · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Do you really want strangers controlling a mechanical device with heavy, metal, spinning blades at your home?

    2. Re:Web-controlled robot by nizo · · Score: 2, Funny

      This might be safer than my plan, which is to have a round lawn with a string (like a weed whacker) that pops up from the center and buzzs around a few times. It could be automated, but having someone chase off any random animals (birds, neighbor's cat, mailman) before turning it on might be prudent.

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    3. Re:Web-controlled robot by whyde · · Score: 3, Funny

      I'm sure within a few hours of "mowmylawn.com" being up there will be an auto-redirect from "mowdownmybegonias.com"

  6. Why a wiimote... by Zakabog · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The site seems to be slashdoted, so here's the Google cache and a Youtube video

    The site doesn't seem to mention it, but why a wiimote? Why not a standard RC joystick?

    The wiimote is okay with games, where misjudging the position of the wiimote will just screw up a virtual character. But why bring that into the real world where misjudging the position of the wiimote will send an industrial mower (with very sharp very fast spinning blades) off in the wrong direction? At least with the standard RC joystick if you let go of the control it'll snap back to the center and the mower would stop. You don't have the same feature with a wiimote, if you want to stop the mower you have to find the neutral zone yourself, if you drop the wiimote, the mower will go shooting off in some potentially dangerous direction (especially when near a road.)

  7. This is a really great innovation... by macraig · · Score: 3, Funny

    ... because my doctor advised me just the other day that I need to be getting less exercise, for the sake of my health.

  8. Same old game by Farmer+Tim · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...just better graphics.

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  9. Re:It's an outrage by Critical+Facilities · · Score: 5, Funny

    [boomhauer]Yeah, man. Dang ol' tell y' wut, man ain't no way that thar wii go'n drive m' John Deere, man. Shoot, dang ol' robot mower go'n invade, man go'n get caught up in that dang ol' Conficker, man go'n mowed m' rose bushes. I tell you what, man, ain't no internet GPS satellite alien technologicalized controller runnin' my mower, boy I tell you what.[/boomhauer]

  10. Re:safety? by Farmer+Tim · · Score: 2, Funny

    Also, I'd never want to have to explain to my neighbor how I accidentally "mowed" her cat.

    A mark of good intentions: putting the inverted commas around "mowed" rather than "accidentally".

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  11. Re:"Modified"? by Chris+Burke · · Score: 2, Funny

    Zelda decals. Duh.

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