Boston Dynamics Reveals Handle, A Robot That Is 6 Feet Tall, Lifts 100 Pounds, and Jumps Up To 4 Feet (popularmechanics.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Popular Mechanics: Back at the beginning of February, a leaked video showed the newest creation from Boston Dynamics -- a wheeled humanoid robot called "Handle." Now the secretive maker of amazing robots has released the full introduction video, revealing some of Handle's brand new tricks. The wheeled bot can travel up to 9 mph, and as you can see in the video, it has no trouble rolling over some light off-road terrain such as patches of grass and flights of stairs. The bot stands 6.5 feet tall when fully extended, though it often crouches to turn or balance. Batteries power the robot's electric and hydraulic actuators, allowing it to crouch down, make sharp turns, and lift objects that weigh at least 100 pounds. Handle has enough battery juice to travel about 15 miles on one charge. Oh and one more thing, this rolling bot can leap four feet into the air.

Comments

Re:oh no!

[hawguy]

like pretty much every delivery person and warehouse worker in the country?

Their job description also includes knowing what to pick up with minimal instructions and an extremely low error rate, as well as where to take it and when and how to drop it off, the ability to work for up to 12 hours repeatedly and reliably, independence from wall power, and the ability to deviate from this routine where and when required in reasonable ways.

Are you describing robots or people? Sounds like a job description suitable for a mobile robot. A human worker isn't going to magically know where to pick something up or where to take it unless some central system tells him to. And a robot is equally able to follow instructions like: "Go pick up item 718281718 from bin 7891 (use your scanner to find the right item), box it and walk it over to loading dock 287 for immediate shipping. There's a liquid spill in aisle 27, find your own way around it."

Re:FIRST Robotics is to blame for this

[Rei]

I love living in the future. ;)

Would make a great mobility aid

[complete loony]

Now build something like this into the base of an electric wheelchair.