Meet Unibot from EVOVACS: a modular robot that makes your home smarter. It works as an air purifier, vacuum cleaner, and housekeeper. The modules can be used independently or together. Users can control the robot remotely with a smartphone app.
Teaching robots to handle uneven terrain is easier when they can use sensor information to adapt. As it turns out, researchers have gotten a DRC-HUBO biped humanoid robot to navigate uneven surfaces without terrain info. As these videos show, the robot can adjust its footstep and maintain balance using its stepping algorithm:
In the past few months, we have covered plenty of cool soft robots here. The Soft Robotics Development Kit 2.0 is for those of you interested in testing custom applications. You can use it for pick & place, food handling, and bin picking applications. The below videos show how these soft grippers can handle steaks, chicken legs, and odd shaped items:
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So you can’t get enough of Trump for whatever reason? As it turns out, a robot version of him is now available at Disney World. This audio-animatronic Trump was recently unveiled at the Hall of Presidents attraction. This video shows him in action:
Here is another compact flying camera that lets you capture special moments in the air. The Flitt Drone is tiny enough to fit in your pocket. It lets you capture smooth video and share it to your social sites with the push of a button.
Flitt can maintain its altitude indoors and outside. The camera can record 720p @ 30fps video. Its battery lasts up to 8 minutes.
Meet the Pudding BeanQ robot: a bean-shaped toy with interactive display that can keep your children entertained. This cute toy has chat functionality and brings games and educational content to your place. Its body is capable of rotating 330 degrees.
Remember the FX-2 Bot? It is a giant humanoid robot that humans can ride and control with simple hand movements. The latest video from HuboLab KAIST shows the robot joining the Olympic Torch relay.
Here is another bio-inspired robot that moves like a worm. The CMMWorm is built from a compliant mesh actuated at segments to create waveforms along its body. The modular mesh is 3D printed. As the researchers explain, the robot can navigate flat grounds and pipes.
In the past few years, we have covered plenty of cool applications for Fanuc robots. Minatech has partnered with Herrmann Ultrasonics to develop this ultrasonic welding system with automatic tool changeover. As the company explains, this system is capable of handling different types of welds without need for a technician.
Here is how it works:
When the cycle starts, the FANUC M-20iB/25 robot picks up the first stack and performs several staking operations. It changes over to a second staking tool with internal air cooling, and performs additional staking operations. During the staking operations, the FANUC robot welds by distance collapse to precisely control how far to collapse the staking post. The distance is measured by a precision linear encoder on the pneumatic actuator.
More information is available here.
Teleoperating robots is going to be much easier with a VR headset and body sensors. Rhode Island’s Brown University have already developed a VR teleoperation interface for robots that allows operators to control machines from miles away.
