The first thing to notice about [Bijuo]’s cat-sized quadruped robot designs (link is in Korean, Google translation here) is how slim and sleek the legs are. That’s because unlike most legged robots, the limbs themselves don’t contain any motors. Instead, the motors are in the main body, with one driving a half-circle pulley while another moves the limb as a whole. Power is transferred by a cable acting as a tendon and is offset by spring tension in the joints. The result is light, slim legs that lift and move in a remarkable gait.
[Bijuo] credits the Cheetah_Cub project as their original inspiration, and names their own variation Mini Serval, on account of the ears and in keeping with the feline nomenclature. Embedded below are two videos, the first showing leg and gait detail, and the second demonstrating the robot in motion.
There’s more than one way to make a robot cat, of course, and here’s another design that doesn’t completely evict motors from the limbs, but still manages to keep them looking sleek and nimble.
[via Let’s Make Robots]
Kind of the way flesh and blood does it.
I dont know how many years of evolution is always a nice place to start :)
What’s the tiny box / robot on the left side of video two?
Seems to me like an Otto or Bob robot.
Now with a fixed spine, how do you stear it? Servo controlled tail?
It could lean slightly in the direction it wants to turn, that would allow it to take proportionate strides.