When it comes to locomotion, robots don’t typically do more than one thing at a time. Walkers stick to walking, and rollers stick to rolling. However, this simple method of enabling a cheetah-style quadruped to stand and even walk a little is pretty clever.
With just a couple of rigid struts attached to the shins of the rear legs, it becomes possible for the robot to lever itself up into a stable standing position, and even shuffle around a bit. Not bad for a couple bolted-on bits with no moving parts!
The robot style will look pretty familiar to some of our readers. It does resemble Boston Dynamics’ Spot but it’s closer to the MIT Mini Cheetah, whose design and brushless motors made for eye-catching agility and speed. It has inspired not just countless DIY efforts, but also kits of parts from overseas sellers.
The image here should make it clear how it works, but take a moment to also watch the short video embedded just below the page break, and see the process in action from beginning to end.
Clever, but creepy!
At the moment the movements appear to be statically balanced, but it’s all a preleminary prototype and plenty of room for improvements. This also makes me realize that the quadruped robots I’ve seen are build symmetrical, while biological quadrupeds tend tho have more muscular hind legs for running.
Another obvious improvement is to give it some kind of “tool belt” so it can switch between “foot soles” “grippers” and other appendages for it’s front paws. And some rucksack or other container to store stuff.
This Idea was inevitably to be implemented by somebody., but nice to see it on video now. I’m interested to see real life applications for this…
I would be more impressed if it simply balanced itself.
It will soon
Maybe it would improve the gait if it swung its arms- bigger steps?
It’s not actually taking steps- just shuffling its feet. Since it isn’t able to step over anything anyway, they could just put small wheels on the feet and let it roll instead of doing what it’s doing.
Rollerskating, basically. Or RoboSkating, I guess
no balancing , it lacks the needed articulation, however ,still potentially useful for manipulation of the environment such as doors and switches
take five background music👌