Duke Robot Climbs to Victory in Madrid 96
neutron_p writes "A wall-climbing, book-sized autonomous vehicle made by a Duke University team drove up a challenging vertical course to win first prize in an international competition in Madrid. Their robot Wallter was the only one that could start flat on the floor and climb the wall on its own, go over a barrier across the wall or stop itself after crossing the finish line."
Book shaped robot (Score:5, Interesting)
Anyhow, the article mentioned "tornado in a cup" technology - "Two vortexes swirl simultaneously, one in a spiral and the other in a toroidal path, like a donut. The forces generated hold the vehicle to the wall and yet allow free movement because the cup never touches the surface." Like a hovercraft that sucks?
However, later in the article, there was mention of magnets - "We tried a wheelie bar to keep the rear end of the robot flat against the wall and prevent the front from lifting up. Unfortunately, the results were disappointing. Time was running out so we had to add magnets and take advantage of the metal."
This makes me wonder if it's the magnets that hold the robot, or the new "tornado in a cup"?
--
Play iCLOD Virtual City Explorer [iclod.com] and win Half-Life 2
Re:Book shaped robot (Score:5, Informative)
Go back and read it again, the magnets were only needed to help in getting over the 1cm barrier.
Re:Book shaped robot (Score:2)
Re:Book shaped robot (Score:1)
Then the robot says "This is not the test course" as it falls to the ground.
Re:Book shaped robot (Score:2)
So in this particular case it's OK to say "Duke Sucks" ?
Re:Book shaped robot (Score:2)
Re:Book shaped robot (Score:2)
"Duke both sucks and blows"
slashdot editing (Score:1, Funny)
You mean and stop itself, right?
Re:slashdot editing (Score:2, Informative)
Re:slashdot editing (Score:2)
More than just a cliche! (Score:5, Funny)
According to Burney, the Duke vehicle set itself apart when it rolled to the foot of a metallic wall, reared up on its hind wheels, and used a "tornado in a cup" to hug the wall and start its ascent...
Huh. Duke really does suck!
Re:More than just a cliche! (Score:2, Funny)
Re:More than just a cliche! (Score:4, Funny)
attachment for the roomba? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:attachment for the roomba? (Score:3, Informative)
When the walls are metal and they have no "barriers" that are over 1 cm (ie texture changes).
Re:attachment for the roomba? (Score:1, Informative)
When the walls are metal and they have no "barriers" that are over 1 cm (ie texture changes).
RTFA - if there aren't any barriers the walls don't need to be metal.
Re:attachment for the roomba? (Score:1)
Re:attachment for the roomba? (Score:2)
(not that that's a bad thing)
Re:attachment for the roomba? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:attachment for the roomba? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:attachment for the roomba? (Score:2)
If that's all it takes to obsolete a sex, then following that logic and given the "gadgets" out there, men have been obsolete for years.
Shhhh.... don't tell anyone. We're hoping nobody notices.
Re:attachment for the roomba? (Score:1)
The new Roomba can automatically return to its dock and, I'm told, has a dirt detector.
I suppose if this technology were to come to the Roomba you'd need to have concave trim to allow the Roomba to make the transition.
Useful on a render wall.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Duke Robot (Score:4, Funny)
Question (Score:5, Funny)
The device uses air currents swirling in a cylinder, about the size of an upside-down tuna can, to exert suction on a wall or ceiling.
How is the size of a tuna can any different just because it is upside-down?
Re:Question (Score:1, Funny)
make your own (Score:5, Informative)
make your own [216.239.39.104]
google cache, since we would deestroy geocities
modifications needed for commercial viability (Score:2, Funny)
Re:modifications needed for commercial viability (Score:2, Funny)
How did the OTHER entries work? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:How did the OTHER entries work? (Score:2)
Don't rape my karma, please!
Re:How did the OTHER entries work? (Score:1, Informative)
Looks like suction cups [iai.csic.es] were a popular choice.
Painting the walls? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Painting the walls? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Painting the walls? (Score:1)
Re:Painting the walls? (Score:1)
Re:Painting the walls? (Score:2)
Article text (Score:4, Informative)
"Robots that climb walls and cross ceilings can go where humans can't," Janet said. "They can do security and safety jobs like looking for bombs or finding cracks in a support beam or the wing of a jumbo jet."
The Duke team's leader was Brian Burney, a staff member at Duke's Pratt School of Engineering and graduate student at North Carolina State University. The other team members were Pratt School undergraduates Kevin Parker, Andrew Meyerson and Julien Finlay.
"Our robot Wallter was the only one that could start flat on the floor and climb the wall on its own, go over a barrier across the wall or stop itself after crossing the finish line," Burney said.
Added Meyerson, "As the smallest, fastest and most novel robot, Wallter was one of the most popular exhibits. I was interviewed for Spanish national television for a story about the conference featuring the Duke robot."
According to Burney, the Duke vehicle set itself apart when it rolled to the foot of a metallic wall, reared up on its hind wheels, and used a "tornado in a cup" to hug the wall and start its ascent.
The "tornado" is generated by a patented device from Vortex HC, LLC of Morrisville, N.C., said Janet, who is vice president of development at the company. The device uses air currents swirling in a cylinder, about the size of an upside-down tuna can, to exert suction on a wall or ceiling. An impeller in the cylinder spins like a propeller but recirculates captive air rather than sucking air in one end and blasting it out the other.
"It's a tornado in a cup, but no ordinary tornado," Janet said. "Two vortexes swirl simultaneously, one in a spiral and the other in a toroidal path, like a donut. The forces generated hold the vehicle to the wall and yet allow free movement because the cup never touches the surface."
Parker said the Madrid competition required performing five tasks: starting on the metal competition wall and climbing as high as possible; climbing after the addition of randomly placed obstacles; crossing a barrier placed on the wall; starting from the floor and then climbing; and stopping after crossing the finish line.
"We faced stiff competition from German and Italian teams," Parker said. "The robot from the University of Catania was amazingly good at detecting and avoiding all the obstacles. Our robot brushed against a couple of obstacles, but it was the only one that completed all five tasks."
Janet said the Duke team combined the "tornado in a cup" technology with an original control system. "A human operates Vortex's commercial robots by remote control," Janet said. "The students added sensors and wrote software that enables their robot to operate on its own."
Parker said they added ultrasonic and infrared sensors across the front and programmed a tiny computer, called a microcontroller, to navigate based on information from the sensors. Ultrasonic sensors detect objects by bouncing sonar-like sound waves off them. Infrared sensors, used in television remote controls, detect light outside the range of human vision.
Burney provided an initial basic design for the Duke vehicle, Janet said. Meyerson and Parker, both biomedical engineering students, focused on writing software and incorporating the sensors.
When tests showed the centimeter-high barrier broke the hold of the Vortex technology, Janet called in Finlay to solve the problem of crossing the barrier without falling off the wall. Finlay is a mechanical engineering student and a veteran of the team that produced Duke's prize-winning autonomous underwater vehicle Charybdis.
Finlay said he tried to design a solution that would work with or without the metal wall at the competition.
"We tried adding treads," Finlay said. "We tried a wheelie bar to keep the rear en
I wonder if it's a girl robot (Score:2, Funny)
Looks like... (Score:1)
Competition was fixed (Score:5, Funny)
My entry owned all the others when it came to the climbing competition, my entry was able to swing from wall to wall, hang from the ceiling and even managed to rescue a woman from a mugger while all the other entries could do was climb a few cm and fall off. Yet the judges refused to give me first prize. I have vowed never to return to Spain and hope to help humanity by using my robot to climb more walls.
Re:Competition was fixed (Score:1)
It found.... (Score:1, Funny)
Wow... (Score:4, Funny)
Are the cliche emitters of the world taking a nap or something? (Where such a comment puts me on the totem pole isn't worth discussing)
Robots that can climb walls and navigate; another enticing step on the road towards truly autonomous navigation. Good stuff. I just wish there weren't (approximately) a zillion steps left on said road.
Xentax
Re:Wow... (Score:4, Funny)
Fine....
I tried not to...
I didn't want to....
But you just had to hold a bottle of scotch in front of the recovering alcoholic, didn't you?
Fine!
I, FOR ONE, WELCOME OUR NEW WALL CLIMBING ROBOT OVERLORDS!
And, BTW,
In Soviet Russia, the wall climbs YOU!
Imagine a Beowulf cluster of these...
But does it run RedHat or SUSE?
And of course, Natalie Portman and Hot Grits!
There, I feel better now allready!
Re:Wow... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Wow... (Score:1)
Cowboy Neal climbs MY walls!
Re:Wow... (Score:2)
Re:Wow... (Score:1)
Re:At least they win at something! (Score:1)
OFFICIAL PAGES (Score:5, Informative)
It's part of CLAWAR [clawar.net] Climbing and Walking Robots. As you can see, the mentioned robot had a very different design from the usual spider-like design.
Cheaters never prosper (Score:5, Funny)
Yay for lazy couch potatoes worldwide! (Score:2)
- Go to the fridge
- Climb up
- Open fridge door
- Grab a beer
- Climb down
- Go back to couh
- Open beer
- Give beer to me
Re:Yay for lazy couch potatoes worldwide! (Score:3, Informative)
Androbot had those things in production, and you could really buy one. Now they're something of a collectable.
Re:Yay for lazy couch potatoes worldwide! (Score:1)
Re:Yay for lazy couch potatoes worldwide! (Score:2)
Duke Press Release & other info (Score:2)
Here [duke.edu] it says:
Re:Duke Press Release & other info (Score:2)
Being that it's a Duke newsletter, they obscured the part where the team lead went to NC State. Also, though now on the faculty at Duke, the team's advisor got his PhD in EE (robotics) from NC State (1998?).
Re:Duke Press Release & other info (Score:2)
And if you check out Duke faculty web pages, you find that Janet is not just an "adjunct professor", he is an adjunct assistant prof [duke.edu]
Re:Duke Press Release & other info (Score:1)
Not sure where the author of the original article shops for groceries, but
He.
has.
one.
BIGASS.
can of tuna.
Why does this thing remind me of... (Score:1)
I had this professor at Duke (Score:1, Interesting)
I had two classes with Janet at Duke and got to see this technology in action. A special fan pushes air out across a surface sorta like a hover machine and the robot and surface attract due to the Venturi Effect. Pretty cool stuff really.
On a personal note though, Prof Janet was a pretty decen
More photos here (Score:4, Informative)
Walter the Wobot! (Score:2)