1930s Japanese robot
Yasutaro Mitsui with his steel humanoid, circa early 1930s. Dig those crazy vacuum tubes… Robot of the day – Link
Robotics
Making a robot can be an incredibly rewarding experience. It’s the perfect combination of creativity, engineering and problem solving. However, if you’re just getting started in robotics, it can also be overwhelming. To make things easier for those who are just starting out, we’ve put together some tips and tricks to help makers bring robots to life! From the basics of assembling your robot to software implementation, these pointers will give you everything you need to get started on your robotic adventure!
R2-S2 (Steam R2-D2) gets props on Star Wars Blog
Make pal I-Wei Huang, a.k.a. Crabfu, the steambots guru, was interviewed by Bonnie Burton for the Official Star Wars Blog… How do your skills as an animator help when you make these cool creations? Being an animator, you tend to see things in a different way, and can’t help but notice subtle details of how […]
Early animatronics
Short, but really interesting article from Popular Science in 1933 discussing what have got to be some of the earliest examples of animatronics – mechanical dinosaurs from the Chicago World’s Fair. – [via] Link.
Universal robots
Here’s a robot play in NYC featuring Roombas as actors… 31 DOWN RADIO THEATER PRESENTS: UNIVERSAL ROBOTS June 28–July 7 Loud music, cool air conditioning, humans struggling with the impending doom of ROBOTS taking over the world… what more could you want? 31 Down returns this summer with a hypnotic sound and image collage inspired […]
Make a beetle robot
Here’s how to make a very simple ladybug bot using PlayStation motors and rubber wheels from an old walkman – Link.
Robothon – September 21 – 23 – Seattle
Branden writes – Robothon is an annual event sponsored by the Seattle Robotics Society that is designed by and for hobby roboticists and Makers of all types. It is held every year at the Seattle Center, just north of Downtown. Robothon is completely free to everyone. Vendors will be on hand with Microcontrollers, BEAM robot […]
SickSack robot
Lars writes – his article is about the robot: SickSack that Aske Olsson and I created for DTU RoboCup 2007, which is an annual competition for autonomous mobile robots held by Automation at the Technical University of Denmark. SickSack snake robot The robot consists of nine cars connected with eight Futaba servos controlled by a […]