hexapod

The Hexanaut: Building The World’s Largest Rideable Hexapod Robot

The Hexanaut: Building The World’s Largest Rideable Hexapod Robot

Whether they realize it or not, fans of Star Wars, Harry Potter, and the Disney+ series Andor may already be familiar with UK creator Matt Dentonโ€™s movie magic. But in 2012, Dentonโ€™s futuristic fabrications transcended the silver screen and landed in the real world with the debut of Mantis โ€” a six-legged, two-ton, human-piloted, steel behemoth.  Originally commissioned for commercial use, a […]

Agile Hexapod Sees with Marketโ€™s Smallest, Lowest Cost LIDAR

Agile Hexapod Sees with Marketโ€™s Smallest, Lowest Cost LIDAR

At the Bay Area Maker Faire, weย saw one of the coolest autonomous robots ever: Rhoeby, a navigation-capable hexapod. While the robotย is built from a customized version of a standard ROBOTIS Bioloid “spider” kit, the real magic behind Rhoeby is the LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) system. LIDAR systemsย work in aย similar fashion to radar. The systemย sends […]

The Mantis Rideable Hexapod

Hexapods, mechanical creatures with six legs, can be one of the easier ways to make a walking robot. A hexapod was one of my first robotics projects, and it turned out great. Great for being around 4 inches tall that is! If you’d like inspiration to build something much bigger, and admittedly more awesome, check […]

Sub-0 Cardboard Hexapod Robot

Sub-$100 Cardboard Hexapod Robot

Mike Estee has been laser-cutting hexapod limbs from cardboard and is making great progress on his hexapod project. As he explains:

As Iโ€™ve written about in the past, cost can be measured in many ways. For this exercise Iโ€™m primarily interested in cost of materials, cost of manufacturing, and assembly time. Design time isnโ€™t particularly optimized here, but as we build on previous iterations, hopefully we can stay ahead of complexity. On the cold hard cash front, I think Iโ€™m doing pretty well. This little fellow consists of: $1.00 in cardboard, $54.60 in servos, and $29.95 in servo controllers.