Mighty Morphing Bioloid
SNAKE WHEEL!
DYNAMIXEL SENSOR MODULE.
DYNAMIXEL SERVO MODULE.
completely disassemble and reassemble
the bot. What would truly be amazing is
a robot that could take the shape of a
crossing gate, spider, puppy, and snake
all without human intervention. That’s
right. We’re talking about transformers.
Shape Shifting
Snake Eyes
fly. The best we could do was to add a
claw to the end of the snake’s tail and
hope that would be enough to keep the
wheel together. Unfortunately, we
already had a flat tire because we needed to include the not so sleek CM- 5 in our
snake, and the shaky connection made
for a wheel that any unicyclist would
avoid. Perhaps the time had come to
move onto something bigger and better.
If cool factor isn’t compelling
enough of an argument, there are a
multitude of practical reasons that shape
shifting robots are a popular quest
among roboticists. Simply put, wheels are
great for smooth terrain, but when the
going gets rough, legs are more capable.
So why not always use legs? Because
wheels are so much faster on smooth terrain. A conundrum — there seems to be a
tradeoff between speed, simplicity, and
the ability to grapple with uneven terrain.
With shape shifting modular robotics,
there doesn’t have to be a trade; you can
have it all. There is the possibility of having a snake to tackle uneven terrain turn
into a wheel to race across flat ground.
That’s what we were aiming to
achieve with our snake bot — a snake
that could curl up into wheel. It seems a
bit underwhelming, but it’s harder than it
sounds. Real shape shifting modular
robots have ways of reconfiguring on the
fly, something that the Bioloid lacks. Real
shape shifting robots have ways of reconnecting and disconnecting modules without human intervention, either through
autonomous latches or some other fancy
bit of technology. The only way the
Bioloid modules are connected are
through nuts and screws, so there really
wasn’t an easy way to reconfigure on the
The Derivative of
Optimus
Advertisements for the Bioloid and
the box of the bot itself are emblazoned
with the iconic form of the humanoid
servo walker, so it seems appropriate that
the humanoid bot is the final, and
presumably most difficult, design
detailed in the instruction manual. The
humanoid design is indeed a challenge,
as it consumes every Dynamixel module
available in the kit. After assembling
beginner and intermediate designs,
constructing the limbs of the humanoid
should be a snap for any roboticist, but
attaching everything to the body is
where the real challenge begins. At times
we were wishing for more than four
collective hands, but eventually we were
able to complete the humanoid Bioloid.
The humanoid Bioloid is filled with
personality. With the demo program,
the Bioloid will fend off obstacles with
karate moves, dance, lay down, and of
course walk all over the place. While
perhaps not as agile as other bipedal
servo walkers that we have worked
with, none of those other servo walkers
could brag that they had been a puppy
mere hours earlier. But is the Bioloid the
proverbial jack of all trades, and therefore master of none? Perhaps the
A PROGRAM!
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