Tag Archives: tailbot

Michigan State University’s Tailbot is a diminutive daredevil (video)

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Michigan State University's Tailbot is a diminutive daredevil video

Check out this video from grad students at Michigan State University -- it starts off a bit slowly, but it quickly picks up steam. It's a testament to the power of the robotic tail (not the first we've seen of that variety, incidentally), showing a 7.5-centimeter tall 'bot that can move, jump and maneuver in the air. Inspired by an article published in Nature last year, Tailbot's titular appendage lets it land on the correct side, stand up and lie down. Check out a video of the tiny adventurer after the break.

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X-rhex Robot Gets a Tail, Always Lands on Its Feet

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The tiny Tailbot robot relies on a tail to control its balance. Now, the creators of the Tailbot and the RHex hexapod robot have teamed up to make the X-RHex Lite. The difference between this robot and the original Tailbot is that the XRL is about 60 times bigger, weighing 8.1 kilograms compared to the tiny Tailbot which only weighed 177 grams.
tailbot
The tail works just like it would on a cat. It lets the robot right itself when falling and flying through the air. Thus, it recovers easily from crashes that turn it over. Even when it’s dropped, the legs are springy and act like shock absorbers. All of this means that it would take quite a lot to not land upright.

And that is important because robots aren’t useful on their backs. Great for search and rescue ‘bots or any robot that does alot of jumping.

[via IEEE Spectrum via Geek]