

Gecko-Inspired Window Washing Robot is Powered Entirely by Water - eguizzo
http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/industrial-robots/geckoinspired-window-washing-robot-is-powered-entirely-by-water

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jws
(Sorry: too late to be read, noprocrast and comment posting timeout conspired
against me.)

I think the interesting part of this is the gait mechanism which is
unaddressed in the article.

A little experimentation with my fingers on the desktop confirms a single
actuator to move the legs between two geometries, and the ability to turn
suction on and off to the pads is sufficient to climb walls. (Turning probably
requires that you can individually activate the pad suctions and have some
flex available.)

    
    
        time ====>	     	      	      	      	 repeat
    
                                        -      O       O
                                         \      \       \
                                          x      x       x
                                          |\     |\      |\
                    -       O       O     | O    | O     | -
                   /       /       /      |      |       |
                  x       x       x       | -    | O     | O
                 /|      /|      /|       |/     |/      |/
        O       O |     O |     - |       x      x       x
         \        |       |       |      /      /       /
          x     - |     O |     O |     O      O       -
          |\     \|      \|      \|
          | -     x       x       x
          |        \       \       \
          | O       O       O       -
          |/
          x
         /
        -
    
       odd     toggle   all     even   toggle   all    odd
       only    position suck    only   position suck   only
       suck    actuator         suck   actuator        suck

------
JoeAltmaier
...and it has a battery. To power the electronics and wireless - is it remote-
operated? So no brains either.

Its not a robot at all then. Its a servo.

------
jpablo
if battery weight is a problem, can't they attach a external power cord to it
? I mean it's not like the water pressure is coming from inside the robot.

------
waratuman
powered by "water pressure"

~~~
bostonpete
Yeah, I was disappointed that we hadn't discovered a way to extract energy
from water...

~~~
arethuza
Extract the deuterium from your water and we've been able to extract lots of
energy from it for a long time (50+ years).

Doing it in a nice controlled and easy to start fashion is the catch...

