The Robot

Recently I came across a video of a robot that makes it look like I've been ripping off ideas. The robot pictured here is called Chaos. It is made by a company in Wellsville, Utah called Autonomous Solutions (www.autonomoussolutions.com). My first exposure to this company was on a PBS special and it immediately struck me as my dream job. I mean, just look at that thing.

Finding this robot on their website was very encouraging for me. The lower picture is of the robot that we are building for mechatronics class. You will note the marked similarity between the two robots. Our team agreed on and developed this idea before we saw this one. As you might expect, it gave us great confidence in the feasability of our design. The other thing that is painfully obvious is the coolness of Chaos, and the relative uncoolness of our robot. I don't say that to diminish our robot. It is awesome, but the difference here is Chaos was developed by a large team of engineers and programmers with large budgets and extensive manufacturing possibilities. Ours is the best effort of three ME undergrads with a budget of $110 (not including the controllers). It's no Chaos, but for what it is, it will be a remarkable accomplishment. If we can get it to work properly the competition will have a real run for their money.