Case robotic car now on display at Crawford museum: Whatever happened to ...

Lynn Ischay/The Plain DealerBrandon Rutter uses a joystick to drive Dexter out of the garage at CWRU's Squire Valleevue Farm in February 2007. The driverless vehicle ran through maneuver drills at the farm to prepare for competition.

Whatever happened to Dexter, the robotic car developed by Case Western Reserve University students to navigate roads like a human?

After performing well in a national competition last fall against other driverless vehicles, Dexter has retired to post-race glory. The squat, computer-stuffed car is now on display at the Crawford Auto-Aviation Museum in Cleveland's University Circl

More than 50 students and faculty from the CWRU School of Engineering spent nearly a year readying Dexter (the name stands for "Deployable EXtreme Terrain Enabled Robot") for the 2007 DARPA Urban Challenge.

The competition, sponsored by the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, pitted teams from robotics-savvy universities and companies against each other.

The challenge was to produce a completely self-guided vehicle able to handle the kinds of situations city drivers face: detours, unexpected obstacles, busy intersections, merging with other traffic, and so on. The winner got $2 million and a chance to help design future autonomous military transports.

A Virginia engineering firm called ENSCO Inc. had built the original Dexter to compete in a simpler version of the DARPA challenge that took place in 2005 in the desert Southwest. For the 2007 Urban Challenge, ENSCO lent Dexter to CWRU.

Team Case heavily modified Dexter, adding advanced sensors and using a "biologically inspired" computer programming approach that mimicked the way living things evaluate information and make decisions in complex situations.

Of the 89 Urban Challenge entrants, Dexter and Team Case were among 35 semifinalists invited to show their stuff last November on a former Air Force base in California. The qualifying rounds included what may have been history's first collision between human-and computer-operated vehicles (fortunately not Dexter).

While Team Case's car performed well, in driving and parking tests, its scores were not high enough to make the finals. The winner was "Boss," a Chevy Tahoe built by robotics powerhouse Carnegie Mellon University.

Still, Dexter and its makers got their share of recognition. "Robocars," a 2008 Science Channel documentary on the Urban Challenge, featured the charismatic CWRU group. And Nortech, Cleveland's regional economic development organization, included Team Case among seven organizations it honored for developing "breakthrough technologies."

Since the contest, some Team Case members have graduated and begun work in robotics-related fields (including two who landed at ENSCO, Dexter's parent company). Others are pursuing advanced degrees and working on additional robotics projects, including building "Cutter," a self-guided lawnmower.

Team Case's leader, electrical engineering and computer science professor Wyatt Newman, is teaching a new "mobile robotics" course based on Dexter technology.

"We have no news of a 4th DARPA Grand Challenge," Newman reports, "but we anticipate we'll compete again, if one is announced."

— John Mangels

Killer Ground ‘Bots Out of Iraq: How Come?

To great fanfare last year, the Army deployed three machine gun-armed Sword ground robots to Iraq, promising they would see combat "soon." But just a few months later, the Swords were sent packing. How come? Popular Mechanics knows why:

[T]he Army’s Program Executive
Officer for Ground Forces, Kevin Fahey, was asked what happened to
SWORDS. After all, no specific reason for the 11th-hour withdrawal ever came from the military or its contractors at Foster-Miller. Fahey’s answer was vague, but he confirmed that the robots never opened fire when they weren’t supposed to. His understanding is that “the gun started moving when it was not intended to move.” In other words, the SWORDS swung around in the wrong direction, and the plug got pulled fast. No humans were hurt, but as
Fahey pointed out, “once you’ve done something that’s really bad, it can take 10 or 20 years to try it again.”

rcrc robot car: no transformer, still a robot in disguise

While I’d rather have a lifesize Optimus Prime, I might just have to settle for this R/C robot that can transform itself into a car, truck or tank.

The RCRC Transforming Robot from AOK can go from ‘bot to vehicle with a quick flick of two joysticks on the included remote control.

When in car mode, the remote lets you drive forwards, backwards, left or right. Flip back to upright mode, and the robot can spin left or right.

In all, the RCRC offers four driving modes: robot, truck, sports car, and “hip-hop dance”, whatever that means. The robot has a built-in rechargeable battery, which should give you about 30 minutes of run time per charge. Check out the video below to see the RCRC in action:

Boy, somebody clearly needs to go back to driver’s ed. Hopefully you can do a better job steering the RCRC than the guy in the video.

You can get one for yourself over at Hammacher Schlemmer for $89.95 USD.

Nissan OneOne

n Nissan’s vision of the 2050s, robots have become an integral part of our lives, blurring the line between humans and machines. The Nissan OneOne combines personal mobility with the family robot concept.

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Billed as the ultimate pet, the Nissan OneOne (pronounced “wan-wan,” the Japanese sound for a barking dog) is a friendly, helpful member of the family of the future. Able to operate autonomously without a driver, the GPS-guided vehicle can help out by picking up the dry cleaning, fetching the groceries, and taking the kids to school.

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OneOne propels itself forward by flexing and relaxing synthetic polymer muscles in its “legs,” much as you would if skating on roller blades.

Nissan’s robot “car”

Nature is always the best model, whether you’re building robots or…other human made monstrosities. And with that in mind, Nissan has applied the idea to the Biomimetric Car Robot or BR23C. The robot car is modeled after Bee behavior in order to prevent car collisions and thereby eliminate accident casualties.

The BR23C adopts a bee’s eye view of the world. The insects rely on a 300-degree field of vision to identify obstacles and avoid them. Likewise the robot, using a Laser Range Finder (LRF) uses a 180-degree radius vision to detect obstacles two meters away. The image is transmitted to a microprocessor, which directs the robot to change direction or speed up in order to avoid a collision. In other words, avoiding collisions is all instinct.

The Future of Citroen 2CV Car

This Citroen concept car has just entered from future for all Citroen 2CV lovers. This concept is designed by David Portela to present a classic model. You will get what you can expect from Citroen 2CV such as the same curved bonnet, hunk sides, roofed rear wheels and much more. Not only this, this futuristic robo-car also features modernistic panoramic windows and steampunky exteriors. Once you have this on the road, you will surely have a feeling of uniqueness and unbelievable. So, get ready to give a modern look to your old Citroen 2CV and just zoom…!!!

Designer : David Portela via AutoMotto

Land-Walker Exoskeleton

The Land Walker exoskeleton is a product of Japanese company sakakibara-kikai. Used mainly for product promotion and display, the intimidating weaponry fires nothing but harmless soft plastic balls. And with a top speed of just 1mph it’s not going to replace the wheel just yet.

However, standing over 3 metres in height, and weighing in at 1000kg (2,205 lbs) the Land Walker’s shuffling gait is an impressive sight to behold. Although it would probably run into problems with anything but a completely smooth surface.

The single seat Land Walker is powered by a 250 cc engine and movement is controlled by four foot pedals. P.A. Technology supplied the computer software which helps to control the Land Walkers movement.

If you want to get your hands on your own moon-walking exoskeleton, price is in the region of $350,000 (£185,000).