Aug 22, 2015 | By Alec

We here at 3ders.org are reminded again and again of what 3D printing can do for the field of robotics, but unfortunately most 3D printed are suited for little more than some tabletop fun. We are therefore always extremely happy to see 3D printed innovations that tackle contemporary issues plaguing the advancement of robotics. One such innovation has just been shared by veteran maker Erin Kennedy, perhaps better known under her internet handle RobotGrrl, who has used 3D printing to tackle very common issues: how do you safely transport and deploy robots in hazardous environments and then control it at a distance?

This problem is more widespread as you might think, as robots are increasingly seen as solutions for humanitarian disasters. Areas ravaged by war, or even by natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods and worse, are always notoriously difficult to traverse and to get help to people in need, and cheap robots are no being recognized as the safest option around. But how do you get a robot carrying supplies to the areas in need?

Erin, fortunately, has a solution. Incidentally, veterans of the online making community might know her as RobotGrrl, as she has been developing interesting robotic solutions for years now – many of which involve 3D printing. She has also been winning quite a few awards for her efforts. Quite a few of these robots have been developed through the Fab Academy, which is also the case for this RDAS Unfolding CubeSat rover robot.

As she explains on Hackaday, RDAS Unfolding CubeSat rover robot (short for Rapid Deployable Automation System) has a dual purpose: to develop a robotic solution that can rapidly deploy through a system of automated movement and that can then be efficiently managed. ‘An example mission of this would be for use in natural disaster settings during the humanitarian efforts. The robot modules would be unpacked from a backpack, then configured and linked together to perform a task,’ Erin explains. ‘Tasks can vary depending on the scenario, such as sorting supplies to go to a specific area, or even digging out areas to let standing water flow away from shelter locations. By having the robots help with tasks the effort is in parallel with the human, freeing up time for the human to do complex decision making jobs.’

This challenging project is moving along quite smoothly, as Erin has just achieved quite some success with the  RDAS Drive module. The robot itself is a cube shape, as you can see above. It is covered in a wide range of panels, which can be extended down upon deployment to turn it into a wide and wheeled movable robot. The idea is that the green pieces will eventually become covered in thin solar panels to power the robot, while the robot is covered with sensors in the front to detect and avoid obstacles. All this is done with an efficient combination of a motor board and a sensor board, for which the bill of materials can be found here.

And as you can obviously see, this robot has been almost completely 3D printed. While the body has been fairly straightforwardly been prototyped, the wings – the key part in the deployment build – were more complex. As Erin explained, these were originally simply bolted together, but the latest functional prototype actually falls apart into three separate prints: the basic wing shape in hard plastic, the flexible connectors, and finally the green covers – all of which have been glued together to form a flexible and protective whole. All the 3D printable files can be found here.

Depending on the purpose of the deployment, the robot can then safely move towards its goal. What’s more, Erin envisions that this robot is functional in parallel to the human operator. He or she controls the robot with the help of a quirky looking headband that revolves around haptic feedback and tracks the user’s head movements to move the robot. ‘This way they can focus on more complex jobs,’ she says. And as you can see in the clip above, the initial tests have been quite successful.

And she believes that parallel functioning of human and robot will play a very important role in the future functioning of robotics. ‘The robots won’t be very helpful if they have to be controlled all the time. They have to be able to do their task as autonomously as possible and when there is human input they have to understand what is trying to be communicated,’ she says.

Ideally, this means that the headband will enable complete hands-free control, though this is something that still needs to be improved upon. ‘It would be neat if I could have the robots respond if you begin feeling apprehensive. So I included a pulse sensor to detect heartbeat,’ she writes on her blog. A gyro has also been added to enable the wearer to tilt his or her head for an additional controlling options, while it also comes with three buttons, that can be used to enter different modes. Most of this headband has been 3D printed and designed in Inventor. More about the design process can be found here.

Of course, it will be very long time before this concept can actually be applied to the field, but the concept itself is very potent. Erin is currently working on the follow-up steps, and hopes to be able to expand the development group for various situations. ‘Another one of the goals of RDAS is to have groups developing on it, so that the robots could be deployed locally if there is a scenario where the robots can help. The experience could then be shared globally and go to all of the other labs working with RDAS, to improve an action plan for how the robots can be used to help in various scenarios,’ she says. Obviously, we will be hearing a lot more about this interesting concept.

 

 

Posted in 3D Printing Applications

 

 

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