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Robot Sticks to Ceilings by Vibrating a Flexible Disc
- naikrovek 5y agoas a layman when it comes to robots (or really anything, if I'm honest) this is amazing.
- failwhaleshark 5y agoIs that the inner medium of a 5.25" floppy disk?
- failwhaleshark 5y agoIt's interesting that this isn't like a Tesla turbine, but that its periodic vibrations create enough net suction to hold it in-place. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_turbine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_turbine
- post_break 5y agoWhen you want to hear what it might sound like but instead they play loud music over the video. Quite frustrating. Is it going to become a ceiling roomba or not based on how loud it is?
- scintill76 5y ago> There are a couple of downsides too, though. The biggest one could be that 200 Hz is a frequency that’s well within human hearing, which probably explains that soundtrack in the video—the robot is, as the researchers put it, “inherently quite noisy.”
- mrtnmcc 5y ago200Hz seems a low enough frequency (1.7m wavelength) that they could do active noise cancellation with a small onboard speaker designed to generate a similar sound 180 deg out of phase such that it cancels in far field. Would probably need some DSP to generate anti harmonics as well assuming there are some nonlinearities.
- AndrewDucker 5y agoIf the vibrations are what's holding it on then cancelling those vibrations might knock it off...
- erklik 5y ago> Is it going to become a ceiling roomba What would be the point of a ceiling roomba? Are ceilings ever that dirty to require regular vaccumming?
- robbrown451 5y agoI've certainly seen ceilings, such as at restaurants, that are out of reach of cleaning so they are covered with visible nastiness. I also once lived in a rental with a really high ceiling that was impossible to clean the cob webs, which were quite visible. Having robots that can crawl up there and clean -- or for that matter, paint -- would be handy.
- dstick 5y agoOh wow - paint! As someone who’s renovating a house at this very moment, I would happily pay for that!
- laurent92 5y agoYes. A rotating disk and paint. Sounds artsy. However, that shows there is demand for paint on high ceilings. A robotic arm, with an AI that is able to paint the corners and circumvolutions with a brush, that is able to retouch if a spot was missed? Maybe in the future, luxury will be in high ceilings that are clean and renovated. Imagine how dusty the paintings are in churches and palaces - imagine we could brush off the dust and restore their intensity every 6 months.
- arbol 5y agoCleaning showers, baths, etc.
- a_imho 5y agoMy apartment is not conductive to robot vacuums, but would entertain the idea of employing a bunch of robot window cleaners. Seems like a very well defined problem at first glance.
- bigbizisverywyz 5y agoWell if it can paint my ceiling in an hour or two, I don't really mind how loud it is (up to a a point). I have very high ceilings. It might also be quite useful for examining the outside of high skyscrapers for maintenance, if you need to get a camera up there.
- sharken 5y agoFor cleaning windows you can also employ a Robot to do the job. Though i think a safety cable is a really good idea, not sure how that is done for a Robot working on the ceiling. https://azbigmedia.com/lifestyle/how-a-window-cleaning-robot-works-and-its-major-benefits/ https://azbigmedia.com/lifestyle/how-a-window-cleaning-robot...
- skykooler 5y agoPainting a ceiling is more difficult for a climbing robot than cleaning the ceiling, since it's got to carry the weight of the paint up there.
- sidpatil 5y agoI could have sworn I've seen something like this before on YouTube already. Someone demonstrated a similar effect, and attached different-sized weights to test the adhesion. For the life of me, I can't find it.
- DoingIsLearning 5y agoYou're probably thinking of gecko style robots which use electrostatic chucks on the surface they are adhering to. This is the same sort of application but a completely new method for the suction effect.
- dstick 5y agoThat’s alright, it just didn’t stick with you.
- sova 5y agoSpace Elevator here we come! Edit: Y'all don't know about the Space Elevator ? There was a competition to figure out how to get a thing to climb a really long rope to space... This looks like it could do it
- LargoLasskhyfv 5y agoIt needs a 'fluid' to work. I think there is not enough of a 'fluid' to work with above a few (dozen) miles, or so.
- dstick 5y agoThis “fluid” term always throws me off :) Then I’m reminded of Fluid Dynamics from my Vfx days. Playing around with 3d fire and smoke never gets old!
- failwhaleshark 5y agoI have a pet-peeve about people using the word "fluid" as an adjective. When it is spoken though, at least it doesn't sound like "moist."
- pjerem 5y agoIsnt rope the real challenge (in term of physics) of the Space Elevator ?
- sova 5y agoYeah, that's definitely the main issue. A winner of a competition used lasers to heat the solar cells on a robot causing it to climb a ribbon. https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18122-space-elevator-wins-900000-nasa-prize/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18122-space-elevator-... But as you astutely mention, how do we construct such a ribbon? ... Great question.
- failwhaleshark 5y ago
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- infogulch 5y agoThis reminds me of levitating fluids over air by vibration, which Steve Mould made a nice video about: The Levitating Liquid Pendlum - https://youtu.be/gMAKamGIiMc https://youtu.be/gMAKamGIiMc The paper that is the source of the footage in the video: https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.04777 https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.04777
- willemlabu 5y agoThank you for this link. That was incredibly interesting. I won't spoil the twist at the end, suffice to say that I now am hoping for something like that in a scifi movie.
- yorwba 5y agoDiscussed on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24362808 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24362808
- iambateman 5y agoSupposing there was a large enough pool to do this effect with a person in it…would it give the perception of weightlessness?
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- scarmig 5y agoI would be curious to try this using the upside down buoyancy demonstrated at the end of the video. That'd be... Trippy? Terrifying? Amazing?
- baybal2 5y agoYou also have suction with very hot disks with a hole in the centre. Bernoulli effect in its different emanations. A more practical use of is to just use compressed air to create vacuum like Bernoulli suckers do It's convenient because this way air tools don't need separate vacuum hoses (which are way more expensive, and bulkier than air hoses.)
- maxbaines 5y agoThis is great! Do like how the Coke branding is blurred out...
- failwhaleshark 5y agoAdvertising must be NSFW. ;-) It's the perfect tool to ride across the ceiling, steal a coworker's lunch, their stapler, and/or shoot NERF minidarts at them.
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- asiachick 5y agocan I please have a shelf dusting Roomba now?
- prodent 5y agoSpiderbot, spiderbot..
- perryizgr8 5y agoHow does it move? Is it able to modulate the vibrations in the intended direction of movement?
- failwhaleshark 5y agoIt's basically like a tank. 2 wheels. FF for forward, RR for reverse, FR for right, RF for left.
- tromp 5y agoIt has (tiny) motored wheels mounted at the tips of the chassis...
- pftburger 5y agohttps://www.mariayablonina.com/milan-design-week https://www.mariayablonina.com/milan-design-week Here's a friends wall climbing robot weaving a rope structure.
- high_byte 5y agojust wow
- yosito 5y agoWhile I find this effect to be really surprising, it's also somehow intuitive to me. I think it reminds me of holding a piece of grass between my thumbs and blowing to make it vibrate. Different, sort of reversed physics, but somewhat related. What really surprises me about this effect is how much weight it can support.
- samstave 5y agoHOLY SHIT! Wait until these are integrated into wearbles - gloves, shoes, a back-pad etc.. Also - overhead delivery pathways. Can you get more load capacity with one large disc or many small discs? If the bot can follow a magnetic tape along a path this could be a delivery mecanism in facilities of the future. Whate would be interesting is if there were a low-voltage track that it ran a connection to for power - or an inverter coil on the top side of the delivery track to provide constant wireless power to the 'suctioned' devices crawling along its path. This thing could revolutionize a lot of deliver mechanisms - Put them along hospital corridors within a tube/enclosure such that delivery bots can peddle about the hospital unheeded and without impeding existing traffic.... I WANT one - how make?
- failwhaleshark 5y agoWearables? I don't want this crawling on me, thanks. haha. Things crawling on the ceiling of occupied spaces.. what could go wrong?