July 30, 2023: It can enter very tight spaces and prevent people from endangering their lives. Know more about the robot and watch the video inside.
The Hybrid Mobility Robot (HMR), a completely autonomous robot that can roll to its destination and even roll over obstacles in its path, was created by a student-founded business called Revolute Robotics in Arizona. It's simply captivating!
There are numerous varieties of autonomous robots. Some even have two legs and can fly or move on wheels. Typically, they are created with a particular purpose in mind and furnished with the necessary tools. Combining different kinds of movement is a challenging game, but the company appears to have solved it.
Where will it be used?
The bot's development is aimed at facilitating inspections in small spaces.
Space is at an all-time low on oil rigs (a structure with equipment for drilling an oil well) and in deep mine shafts, and sending humans to investigate them entails significant safety hazards. Inspections can last for weeks and disrupt operations, increasing the expense to the company.
These bots might also be employed for security reasons, such as checking a suspicious object or patrolling a sizable perimeter while keeping people safe. Similar to most bot technologies, it might be used by the military for surveillance operations in hostile areas.
The answer provided by Revolute Robotics is that when the robot has to fly over barriers or just reach an inaccessible area during an inspection, it can activate its four propellers.
The bots can absolutely be scaled down for civil applications like inspecting pipelines, despite their current size being very enormous. Therefore, if a utility company suddenly appears in a building near you with one of these in the future, it shouldn't come as a huge surprise.
How is the system going to work?
The system comprises a switchable camera or sensor, and the complete assembly is housed inside a light outer cover that is robust enough to withstand shocks from falls or bounces on uneven terrain. Additionally, it conceals the propellers so that the bot can work alongside people.
The roll is the bot's main method of motion. Additionally, it saves energy during operations because flying uses up the onboard battery five times more quickly. Nevertheless, the bot's capacity to fly allows it to avoid dangerous circumstances, such as falling over a high ledge.
The bot can also be used in search and rescue operations where efficiency is increased by deploying a swarm of bots rather than a single one because time is of the importance.
To gather money to produce its bot and prepare it for commercial use, Revolute turned to crowdfunding. Crowdfunding is the practice of using small donations from lots of people to finance a business without using regular channels.
One might simply release the robot in a fully autonomous operation, and it would roll around utilising its gimbal rings until the mission objective was met, at which point it would dash back to you. A gimbal ring is a mechanism made up of two or three pivoted rings arranged at right angles to one another that allows an object, such as a compass, to be suspended freely in all directions.