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Researchers at Cranfield University in Bedfordshire hope to harness that wind to power the Wander-bot, a walking device they believe could aid a search for extraterrestrial life. Inspired by the Strandbeesten (beach beast) kinetic sculptures of Dutch artist Theo Jansen, Dr Saurabh Upadhyay and Sam Kurian set out to create a low-cost and easily repairable robot that does not need a battery to power movement (which usually accounts for 20% of energy use).
The 3D-printed machine could go far, but some challenges need to be solved first – turning left and right, for example.
Walking into the wind
Unveiled in March, Cranfield’s 1ft prototype converts wind into locomotion using a vertical Savonius wind turbine. Use of the helix-like turbine enables some features that might seem impossible at first.
“The wind turbine will move only in one direction, and that will make the robot move forward. So even if the wind is coming in front of the robot, it will still be able to go towards that direction,” says Upadhyay, a lecturer in space engineering.
The turbine is connected to a Jansen linkage mechanism, as found in the Strandbeesten, by a gearing system. As the turbine spins, it moves the legs to create locomotion, the movement of each foot optimised to maximise contact time with the surface.
Designed to demonstrate wind harnessing and a 3D-printed locomotion system, the prototype is fairly simple, with no embedded systems or even steering. Options being explored include differential steering and a modified locomotion system for greater flexibility.
The team aims to minimise the use of electronics in future versions, using light power sources for data collection or transmission. It also plans to explore different materials and use commercial 3D-printing systems to increase the robot’s size. It currently requires wind speeds of at least 2m per second to move, but that could increase with larger machines.
Extreme conditions
Wander-bot’s wind-powered locomotion could make it well suited to long-duration missions on Titan, which Upadhyay calls “one of the key scientific places for people working in planetary exploration”.
Closer to home, it could work in polar environments. “This is quite interesting for Arctic and Antarctic applications,” he says. “Existing robots face a very challenging scenario because solar panels will [only] work for six months, because there is very low light there. If you want to cover as much as possible in these polar regions, you need a source that will always be available. And the real answer is wind.”
Working on such a unique project is exhausting and exciting, he adds. “When we started building this thing, we had only one or two applications in mind. But now it looks like only slight modifications or adaptations [are needed for] specific applications. This opens up a completely new branch of robotics, where the key idea is you can build very simple 3D-printed robots and you can use them in hostile environments.”
The research was supported by the UK-RAS+ Network at the University of Manchester and funded by the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.
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