Tokyo-based start-up Tsubame Industries has developed a 4.5-metre-tall (14.8-feet), four-wheeled robot that looks like "Mobile Suit Gundam" from the wildly popular Japanese animation series, and it can be yours for $3 million.

Tokyo-based start-up Tsubame Industries has developed a 4.5-metre-tall (14.8-feet), four-wheeled robot that looks like “Mobile Suit Gundam” from the wildly popular Japanese animation series, and it can be yours for $3 million.

      •  TWeaK   ( @TWeaK@lemm.ee ) English
        6•1 year ago

        I get the feeling that, seeing as hydraulics have been around for longer than robotics, it just isn’t practicable to build a robot out of hydraulics - otherwise we’d have them already.

        •  ShadowRam   ( @ShadowRam@kbin.social ) 
          3•1 year ago

          Nah, you can’t beat the power density of hydraulics and never will unless room temp superconductors become a thing.

          Big Dog from Boston Dynamic was hydraulic.

          Going that size or bigger, hydraulics is a must.

          The reason you don’t see it is hydraulics is a completely different ball game.

          Controls researchers stick with small and electronic, because that’s what they know.

          It’s very rare to find a controls engineer that understands hydraulics.

          And the hydraulics experts out there, don’t have the background for sophisticated control theory.

    •  Allseer   ( @StalksEveryone@futurology.today ) English
      3•1 year ago

      i think they had an idea, a good one, but then at the last moment realized that it was all too dangerous and expensive in practice.

      then they tried doing some weird hybrid between “professional” wrestling and a documentary.

      poor planning was the ultimate downfall. i had high hopes.