Please proofread, Full story at http://www.physorg.com/news3472.html

http://www.physorg.com/news3472.html

Though the article

Why bother? This whole thing was done by idiots, for idiots -- and I am a moron, _not_ an idiot.

Point: the deficiencies and inherent flaws of tracked-vehicle design and realisation are well known. Sand, small pebbles, short sticks, et al *will* stop this "vehicle" cold.

Second point: there is only one motor and drivetrain in this device. Therefore, the jamming of even a single tread will render the entire machine completely inoperable. How stupid.

Arthur C. Clarke had it right --- spheres with tentacles; _that_ is the ultimate in agility and mobility, for robotic design. Plus, such units can easily link together to form a much greater whole, if required --- they could perform nearly *any* engineering, construction, or transportation task.

And for the military... well: imagine a carpet of many thousands of these murderous little machines, rapidly rolling towards you in piranha-like frenzy...

Do you have any references/links to this "Clarke Machine"?

.drt

You mean like one of his 70+ popular books?

Approved by the Department of Redundancy Department.

Point taken, you are a moron. This is an excellent device particularly for tunneling applications. Additionally, the current version is only a prototype, so the single motor thing will probably be changed if it becomes problematic.

I think in melee combat, these things would be just as effective as spherical robots with tentacles. One significant advantage of tracks it the greater surface area (and friction). Mount a gun down the center, and the snake will handle the recoil better than a sphere (unless the tentacles are particularly hefty, which would in turn reduce their agility).

Imagine if they made one of these suckers as big as the worms on Dune.

hey moron Clerks idea is good for the technologies to come....i dnt think sphericle robots with tentecles could be easy to made because each of them need seperate power
plus intelligence to work.it would make things more complicated but this idea is great in terms of current technologies,easy to make and maintain........snakes can move through sand or pebbles.....they can develope the Tread to do that........think logically man.......

Not just more than twice its height, it's over more than twice! That's like, double the height or something.

A correct sentence was to appear in the appears on this article.

Snakes do not have treads, nor do they have any entry points for sand or pebbles or sticks to work their way into. And you're telling *me* to think logically? What have you been smoking?

Some participants of this forum are amazingly fast with their judgement.

Here are some comments by the inventor of the OmniTread:

1. The model shown in the photos on this web site, the OT-8, performs exceptionally well in sand. We have run it for extended period in our sandbox. See some more test results in this recent paper:
http://www-personal.engin.umich.edu/~johan...rs/paper110.pdf

2. Our latest model, the OT-4 (half the diameter of the OT-8), is designed with clutches that allow each track to be engaged or disengaged individually. This feature is mostly aimed at saving battery power, but it can also be used to disengage a disabled track.

3. The single motor design is the result of careful study and experimental validation. The design is advantageous over having a motor in each segment because it saves weight, volumen, and electric power. The only real disadvantage of the design is that it limits the bending of the joints to 35 deg. However, the pneumatic actuators impose about the same limit in bending, so even if we had individual motors, the joint angles would still be limited.

Johann

Well, good luck with that, then -- I wouldn't buy one. Natural organisms don't have open surfaces or rotating shafts, for good reasons.

Yes...... soon my army of highly trained snakes and monkeys with sealed nostrils, eyes and ears will be ready for me to take over the world MUAHAHA!! Yours for 1 million dollars.......

I was thinking the same thing.. That it's similar to a tire touching a road, like a tire touching a road.

When I read this, I envisioned future posibilities, not the restrictions of currect design

1) Seperation of snake into individual chunks that communicate with each other in a chain. I.E. Node at end says we want to go farward, but there is a rock next to me. This gets shuffled to node 2. Node 2 works to lift node 1. First says, good, but not enough. Third node becomes involved - nodes 1 and 2 lifted. Node 1 says, we are there. Node 2 and 2 relaxes. If node 2 becomes disabled, node 1,3 and the 4 can perform the same function...

2) Each node could containing different momentum devices, which you can customize depending on mission. Some with claws for climbing, paddles for swimming, wheels for speeding, etc. Each node can active it's moment device as needed by the device as a whole.

3) You could incoorperate power nodes. A node that simply supplies power to surrounding nodes.

4) These nodes call all be plug and play

5) You could have equipment nodes for specific purposes, such as camera's, scanners, etc.

6) node ejection. If a node becomes disabled, it would be possible for the two remaining parts to eject the damaged node and re-join to create a new device... taking this father... for the snake to pickup new power nodes or equipment nodes, or
perhaps dropping off a spy node at some secret location, before fleeing the scene. All very possible.

I could go on, but I think the point I am making is that with a ball and tenticals... you have a ball and tenticals. If a tentical becomes damaged, you have problems. This does not need to be the case with the snake.

I like the concept of snake, though it is currently primitive in design.

There are microscopic structures like the flagellum and cilia in Archea, bacteria and eukaryotes which have rotating shafts.

Some viroids lack cell walls or protein coats making them as "open" as is possible for DNA/RNA-based life.