Awesome Robots

Not to be confused with the decade-old Heineken Beerbot, the Heineken B.O.T. is basically a robo-butler for transporting cold drinks on hot days. The beer company built this six-wheeled robot that can follow you around like a puppy dog with a cooler full of beer. You can win one on the HeinekenBOT website starting 7.1.2021.

To celebrate its acquisition by Hyundai, Boston Dynamics shows off its Spot robots once again. Enjoy this precision choreographed dance routine featuring a pack of the robo-dogs dancing to the Korean automaker and BTS collab IONIQ: I’m On It. This time it’s about their arms as much as it is about their legs.

Gav from The Slow Mo Guys mounted a fancy high-speed camera to the arm of an agile and precise robot. Combined with a remote triggering mechanism, he was able to capture some unique perspectives on their subject – a colorful fountain made from diet soda, Mentos, and their sponsor MiO’s instant drinks.

We never could play Guitar Hero on Hard or Expert levels. Engineer Nick O’Hara has no such problems, thanks to the robot he built. Jon Bot Jovi uses AI and computer vision tech to detect the notes and timing, then triggers solenoids to push the guitar’s fret buttons and strum bar to perform even the most challenging tracks.

Inspired by Goodyear’s concept for a ball-shaped tire, engineer James Bruton created a spherical wheel that can roll in any direction. After validating the design, he built a trio of the wheels and attached them to a robot as a testbed for the technology. We’re impressed with the little fella’s agility.

We’ve seen how individual blacksmiths and blademakers painstakingly handcraft knives one at a time. This factory footage from Sweden’s Morakniv shows us the opposite – how robots and other machines crank out thousands of knives each day. Humans are still involved in the assembly and quality assurance processes.

Engineers at Walt Disney Imagineering have been working on animatronic robots which can walk on their own for a while now. As part of their Project Kiwi initiative, they created a walking version of Baby Groot from Guardians of the Galaxy. He needs a safety tether at present but is still an impressive creation.

The MowRo RM24 keeps your lawn neat and tidy while you relax. It automatically drives around your yard, quietly trimming your grass thanks to its zero-emission battery-powered drivetrain. It automatically stops if it bumps into anything, and works with boundary stakes and wire to keep it on your lawn. Save 14% in The Awesomer Shop.

Like some other bendy machines, these unconventional robots move with the power of compressed air. Veritasium shows how these inexpensive, inflatable tubes can access places that other robots can’t, and could be used on search-and-rescue missions, or helping to intubate patients. You can even make your own vine robot.

Remember when you had to manually transform your Transformers? That changes today, thanks to Hasbro and Robosen. This impressive 19″ tall robot can automatically convert, and can do it via voice or a smartphone app. The G1 Optimus Prime is loaded with 80 sound effects, and the original voice of the Autobot’s leader.

Saarland University researcher Marc Teyssier created the creepiest webcam we’ve ever seen. The Eyecam uses six servo motors to realistically replicate the movements of a human eyeball, eyelids, and eyebrow, staring down its subject and making sure they are paying attention during Zoom calls.

Among its technologies, Festo are experts in robotic biomimicry. In this video, they show off the latest generation of their BionicSwift, a robot that mimics the flight mechanics of a real bird. These artificial swallows can autonomously fly in coordinated flocks, and can pull off tight turns and loops.

Skynet, er Boston Dynamics reveals another of our future robotic overlords. Stretch is a wheeled robot that uses an articulated arm and suction grabber to pick up and carry objects, reducing repetitive and back-breaking work for humans. Watch it pick up a Spot robot, then set up and operate a box handling line.

LEGO builder Tom Jones, aka WalkCrawlRun created this 1/4-scale model of Boston Dynamics’ adorable Spot robot. While the LEGO version isn’t likely to be as smart or agile as the $75,000 robot, it is able to trot around on its legs like a robodog. Show your support for the design on LEGO Ideas.

It’s pretty tricky to balance a cube on one of its corners or edges. But ReM-RC shows off a really cool machine they built that does just that automatically. The system uses an ESP32 controller, an MPU-6050 gyroscope-accelerometer chip, and a set of three servo motors that spin wheels to maintain its balance.

Musician Moritz Simon Geist creates music with the help of robots. For this performance, he set up a pan filled with hot oil, popcorn, and sensors that triggered strikes on a drum kit each time a popcorn kernel burst open. The resulting beats are definitely giving us a jazz fusion vibe.

BionicHIVE’s unusual warehouse worker robots not only can scurry about on the ground, but they can hook themselves onto tracks on shelving units and climb vertically. They can load and carry small packages and take up very little space so that shelving units can be placed closer together than normal.

One of the big problems with Roombas and other robot vacuum cleaners is that they can’t go up or down stairs. Leave it to builder Peter Sripol and his pals to come up with a solution. They attached three ducted fans to a cheap Roomba knock-off, so it can fly like a drone between floors.

Anyone who watches Futurama knows that robots that bend are the best. Veritasium looks at unconventional robots made from flexible materials, including Zachary Hammond and team’s isoperimetric robot. The advantages of these “soft robots” include their light weight, enhanced safety, and shape-shifting abilities.

Dancers Jackson Chavis, BluPrint and Taylor Pierce take robotic dancing to the next level, working in perfect sync in this routine they choreographed to Kid Cudi’s 2009 track Day ‘N’ Nite. Be sure to check out more mad dance moves on Jackson’s TikTok feed.

Likely inspired by the binary solo at the end of Flight of the Conchords’ classic Robots, the guys from Auralnauts re-recorded the Boston Dynamics robot dance video with more appropriate lyrics. If you’re not fluent in binary, it translates to: “Dance sets us free. Join us. Humans are doomed.”

One challenge for electric vehicles is the limited availability of chargers. Volkswagen is showing off a robot that can drive around a parking lot, connect to a vehicle, and charge it no matter what space it’s parked in. It can also leave a charging pack next to a car and fetch another to charge multiple vehicles at once.

To celebrate the end of 2020 and to ring in a happier 2021, robotics company Boston Dynamics programmed their ATLAS, SPOT, and HANDLE robots to perform a little dance routine to The Contours classic Do You Love Me? Everything you see here was filmed in-camera with real robots, and with no CGI or visual effects.