a history of cybernetic animals and early robots
As a child, I really wanted one of these! Of the three built, two may still be in existance at the Rancho Los Amigos. **Video clip via youtube – has both the Moon walker prototype and the chair** Either an early version, or the prototype for the later Iron Mule Train see here. Cam-leg set-up …
Read More “1966 – “Moonwalker” Disability Walker – Jack Miller / W.C. Baldwin / Brodsky (American)”
Image found on flickr. Exhibit now located at Musée Mécanique, San Francisco. See video clip here. from Mechanix Illustrated May 1947 from Popular Science Jan 1939.
The above image from Popular Science April, 1933. The Harford Courant Mar 6, 1933 p16 Italian Designs Mechanical Horse From Steel Tubing —- Device Looks Like Grasshopper Stepping Along Road Spezia, Italy—(AP.)—A mechanical horse, designed to substitute for the farm animal or even light tractor, has been invented by an engineer here, Signor D. G. …
Read More “1932-3 – Mechanical Horse – D. G. Alzetta (Italian)”
1983 "Trojan Cockroach", a Six-Legged Hydraulic Walker by Ivan Sutherland. The Sutherland Walker was a six-legged all-terrain robotic designed by Sutherland Sproull Associates with the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University under contract to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The robot used a gasoline motor to power its legs and required a driver …
Read More “1983 – “Six-Legged Hydraulic Walker” – Ivan Sutherland (American)”
http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA139111&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf