a history of cybernetic animals and early robots
An entirely different approach by Spartaco Maratori(8) produced his 'Golden Horse' which, in the final analysis, is somewhat similar to Shigley's approach. Maratori based his concept on an analysis of the locomotion of the horse. He studied the way horses walk, trot, and gallop and after carefully cataloging the various leg motions, attempted to duplicate …
Read More “1960c – “Golden Horse” Walking Machine – Maratori – (Italian)”
Michael Freeman's first robot was RUDY, a robot he designed and entered into the Westinghouse Science Fair in 1960, aged 13 where he won first place!. Rudy was a mechanical robot that could walk around by using a tether and wheels, and could remember where it went so that later on, it could re-trace its steps. …
Read More “1960 – Rudy the Robot – Michael Freeman (American)”
In the early ‘60s, as part of the preparations for the Apollo manned moon landing mission, the Jet Propulsion Lab planned a follow-on program to its very successful ‘hard’ landing ‘Ranger’ program, which gave the first close-up views of the moon’s surface. The proposed ‘soft’ lander program was called ‘Surveyor’. An initial concept was for …
Read More “1961 – RCA “Porky the Pig” Moon Walker – (American)”
There are at least two variations of the walking machines attributed to Prof. Joseph E. Shigley, then from the University of Michigan. The first relates to the pantograph leg with some descriptions suggesting up to 16 legs were to be used – 4 gangs of 4 legs so a leg was on the ground at any …
Read More “1957-60 – Walking Machine(s) – Joseph Shigley (American)”
Illustration above showing a depiction of "ЧТС" shaking hands with "ТУМ". Вадим Викторович Мацкевич – Vadim Viktorovich Matskevich built quite a few robots in his lifetime. For further infomation on Matskevich, see here.