Robot Living

The New Zealand wine industry is set to save over $20 million a year thanks to a vine pruning robot developed at the University of Canterbury.   A team led by Dr Richard Green will spend the next four years developing the technology.

Using 3D imaging and night vision, the robot will be able to prune around the clock while moving at walking speed.  A robot with night vision and sharp pruning shears is actually kind of scary.

“Such a fast vision-based pruning system is only possible using recently developed camera technology with efficient cutting edge computer vision-based tracking and AI algorithms,” said Dr Green. “We are leading the world with fast accurate colour 3D depth maps of vines, light robot cutting arms and the AI to coordinate this moving at walking speed. Not only can a higher quality be maintained by pruning consistently and accurately while recognising disease and age of vines, but the industry will be able to guarantee pruning within the very brief seasonal window each year.”

We always new Edward Scissorhands was a robot.

Link via (3News)

Tags: New Zealand

Creepier than a human like robot in an uncanny valley is the robot that is being trained to harvest cauliflower.

Scientists at the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) have developed an infravision system which should allow them to see through all the leaves and greenery and harvest cauliflower with a robot easily.

NPL is working with KMS Projects and Vegetable Harvesting Systems (VHS) to develop this project.  The project came about after a study of farmers indicated that up to 60% of certain crops are wasted each year, causing farmers to lose money.  Part of this is due to a loss of migrant workers.

Link via (The Register)

Tags: harvest, robot, uk

Carnegie Mellon is at it again.  This time they want to make robots do all the farm work.

Tony Stentz, an engineer from Carnegie Mellon thinks the time is right for such pursuits.  Tony worked on Boss, the autonomous vehicle that won DARPA’s Grand Challenge.

Tony and other colleagues have outfitted the tractor pictured here and are able to make it navigate on its own through an orchard by using a 3D laser ranging scanner.

The outfitted vehicles could either be used to spray crops or potentially pick fruit.

A company called Vision Robotics already has robots that do pruning.  This is a slightly different approach to robotic farming in that a human drives the tractor and robotic arms do the pruning.

Link via (New Scientist)

Tags: carnegie mellon

More robotic gardening.  This time Adafruit Industries visits Peter Sand at the W/——— project space in Chinatown NYC.

Using a protoshield, Arduinos and many other parts, Peter’s robot plants seeds and tends the garden.

Video after the break.

Link via (Make) via (Adafruit)
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Tags: arduino, gardening, robot

The Automower 260 ACX from Husqvarna can now send text messages when it sees you loafing about.  You lazy sod *$% !, get out here and help me.

The mower can mow about 1/2 an acre on a single charge and then heads back to it’s base for a recharge, which takes about 40 minutes.

Currently priced for the European market at €4,000.  No word on when it is coming stateside.

See Husqvarna’s solar powered mower here.

We couldn’t find a video of the 260, but see the other models in a video after the break.

Link via (Endgadget)

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Tags: automower, husqvarna, lawnmower, robot, swedish