IRonCub: A Humanoid Robot Designed to Fly Like Iron Man

https://spectrum.ieee.org/ironcub-jet-powered-flying-robot

52•rbanffy•4mo ago

Comments

voidUpdate•4mo ago

I really feel like people need to stop trying to make these sorts of robots look so "human-like". The effect of a mouthless bald doll head strapped on top of an iron man robot isn't exactly comforting, to me anyway. It starts to hit the uncanny valley a bit

sausajez•4mo ago

I feel like the funny part is that there are so many "robot" mask designs in pop culture that would look 1000x more comforting than a slightly psychotic looking robotic doll

voidUpdate•4mo ago

That's exactly my idea. I would feel far more comforted being rescued by something like Chappie or The Iron Legion than something like the Sophia robot or this thing. Human-inspired over human imitation

zhainya•4mo ago

Everything about this design feels wrong. Like they went out of their way to make it unappealing.

ahoka•4mo ago

This looks like it was put together by Sid in his room.

freedomben•4mo ago

That was exactly what I thought of too when I saw it, hahaha. If it wasn't terrifying enough already...

KineticLensman•4mo ago

A similar type of robot is key to the plot of the superbly quirky film 'Brian and Charles' [0] in which a nutty inventor build a robot that looks exactly a weird old-man's head stuck on top of a washing-machine shaped body.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_and_Charles

wsintra2022•4mo ago

Under rated British comedy gold right there, layers and layers especially the illuminati references

eig•4mo ago

Presumably they want to eventually put a human inside it, in which case having a humanoid robot to work off of wouldn't change the aero calculations and designs too much. The article talks about specific design considerations to avoid the exhaust gases.

voidUpdate•4mo ago

Gravity Industries already has that sorted https://gravity.co/ . I was almost expecting this robot to just be a humanoid robot with one of those suits on

legacynl•4mo ago

Looking at the 'hands' of this robot, it looks to be exactly that.

bArray•4mo ago

> Presumably they want to eventually put a human inside it [..]

I'm imagining a team just putting the organs of a human into the robot to save on space. Basically a brain plus whatever is absolutely necessary to run the brain.

stavros•4mo ago

Wasn't that Robocop 3?

konart•4mo ago

Maybe the wanted to create an https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astro_Boy

stronglikedan•4mo ago

I would look at that and think "doll". Others look at it and think "human". People are weird.

sgt•4mo ago

I think they could make it a bit more professional looking like: https://imgur.com/a/vXED98B Like a friendly yet stern Butler of the Skies.

Klaster_1•4mo ago

Next step: add an RTG power source and make it look like a boy.

MSFT_Edging•4mo ago

Can we please be honest with ourselves for a second and call out the ridiculousness of the "find a lost hiker" and "disaster relief" excuses used by kill-bot companies?

Who is this robot going to save with glowing hot turbine engines on it's fore-arms.

This is kill-bot tech put on the iCub to get articles in circulation.

busterarm•4mo ago

If you truly wanted to do this, the Russia-Ukraine conflict has already proven that you can drop bombs via drones with pinpoint accuracy for dirt cheap.

If somebody's going to work on something a million times more the cost and a similar fractional multiple of the effectiveness, maybe you can take them at face value that they're not building a murderbot (at least not by design).

SketchySeaBeast•4mo ago

> at face value

Freaky baby face value.

MSFT_Edging•4mo ago

> something a million times more the cost and a similar fractional multiple of the effectiveness

I assure you that drone warfare isnt cutting down on any r&d budget at the pentagon. the whole point is to spend that money.

busterarm•4mo ago

And the first line in the article here says that this is being developed by a university in Italy.

"The Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT) is primarily funded by the Italian State but also receives significant funding from European Union research programs, such as the European Research Council (ERC) and Horizon Europe".

No pentagon money here.

fragmede•4mo ago

It's dual use technology. It can and will be used to find lost hikers, it's just that it can also be used for nefarious purposes.

TheWookieDavid•4mo ago

Yeah, it could find lost hikers, while starting multiple forest fires just by flying low to the ground. Its hands are replaced by jets. This is not designed for rescue purposes nor would it be a good tool for rescue purposes.

fragmede•4mo ago

https://xkcd.com/2128/ also applies

trenchpilgrim•4mo ago

"disaster response" is code for "we built the robot before realizing we need to justify it to others" https://xkcd.com/2128

josefresco•4mo ago

Came here to say this. It appears 14 words into the article! I laughed out loud and immediately stopped reading. Write an article when their robot has "saved" at least one living thing and I'll pay attention. Until then it's just vapor. In the meantime I'll wear my downvotes with pride.

arnaudsm•4mo ago

Why would you need bipedism for a flying object ? Wouldn't a quadripod + quadcopter setup would be much more stable and cheaper ?

voidUpdate•4mo ago

It's being advertised as being used for generic disaster recovery, where it's beneficial to be human-shaped (human infrastructure is designed for humans, so its easier to interface with it if the robot is human-shaped too), so they just strapped some jets on it to take it to the disaster zone itself

input_sh•4mo ago

That's just something robot manufacturers say to justify building their expensive toys, I promise you it'll never be used for that purpose.

See the XKCD someone has already posted below.

voidUpdate•4mo ago

Yeah I know, but that's what they're advertising it as

meindnoch•4mo ago

>It's being advertised as being used for generic disaster recovery, where it's beneficial to be human-shaped (human infrastructure is designed for humans, so its easier to interface with it if the robot is human-shaped too)

Ummmm, disaster recovery is hard precisely because the infrastructure (e.g. a collapsed building) ceased to be suitable for humans.

voidUpdate•4mo ago

The way in which it isn't suitable for humans depends on the disaster though. If somewhere is flooded or on fire, a humanoid robot will probably be able to navigate it better than a quadrupedal one. If the building is collapsed, sure

cdfsdsadsa•4mo ago

That's not the point of this robot.

I suppose the original iCub research robot is running out of grants it can milk, so they strapped some jet engines to it.

pettycashstash2•4mo ago

Reminds me so much of Mega Man on NES.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxyLui5LdCc

p0w3n3d•4mo ago

Flying is usually the easiest part of "flying like Iron Man"

SketchySeaBeast•4mo ago

Given that the video showed ~1 second of "flying", I don't even know if that's the case.

exe34•4mo ago

"uh.... search and rescue."

micromacrofoot•4mo ago

a humanoid robot designed to fly like a billionaire arms dealer

wheybags•4mo ago

https://gravity.co/ is a similar project that seems to be much more advanced, and also attaches to a real human body, rather than a nightmare doll head

switchbak•4mo ago

Man, the carnage that will inevitably happen when someone pushes this thing too far. I suppose that’s true of many things (motorcycles), but this just terrifies me.

busterarm•4mo ago

It's also incredibly difficult to learn to use and to operate. The whole point of putting a robot in the cockpit is that it won't make mistakes humans will and thus be more fuel efficient (e.g., longer operation times).

At least if you can keep the weight down.

jandrese•4mo ago

> “is that the exhaust gas from the turbines is at 800 °C and almost supersonic speed.

MY SHOES ARE ON FIRE!

They kinda handwaved the whole "wash the disaster area in superheated jet exhaust before doing your S&R" problem.

insane_dreamer•4mo ago

It seems that flying a robot to a disaster response area is the easy part. The question is whether it'll be able to do anything truly useful there.

astroflection•4mo ago

Obviously being able to fly a bipedal kill bot into a "war zone" and then use it for door-to-door fighting is something certain large organizations are looking for. The stupid baby mask is just to distract critics of kill bot tech.

robomartin•4mo ago

This goes into my "Top 100 really dumb things I've seen this year" list. Not sure if it makes top ten. It's definitely in the top 25%.

OK. Why?

Let's forget then "Let's strap model airplane jet engines to the robot and make it fly." part.

For this dumb mechanical albatross to be anywhere close to useful in ANY scenario, even without flying...it has to be useful as a humanoid robot. It isn't. iCub was a cool concept, but it is so far behind the current state of the art I am not sure why they are trying to make it fly.

And, flying?

You can hang a humanoid from any of the already available mega quadcopters and drop it off anywhere within the flight range.

You can probably stick a parachute on an already available humanoid and drop dozens of them from an airplane.

Flying is a solved problem. A humanoid useful in the real world --particularly in disaster areas-- is not. At all.

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IRonCub: A Humanoid Robot Designed to Fly Like Iron Man

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