Hi All
Introducing the AIMEC:EZ1
We are in discussions with DJ to produce a special version of our AIMEC (Artificially Intelligent Mechanical Electronic Companion) robot for the EZ-B, this will be a very advanced robot that will be made available in kit form, which will probably be by the end of this year.
Some history, the first AMI (Applied Machine Intelligence) robot was the AIMEC:3 which is a "hyper-tech" toy and we were very close to licensing this design to a large US toy manufacturer, but the deal fell through. Our most advanced robot is the AIMEC:4 which is still in development, this robot has advanced voice recognition (Dragon 11), face recognition and eye tracking and object recognition the robot has an advanced Ai core and is capable of self learning. When we came across the fantastic EZ-B system that the genius DJ Sures produced we immediately thought that it would be really cool to make a EZ-B version and this is what we are currently developing the AIMEC:EZ1. This robot is the development platform for a ground breaking robotics kit that we plan to sell to the general public, for the first time a highly advanced robot will be available (in various versions) at a price that hobbyists would be able to afford.
I have been building robots for over 30 years and some of my designs are recorded on Cybernetic Zoo
http://cyberneticzoo.com/?p=2280
http://cyberneticzoo.com/?p=3984
On our team we have the brilliant model maker (and engineer) Steve Cole (Articole Studios) http://www.articolestudios.co.uk/ who is also a member of this forum @ukrobotman, with Alex Cole on 3D design and (the incredibly talented) Mike Hodgson on software development. I am doing mechanical, electronics and sensor designs and firmware development for support PIC microcontrollers that enhance the EZ-B boards operation over the I2C bus.
We are all looking forward to working closely with DJ and his team in the new future!
Tony
-- Conceptioneering Ltd - Inventors of the Award Winning Cube World To see Product Innovation - visit our website at www.conceptioneering.co.uk To see Robotic Innovation - visit our website at www.appliedmachineintelligence.co.uk
Awesome! I can not wait, do not take away the eye of this thread.
@rgordon
Yes, we plan on having an (entry level) version costing <$1000. Thats the great thing about our kit concept users can come in at many levels of robot, for instance we plan to have 3 arms available for the most advanced robot (Ultimate) the robot will have 5 DOF arm and we will have a mid range arm at 3 DOF and also a (non mechanical) poseable arm where users can manually put the robots arm into positions for holding trays etc. We have had to develop our own (low cost) mega servo for the shoulder that has a whopping 200Kg.cm torque so the mechanical arms will be capable of picking up quite weighty objects. The Ultimate version will obviously have a higher cost, and we do not currently know what this is until all the design is finalized.
But the robot body/chassis is universal so you may start off with the poseable arms then later decide to upgrade to the motorised arms the system is very flexible and will let users do this. There will be users that maybe just want to buy the body shell and build there own mechanisms or say the body shell and locomotion drives and they then add their existing EZ-B etc.
I hope you meant to say less than <$1,000. As much as I would like to have one, I could not afford it if it cost more than that. It is hard enough to justify (to the wife) spending any extra money these days on something that is a hobby. Oh well, I will just have to wait.
However, I will endeavor to continue to scratch and save as best I can to keep doing the thing I love the most...building robots.
@rgordon
Thanks for picking up the typing error, yes it should read "less than" $1000. We think a lot of users may just start with buying what will be a very professional looking robot body and build it up from that. We cannot give prices yet for just the body shell, but we want it to be affordable to the hobbyist.
It is great to be working with Steve Cole @ukrobotman, he been a great friend for years and makes all my prototype models for my concept toy inventions that we license to companies like Mattel etc.
To show off some of his work, I got him to make me a half scale Dalek, which one day I must put an EZ-B into!
Steve is also a great mechanical engineer and doing some great work on our AIMEC:EZ robot arm designs.
That Dalek would look super cool driving around and taking over the world. That would make a cool robot platform for Dr. Who fans, or anyone who loves robots.
I know of at least one person on here who is a huge Dr Who fan and I just know he will love the idea of that Dalek running around with an EZ-B in it.
I did start to robotize it, here is the eye with a simple thermal imager (from Robot Electronics) and a single transducer ultrasonic ranger. In the photo I am testing it (on 2 PICs) that are connected with a superfast bit/bang algorithm that I have developed for high speed comms between multiple microcontroller nodes in my robotic systems.
Here is what the eye looked like
I think an EZ-B would be perfect for this Dalek.