From: farid@gradient.cis.upenn.edu (Hany Farid)
Newsgroups: comp.robotics
Subject: Re: Please Repost Stiquito info
Date: 13 Oct 92 12:59:15 GMT
Distribution: na
Organization: /home/farid/.organization
In-reply-to: simon@engcon.marshall.ltv.com's message of 13 Oct 92 12:22:50 GMT


>
>  Could someone please repost the Stiquito info (description, address, cost?).
>

Here it is. 

Hany Farid
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From jwmills@moose.cs.indiana.edu Wed Sep 30 13:20:32 1992

Stiquito:  A Small Nitinol-Propelled Hexapod Robot

The Computer Science Department's Robotics Laboratory at Indiana 
University (Bloomington) has designed, built, and tested 
"Stiquito," a six-legged robot that you customize by adding 
sensors, controllers, power sources, etc.  The robot provides an 
inexpensive platform to study computational sensors, subsumption 
architectures, neural gait control, emergent cooperative behavior, 
and machine vision.  It is currently being used for research at 
IU, and, at a ratio of one robot per student, in "VLSI for 
Robotics" and "Machine Learning" classes.

Stiquito is small (3cm H x 7cm W x 6cm L) and simple (32 parts) 
because its legs are propelled by nitinol actuator wires.  Each 
leg has one degree of freedom.  The robot walks up to 10 
centimeters per minute and can carry a 9-volt cell, a MOSIS "tiny 
chip" and power transistors to drive the nitinol actuator wires. 
Alternatively, power and control can be supplied through a tether.

A single robot costs between $10 and $30. The pro-rated cost of 
materials to construct robots in volume (200 or more) is less than 
$3. The design can be replicated to build complex arthropods, or 
colonies containing hundreds of insectoid robots.

IUCS Technical Report 363a, "Stiquito:  A Small, Simple, 
Inexpensive Hexapod Robot -- Part 1.  Locomotion and Hard-Wired 
Control" contains detailed instructions to build the robot and a 
hard-wired, manually-operated controller.  The instructions are 
illustrated with 80 life-sized figures that include dimensions and 
enlarged details.  Materials, tools, and vendors are listed. 
Special sections include construction skills for novice users, how 
to fix mistakes, and troubleshooting problems found in real-world 
experience with the robot.

Stiquito and its manual controller are assembled by crimping and 
press-fitting parts.  No soldering is necessary.  The resulting 
robot is very reliable.  A tethered Stiquito walked for over 100 
hours. During the test each leg made 300,000+ 2-3mm strokes. The 
leg movement was reduced because power was supplied during the 
test by a 6v AC/DC adapter.  With a 6v "J" battery typical leg 
movement is 3-7mm. Battery-powered leg movement was unchanged 
after the test.

Anyone may build and use Stiquitos in any quantity for educational 
or research purposes, but Indiana University reserves all rights 
to commercial applications.  Part 1 of the technical report is now 
available and can be obtained in two ways:

1. ELECTRONICALLY
-----------------

    Use anonymous ftp to obtain the technical report free.  IU's
    ftp site is:

         cs.indiana.edu

    Log in as "anonymous" with username@host or "guest" as a
    password.

    The report will be in one or the other of two directories:

         pub/
         pub/techreports

    The report is available in two formats:

         stiquito.tar (PostScript)
         stiquito.hqx (stuffed, binhexed Microsoft Word 4 for Mac)

    Unfortunately, some of the illustrations in the PostScript
    file print with minor errors (patterns missing, and some
    polygons deformed), but they are still understandable.



2. BY MAIL (with options for a kit and a videotape)
---------------------------------------------------

     Send your request for the report with payment to:

         Computer Science Department
         215 Lindley Hall
         Indiana University
         Bloomington, Indiana, 47405

     To receive the technical report only send $5 US PRE-PAID and
     add the following line to the address:

         ATTN: TR 363a

     To receive the technical report and a kit containing all
     materials needed to construct Stiquito and its manual
     controller send $15 US PRE-PAID.  Add the following line to
     the address:

         ATTN: TR 363a Stiquito Kit

     The kit alone is available for $10 US PRE-PAID. Add the
     following line to the address:

         ATTN: Stiquito Kit

     The charges cover materials, a kitting fee, the technical
     report, and mailing.   The kit is provided as a non-profit
     service by Indiana University.  The author receives no fee or
     reimbursement from the sale of the kit.

     The CS department has also videotaped the assembly of a
     Stiquito (including the author making some mildly 
     embarrassing mistakes during construction! :-).  It is
     available separately for an additional $10 US PRE-PAID.
     Just add VIDEO to the attention line.

     For example, if you purchased the TR, kit, and video then
     $25 US would be enclosed and the following line would be
     added to the address:

         ATTN: TR 363a Stiquito Kit VIDEO


Part 2 of the technical report, "Sensors and Controllers," is in 
preparation.  It describes analog and digital controllers, legged 
Braitenburg vehicles, and sensor and communicatons interfaces to 
Stiquito.  Part 3 of the technical report, "Experiments with 
Arthrobots," will describe a variety of arthropod robots and 
report on experiments in emergent cooperative behavior using a 
colony of Stiquitos.

Questions about Stiquito should be sent to jwmills@cs.indiana.edu.

There are many different ways to design smaller, larger, or
multiple-degree-of-freedom nitinol-propelled robots, legs, 
tentacles, grippers, etc.  Some we've tried, most we haven't. We 
hope you will be encouraged to use Stiquito as a stepping-stone to 
better and more effective miniaturized robots.


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This research was funded in part by NSF Grant MIP-9010878 
"Lukasiewicz Logic Arrays" awarded to J.W. Mills, and NSF Grant 
CDA-8852304 "Incubator Laboratory Development" awarded to D. 
Gannon, G. Rawlins, and J. Smith.  NSF's support is gratefully 
acknowledged.  Standard disclaimer for opinions, etc. expressed in 
this posting.
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- J. W. Mills                                           "Sic ago!"
Newsgroups: comp.robotics