If you grew up in the 1990s, you might remember the popular show “Robot Wars,” which as the name suggested, involved robots that fight each other to the death. Well, now someone else has taken that idea and made it more “practical” (depending on your point of view) by building a robot with a flame thrower attached to it.
As the name suggests, the robot has a flame thrower and it actually shoots flames in directions that you control. The robot is actually named Kunstrasen, which is a German name, given to it by the two guys that designed it; Sebastien Neitsch and his friend. The design and the robot’s capabilities are pretty interesting, as you can basically teach it to draw vector graphics on someone’s lawn. In fact, with the design being as it is, I get the feeling that that’s what it was designed for.
The robot was programmed very well, and takes commands from a graphics input software, and then takes those commands and converts them into a smoldering grassy masterpiece. The robot has treads for movement, and is relatively small so it has a low center of gravity which gives it a stability when working on difficult terrain.
The robot features a flamethrower mounted onto the front, and a propane canister where the tubing is hooked up. The robot is powered by at least 5 AA batteries, which means that it’s a real power-sucker, but I guess depending on what your purpose is, this could provide a few hours of entertainment. I imagine that this isn’t ideal for enjoying anywhere but outdoors on a relatively dry day, with all the exposed electronics. Either way, the idea behind it is neat, and definitely worth looking into if you want to visit the good people over at Dude Craft, who have a little more information on it.
You can check out other really cool robots like this one that is programmed to mow your lawn, the Kinectbot that obeys your commands, or this prototype robot mailman.
