Posted on 12/12/2024 7:15:31 AM PST by yesthatjallen
A spherical robot which can operate both on the ground and in the water with the ability to track, combat and capture, recently patrol side by side with police officers in a commercial zone in Wenzhou, East China's Zhejiang Province, drawing public attention with its futuristic shape and functions. With its constant improvement in size and functions, the robot is expected to have broad application, the research team told the Global Times on Tuesday.
A video clip circulating online shows the smart amphibious spherical robot automatically moves on the ground without human's control, patrolling the streets side by side with the local police officers from Lucheng district in Wenzhou.
Weighing 125 kilograms, the robot can run as fast as 35 kilometers per hour, according to Wang You, associate professor from the College of Control Science and Engineering, Zhejiang University, who led the research team for the project.
Apart from its rapid acceleration, the robot has excellent off-road capabilities and it operates with stability against tipping over. With its solid structure, it can also resist strong impact, Wang told the Global Times on Tuesday.
Wang's team also made improvement and attaches some more gadgets to the robot such as net guns, tear spray, smoke bombs, as well as horns and acoustic wave dispersers to meet the needs of the police, including confrontation capabilities and the capacity of dealing with threats at close distance.
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(Excerpt) Read more at ecns.cn ...
Wow, that reminds me of The Prisoner TV show.
The balls just need to bounce and quiver as they kill you.
How does it hold up against rifle fire?
There’s a lot about that TV show both creepy and prophetic.
The technology, the surveillance society, the uncertainty of trust, the question of who is in charge….
Robocop without a prime directive.
How about the spheres from Phantasm?
Housing bubble?
Maybe they have made a drone version that flies in the air.
Had the exact same thought.
There was a fairly recent re-do of the show that was quite good.
No Lotus 7, sadly, if I recall correctly.
Presumably run flat steel belted radials.
Not sure about rifle fire, but pistol fire probably wouldn’t be an issue.
If there are metal rims under there, maybe even rifle fire. You’d have to shoot the side.
A video clip circulating online shows the smart amphibious spherical robot automatically moves on the ground without human's control
In the video, at the one minute mark, you can see an officer with the remote controller walking behind the bot. He is the only one not wearing gloves. The other officers are holding their hands in the same position to try to avoid making it so obvious.
Other scenes are staged fakery, like a guy hitting the robot with a baseball bat that was prescored to break it in half.
A video clip circulating online shows the smart amphibious spherical robot automatically moves on the ground without human's control
In the video, at the one minute mark, you can see an officer with the remote controller walking behind the bot. He is the only one not wearing gloves. The other officers are holding their hands in the same position to try to avoid making it so obvious.
Other scenes are staged fakery, like the guy hitting the robot with a baseball bat that was prescored to break it in half.
Holes, trenches slightly wider and deeper than diameter of ball as an obstactle.
OK ...
I watched the video ...
Wild-eyed guessing ... From the side, probably vulnerable to multiple hits from 5.56 or better. From the front ... probably need 7.62x51 or better depending on the rim material.
Pistol fire from the front won’t do much good. From the side ... maybe. Shooting the guy with the controls might be a better bet.
IMO. YYMV. IANAE.
I’ve seen videos of it allegedly coming out of a river and chasing down criminals. Staged and cgi.
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