Elevator operating robot janitor goes on sale in Japan
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted December 2nd 2009 3:03AM
posted December 2nd 2009 3:03AM
In one year alone we've seen robots shaking things up in such far-flung fields as fashion and interpretive dance. That said, our concerns are generally more prosaic -- that's why we're most excited by the industrial strength autonomous sweepers developed by the likes of Fuji Heavy Industries, Sumitomo, and Subaru. Like last year's model, their latest sweeps the floor, picks up the trash, is able to operate modded elevators, and comes equipped with laser sensors for avoiding obstacles and may even be outfitted with a camera. In addition, this new guy has slimmed down to about half the size (better for slipping into tight corners) and sports a twenty-four volt battery that gets about 2.5 hours per charge. The best news, however, is that it's finally for sale! It should hit the streets of Japan by the end of next year for a price somewhere in the $35,000 to $46,000 range. We'll take two. [Warning: PDF source link]
Teach him to cut the grass and I'm in.
teach it the robot dance and i'm in.
http://www.tvlesson.com/video/4012_learn-the-robot-dance.html
I'm waiting for the WRX STi model.
@Harrison I hope this version at least has the awesome boxer engine soundtrack.
1 robot, 1 man, 1 elevator, 10 floors; 2 enter, 1 leaves...
teach it to fix my car and i'm in
Apropos of nothing... before the big Engadget redesign, I was subscribing to an RSS feed of the Daily Roundup. That was hugely helpful, since I don't have the time to follow everything. Could you guys please start using a tag for your Daily Roundups? Love the site, been here since about day 5.
That's nice...
After you get hammered into the ground by the ping-pong terminator, this little guy comes in and sweeps away whats left of you...
Danm my house has stairs...
All I know is that any product by a company with "Heavy Industries" in the title automatically sounds more awesome...
I wonder if humans have preference in those elevators or you'd end up twiddling your fingers while a robot is using the elevator, that doesn''t seem right to me, especially if a building has several robots.
Also: The author forgot to warn it's a pdf link, as is the polite practice.
Robots using elevators is nothing new. The folks at Aethon (http://www.aethon.com/), have a delivery robot which has been using elevators for years.
I'm not sure why I kept reading it as "Elevator operating robot janitor goes to Jail in Japan".