New Two-Legged Robot Comes With Motorized Wheels

Jan, 2022 - By WMR

Ascento Robotics developed a self-balancing mobile robot that uses both versatility of legs and the speed of the wheels to hop and roll.

Ascento Robotics, a Swiss company developed the Ascento Pro, which is an advanced version of the Ascento 2 launched a year ago. It was also a self-balancing, wheeled, two-legged robot that can hop. However, the Ascento Pro has additional features. As the Ascento 2 could partially operate autonomously, the Pro is capable of doing that completely with the use of LiDAR sensors, LED headlights and on board camera.

The Ascento Pro has a compact, modular and simple design developed for it to leave enough space for custom sensors and different payloads. As the Ascento 2, the Pro has two legs with motorized wheels. It has a tensional spring in the knees for compensating the weight of the robot. It bends its knees and shrinks into smaller size and it can also walk on any surface, jump forward, hop over obstacles, and climb stairs. The Ascento Pro has LiDAR sensors integrated into it. It also has cameras and LED headlights for finding its way around, which makes it fully autonomous. Moreover, the Pro can even locate a specific charging post for the system. It bends down its upper body in oder to connect to a charging port on its underside.

The Ascento Pro can run for around eight hours per charge. The battery of the Ascento Pro is removable and even swappable with a freshly-charged batteries when needed. Furthermore, the Pro comes with bigger wheels than the Ascento 2. It allows the Pro to roll over small obstacles with more ease and more speed. The Pro has 7.5mph (12kmph) top speed. The Ascento Pro could possibly be used for surveillance, inspection, robotic research, ans urban deliveries in the near future.