I *heart* Bots

I *heart* bots of all kinds.

I really want to get one of those vacuum cleaning bots to chase our dog around the house. If you have one, please tell me how well it works on cleaning up disgusting animal fur.






Anyhoo, with bots on the brain, on Saturday gerg and I took a snowy field trip to FoamCarver USA.

Why? The friendly folks at FoamCarver USA have a ShopBot PRSalpha - Personal Robotic System.

Personal Robotic System??? YES!!! With a little imagination and some software skilz, a person can make just about anything out of foam, wood, or metal with a high performance router such as the ShopBot.




















So basically, you develop a plan using Shopbot's software, or some other comparable software, and the machine reads the plan and carves the pieces of the plan out using a router. Things like signs or flat wooden pieces for furniture are a breeze. You can take it to the next level by designing and carving out layers in order to create an entire sculpture.

The folks at FoamCarver USA are responsible for all kinds of projects around the Twin Cities, including some of the giant animal carvings at the RainForest Cafe. And they use the ShopBot for most of their projects. The machine itself costs about $10k, which ain't bad considering the versatility and maintenance package available.

The router itself is WAY quieter than gerg and I imagined it would be. It's about the size of a queen-sized bed, so you could easily take naps at work (smaller models are available). And it's a lot more versatile than I imagined. After we watched the machine in action, we spent the rest of the day imagining potential projects. I also made up a song about the ShopBot to the melody of Love Shack because I'm lame.

We also decorated our Christmas tree. So Saturday was a totally RAD day.

[where: 55406]