From package delivery to aerial construction, quadcopters harbor much more potential for practical application than simply film and photography. Last year, graduate students from ETH Zurich put this notion to the test by demonstrating how quadcopters tethered to a pole by a string could perform high-speeds aerial acrobatics in-sync. The end result? Impressive, albeit novel without a practical outlet. This year, however, the team returns to show us what quadcopters are truly capable when building with rope (polyethylene fiber) – a material that naturally plays off the quadcopters’ strengths.
Constructing things with aerial robots is not new in and of itself, but is unfeasible under most circumstances given the quadcopter’s extremely limited carrying capacity and the weight of most construction materials. Realizing that rope, and its ability to be woven, plays right into quadcopters strengths, the team set out to build a bridge using light-weight, high-strength polyethylene fiber.
The end result? A woven bridge made from 120 meters of fiber that spans a 7.4-meter gap.
The organized tangle of knots and braids was constructed entirely by quadcopters armed only with a motorized spool to control the tension of the rope, and a plastic tube to prevent the machine from entangling itself.
Note that coordinating such an advanced level of synchronization involves a very complex external localization system, so we’re unlikely this kind of tech out in the wild any time soon. But it’s fun to realize its potential.
Source: IEEE Spectrum
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