I finally acquired a pair of iSOBOTs, the little humanoid robot from Tomy. iSOBOT is driven by 17 servos and is able to do a number of fairly sophisticated moves including kicks and punches, hand stands, and more. These guys are fun to play with, and don't require a whole lot of floor space (they can walk, but kind of slowly, so moving more than about 2 feet is an excercise in patience).

There are a few resources for iSOBOTs on the web; the official site is www.isobotrobot.com but seems to be a work in progress. More info and links can also be found at RobotsDreams.com.  I'll be sure to document the innards when I get to the point of dissecting one; so far I have only taken apart one of the hands (which is posable but not powered, and kind of weirdly designed so as not to be able to hold anything.)

I'm thinking of taking them to Robogames 2009 next year, although now that the new Mech War competition is looking like a go, we may shift focus to that instead. Our own GWJax and Robosapien-4mem8 are also working on a Mech War entry, so keep an eye out for some pix of their progress! You can read more about the proposed competition on the official Mech War forums (Trossen Robotics).

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