Recon Robotics is now introducing another cool robot – this one for under-vehicle inspections.
If you live in a large city then chances are that upon entering large (government) buildings your car has been subjected to an under-vehicle search. The basic procedure is that you’re stopped at a checkpoint and security personnel use a mirror mounted to a long handlebar to inspect the under-carriage of your car. Recon Robotics is hoping to convince law enforcement to instead use their robot – which has cameras – and joystick it underneath the car for inspection. The joystick has a small LCD screen that displays the feed from the robot’s camera.
I have always felt that this would be a great robotic telepresence application – but I’m not sure how likely adoption will be. In other words, how would you convince someone to give up a mirror you can buy for under $100 and instead use a robot – which is certain to cost at least 10x as much. Stay tuned.