It's super light (a grown man can operate the vacuum and hold a beer with the same hand, while holding a baby with the other arm), and yet it is SUPER powerful (I just leave mine in MAX mode, which only lasts for 6 minutes between recharges - but that's plenty). Hmm, yeah, why? I haven't reflected on that, so let me do so now: This is what it uses the 360 camera for and SLAM image processing and maths that I still don't fully understand :) The chap with grey hair switching it off at the end of the teaser video is the brains behind all the navigation and image processing software, Mike Aldred, very clever guy. It uses an intelligent algorithm to maximise the potential of the runtime, meaning that it tries to elminiate running over the same patch of floor more than once. Also the prices of other components, high power embedded CPUs, cameras and sensors have reduced dramatically since then. Sadly the battery technology has taken a long time to get to the point where it can now give a useable run time, even when the vacuum only consumes 100W (typical cabled vacuums use 1.7-2kw). I developed the initial wheel system for this and early prototypes of their digital (switched reluctance) motor once we realised we'd need a very high power density compressor motor. I worked on this product back in 2002-2005.
0 kommentar(er)
