A Nintendo Wii is always good around the house, not necessarily because you'll want to play certain games on it, but because of the special powers the Wiimote has. It is a very useful device since it's very easy to connect to a PC via Bluetooth, allowing you to use it in all sorts of scenarios. For instance, you can control your PMR with it, you know, personal mobility robot. Like the one I'm presenting here.

This PMR is a wheel chair platform built by Toyota, which balances on only two wheels, just like a Segway. It has a passenger sit and a manual controller that can be used to change its direction and speed. What two students at the University of Tokyo did is take advantage of the wireless Wiimote controller of a Wii console in order to control the PMR. The movie below will be very fun to watch.

Though the PMR is a pretty complex machine, with a weight of 150 kg and maximum speeds of to 6 Km/h, it can be employed with a cheap and easy-to-use Wiimote. That is the part, which impressed me the most.

For more robotics, this mobility gadget can even be tweaked to work via an advanced navigation system that allows for the PMR to localize itself and plan trajectories in order to get from A to B. This would be done with the help of laser range sensors in order for the transportation device to detect objects in its surroundings and avoid them if necessary. You can read more about this on IEEE Spectrum.

Now, back to our Wiimotes, there are more robots out there that can be seen on Hack-a-day.




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