Strandbeest (opens in new tab)

> legged vehicles have many downsides but one big upside is that you can theoretically avoid the rubber/microplastic particulate emission associated with tires and wheeled vehicles if you can make legged vehicles as good as wheeled ones.

How do you square this idea with the fact that my running shoes wear out? I'm a legged vehicle, and it's clear that the soles of my shoes wear down over time and the lost mass of the rubber went somewhere.

Whether legs or wheels, there are going to be contact patches that have to endure some quantity of sheering force when the vehicle is doing anything other than remaining stationary. It's this sheering force that grates the particulates away from tires, and I presume a legged vehicle would need a tire-like compound on the surfaces it uses to contact the road. So why would legs be different in this regard?

Wouldn't a legged vehicle still have that problem if it can achieve the same speeds and weights that regular cars go at?

Scale up a human for example to the weight and speed of a car. Crazy powerful and big legs, big feet, big shoes. The rubber must hit the road either way and push down with a force to propel the weight of this car-heavy legged human at speeds of 100km/h. It would still wear rubber away just like tires do.

Legged vehicles aren't a replacement for regular vehicles if tire particulates are your concern.

I feel like your choice of phrasing downplays the fact that the strandbeest is created by the guy the principle is named after.

So many people dont know this - the tire muck that comes from theforever chemicals used in all tire manufacture is horrifically bad - to the point where one eco guy I was listening to basically gave up when he learned just how bad the chemicals from tires are. (ill try to find the podcast) -- and he notes how Humans tried to make reefs out of tires for Ocean Life.

In dystopian Dark Mirror Humor, I bemused myself with the day dream thought that Michelin Star restaurants, whom are awarded 3 stars for the distance one should be willing to drive is greatest with more stars - meaning that you should be willing to make a journey to the off-beaten path to visit and eat this food (which has yet to be em-poisoned with the forever chemicals our Tires have put into all the densely populated environments, thus this Elite Food is Clean.

There's a question of course about why we're not using legged machines but I think you're way over-thinking this. Strandbeests are just a cool and beautiful art project and there is no more justification that they need than that. Art has a utility all of its own without having to inspire engineering works.

Besides which strandbeests are made of plastic tubing which kiind of weakens your argument about environmental friendliness.

You seem to posit that legged vehicles doing 100+ km/h for hundreds of thousands of kilometers do not have as much wear and tear as rubber tires do. What is that based on? And does it have the same or better friction / energy efficiency?

(I know the answers, I'm just trying to provoke you into thinking about your comment)

Are any companies doing r&d for drop in tire replacements that don't have as much of an issue with micro plastics?

That’s a dumb reason. A reason for reasons sake.

These matter because they are beautiful and make people happy. They’re also appreciable technical achievements.

Isn't another advantage of legged vehicles being more applicable to uneven/unstable terrain? (Like in this case the constantly shifting water/mud/sand boundaries of a beach)

If you wanted to build a similar contraption that is powered by wind but moves on wheels, I imagine there is a much larger chance of it getting stuck.

It says these are made of plastic pipe. Doesn't the pipe wear down where it contacts (or even slides in the video) the ground, creating microplastics?

Also, it already slides some of the time in the videos. Not sure what the advantage is over a simple slide dragged by a sail.

Yes indeed - Jansen's machines are applications of Jansen's linkage :)

If your goal is to replace rubber tires, then how about going whole hog and turn the entire road system into a railway system? Tires made of steel, parallel tracks, lots of switching, perhaps regional control systems to guide computerized vehicles along the fastest route keeping safe distances between cars, and cars that automatically link and unlink to create dynamic trains along shared routes. I think that would be a very cool system (although outrageously expensive to realize).

There are tire particulate matter capture devices out there, in research at least [0]. This solution plus having a heavy vehicle weight-dependent tax could help (i.e. encouraging more 2 (or 3) wheeler transportation regardless of whether motorized or not).

[0] https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/195595/worlds-first-device-c...

"but one big upside is that you can theoretically avoid the rubber/microplastic particulate emission associated with tires".

Flying cars would solve this problem.

I love this script, it's a shame that it will probably never be a film. The philosophy question it implies - does science and technology have its own teleology, and if so is that good or evil - is one that fascinates me

for anyone who doesn't know the history, Carruth shopped this script around for years before giving up on finding anyone to fund it. Eventually he gave up and made a different film. And then he was arrested on charges of domestic violence, and a second victim filed a restraining order against him. Since then, he hasn't been welcome in Hollywood. The rumor is that he's returned to his old career, software engineering, where it's easier to find work.

I wasn't aware a script existed! I've been waiting for years to see the movie, being a huge Primer fan, though I understand it probably won't get made.

It's partially euphemism, but there's also more substance to it than you may realize.

The ratios in the Jansen linkages were originally developed through genetic algorithms in computer simulations. Jansen now builds multiple generations of machines at once and has them compete in various "survival" tasks on the beaches, prioritizing further development based on the success of each "mutation"; an ongoing human-assisted evolutionary process.

The Strandbeest machines are also capable of much more sophisticated behavior than may be evident: they pressurize air using wind power and store it in bottles, which in turn run pneumatic "nervous systems" made from logic gates, oscillators, and flip-flops. As the machines have grown more sophisticated they've gained the ability to sense the waterline (with ground-trailing hoses that detect back-pressure from water) and avoid it, to anchor themselves to the ground when it gets too windy, to steer around simple obstacles, and so on.

Strandbeest machines reproducing independently from humans would be a pipe-dream, but at the very least they should be understood as autonomous, biomimetic robots at the same time as they are sculptures.

Bear in mind he is an artist, and it's de rigueur to have some story or concept with what you make. I learned this the hard way when I used to do algorithmic art back in college, you can't just say what it is or how you made it.

The artist's idea is that these machines can ultimately roam the beach independently without the need of human interaction. They also don't need fuel since they only move from the wind they catch. At the same time it looks like some kind of weird huge animal (strandbeest translates to beach beast). And it's an art project so yeah I get why he calls it like that.

I think as a programmer they fascinate me because they feel as simple and elegant as a boid algorithm and looks like life in a similar way but they also exist in the real world. It gives you the idea that you could build other similar simulated life like things.

I think its a cool exploration between art and engineering, with the end effect looking lifelike and emergent. It reminds me of the game of life.

But yeah the peanut gallery with 30k in hn karma probably have something snarky to say about it.

It's lore. Superman is also cool-looking and the whole story around it just adds depth; no one thinks it's real.

That’s just interesting lore.

On the subject of coincidences, I went to order one of the Strandbeest mini sets from this very website last week.

Unfortunately their virtual store is closed for a couple weeks more. I was prepared to place an order and wait, but on the website checkout page there was a random person's name as if I was checking out someone else's order. It's probably an innocent mistake, like a hard coded default value or something.

I like to support artists directly, and it was a bit disappointing that there was so much friction with the buying process.

https://youtu.be/rqs9Awx5zgQ?si=Ojawx-oejvcRkopC, will probably not cross a dessert, but pretty cool.

What if it's only after you see it that you think you thought of it the day before? If it's all in your head, there's no way of knowing that your mind didn't just make up the memory of thinking about something in the past, like deja vu.

I'm sure they could, but they'd need a different design to carry the extra load; at the moment it only carries its own lightweight construction.

That said, for personal transport in windy / flat conditions, a kart with a parachute kite works as well, you see those on the beach on occasion too.

If you want to experience Strandbeest yourself, Theo will be giving demos on september 14 in Vlissingen, the Netherlands.

https://instagram.com/p/C_Fr24Zg2pl/

Bought one of these miniature kits years ago and kept it on my desk at work and goddamn is it cool and fun and works great! Really encourage any model machine nerds to get one.

The miniature in action: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9CENC972pY

I need his heart. Please give it back.

English still uses the cognate "strand" to mean beach or riverside. The most famous is The Strand in London, along the Thames. It's a bit archaic sounding but is not too uncommon.

More like “beach beast”. “Animal” is “dier”.

When you said 3D printed, I wanted expecting that scale. That was cool

Similar in visual appearance, difference in design.

https://medium.com/kickstarter/the-explosion-artist-5db66a99...

> Aside from these functional benefits, Mine Kafon has an undeniable aesthetic beauty. The tumbling dandelion-like structure recalls Dutch sculptor Theo Jansen’s Strandbeests, similarly fashioned from repurposed industrial materials and eerily imbued with life by the wind. Hassani’s work even caught the eye of MoMA’s Senior Curator of Design, Paola Antonelli, who included Mine Kafon in the museum’s 2014 Design and Violence show. More exhibitions around the world followed, and the project became something of a viral sensation, with the elegance of the idea — and Hassani’s inspiring story — propelling the pressing issue of landmines through social media and beyond.

> Mine Kafon also garnered attention from the Dutch Ministry of Defense, which evaluated the design’s effectiveness in their test minefields, ultimately determining that the project was not practical for operational use but still valuable as a tool for raising awareness.

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It has some issues with following topological contours and one not getting blown up isn't a "this area is clear" (or even a deterministic "this path through this area is clear"). One getting blown up means it found one mine (possible some more if its durable) ... and then you need to clean up the scrap, but this returns to the "you don't have a positive signal of this area is completely free from mines."

Given that Mars’ atmosphere density is only about one percent of Earth’s, that seems unlikely.