OMEN
02-06-2008, 11:10 AM
http://www.stuff.co.nz/images/700110.jpg
FILL IT UP: A car-fuelling robot unscrews the petrol cap before fuelling a car in Emmeloord, central Netherlands.
Motorists nostalgic for the time they could sit tight while attendants braved windswept garage forecourts to fill their tanks may yet see those heady days return – thanks to a Dutch robot.
Dutch inventors have unveiled a $NZ142,000 car-fuelling robot they say is the first of its kind.
It works by registering the car on arrival at the filling station and matching it to a database of fuel cap designs and fuel types.
A robotic arm fitted with multiple sensors extends from a regular petrol pump, carefully opens the car's flap, unscrews the cap, picks up the fuel nozzle and directs it toward the tank opening, much as a human arm would, and as efficiently.
"I was on a farm and I saw a robotic arm milking a cow. If a robot can do that, then why can't it fill a car tank, I thought," developer and petrol station operator Nico van Staveren said.
"Drivers needn't get dirty hands or smell of petrol again."
He hopes to introduce the "Tankpitstop" robot in a handful of Dutch stations by the end of the year.
Reuters
FILL IT UP: A car-fuelling robot unscrews the petrol cap before fuelling a car in Emmeloord, central Netherlands.
Motorists nostalgic for the time they could sit tight while attendants braved windswept garage forecourts to fill their tanks may yet see those heady days return – thanks to a Dutch robot.
Dutch inventors have unveiled a $NZ142,000 car-fuelling robot they say is the first of its kind.
It works by registering the car on arrival at the filling station and matching it to a database of fuel cap designs and fuel types.
A robotic arm fitted with multiple sensors extends from a regular petrol pump, carefully opens the car's flap, unscrews the cap, picks up the fuel nozzle and directs it toward the tank opening, much as a human arm would, and as efficiently.
"I was on a farm and I saw a robotic arm milking a cow. If a robot can do that, then why can't it fill a car tank, I thought," developer and petrol station operator Nico van Staveren said.
"Drivers needn't get dirty hands or smell of petrol again."
He hopes to introduce the "Tankpitstop" robot in a handful of Dutch stations by the end of the year.
Reuters