Your childhood dreams or…perhaps nightmares are about to come true as a Japanese group has built a fully working Transformers robot.
The 1.3 meter (about 4.3 feet) tall (in robot mode) and long (in car mode) prototype is the creative work of Brave Robotics, Asratec Corp and original Transformer designers Tomy Co. Ltd. who have named it J-deite Quarter.
What’s interesting about the name is that “quarter” refers to the scale (1/4) of the current prototype and yes, what this means is that this is just the first step to creating a real-life sized version.
The Japanese group says it plans to complete a second model called “J-deite Half” measuring around 2.5 meters (8.2 feet) by 2016 before they introduce the final, 5 meters long (16.4 feet) 1:1 scale version in 2020!
Running on a proprietary software system called V-Sido OS, the current J-deite Quarter prototype weighs in at just 35 kg (77 pounds) and has a 3 kW battery that offers a 1 hour operating time, depending on if it walks at speeds of up to 1km/h (0.6 mph) in robot mode or drives at speeds of up to 10km/h (6mph) in car mode.
Its creators haven’t shed any light on what they plan to do with the robot once they’ve achieved their goal of building a life-size version, but you can bet that many loaded pockets will be interested in one.
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