Meet CHAP, a Cheap Robotic Arm

As reported on Robohub, Plymouth University professor Guido Bugmann has been working on a cheap robotic arm platform that he calls “CHAP” for short. The bot can be built for about $2,000.

This robot, or rather telepresence device, uses a Raspberry Pi to host a local webpage which users can log on to and manipulate objects as needed. The arm takes the form of a roughly human-sized mast, on which an assembly of rods containing a gripper on the end can be moved up and down.

CHAP is also able to move around the room via a wheeled platform on the bottom. In the video here, the bot can be used for tasks such as picking up a bottle and placing it on a table.

You can read more about this open source project here, and see it in action below.

[h/t Robohub]