Microspines for a tiny climber
A tiny platform with 3D-printed bioresin microspines, inspired by squirrel claws. It gripped. It climbed a paper box in the lab, then sat on a branch on the VU campus. It only fitted branches of a certain size. It was too small to carry batteries and the mechanics for work and harvest. We retired it and moved to Gibbon Bot.
A retired platform, July 2024. Lab at Demonstrator Lab Amsterdam, then a tree on the VU campus. Grip was the success. Scale was the failure.
On a paper box
23 July 2024, DLAB. The same bioresin spines, on cardboard. Two takes. You can see the wheels pinching the edge and the body climbing. Tethered. Not a tree yet — a box is a known diameter, which is exactly the limit this model later hit in bark.
On a branch
The same day, VU campus. The platform on a live branch. Good at gripping. The clip is a hold, not a harvest. The branch is in the size this model was built for.
Why it was retired
This model worked only on branches of a certain size. We kept developing for mobility and for different diameters. The deeper problem is scale: the platform is too small to hold batteries and the mechanisms you need for work and harvest. So we stopped this architecture and moved to a different one — Gibbon Bot.
The parts on the desk
Three days later, still at DLAB, a pile of other mechanisms for the same tiny idea. Some of the teeth are laser-printed in a bio-resin from soy oil. That is how you get microspines at a resolution of micrometres. We liked playing with it. It is also messy, tricky, and the parts are fragile.
The others are PLA — polylactic acid, a bioplastic from fermented starch — printed as filament. Coarser, the same family of material as the tree gripper. Resin where the contact has to be fine, filament where the hub can be thick.
Work with us
Printed contact geometry, CAD you can print: firmware and CAD. Email services@olivabot.com.