Top 10 Amazing Mobility Robots for the Handicapped and Disabled

Being handicapped isn’t always fun, but at least you get access to some pretty amazing techno-stuff. You might think electric wheelchairs and mobility scooters are top of the pop, but then you haven’t seen the latest in mobility robots.

A mobility robot is a robot that is designed to help handicapped and disabled people move around. It might have wheels, but most often it will have legs so it can climb stairs and uneven ground. It might also take the form of a mobility suit, which is a kind of robot that surrounds the shape of your body, arms and legs.

All mobility robots are pretty amazing, but here are the top 10 amazing mobility robots:

10 - AIST Intelligent Wheelchair

This first amazing mobility robot might look like any electronic wheelchair, but don’t let that fool you. The AIST Intelligent Wheelchair has 36 cameras that together create a 360-degree view of the surroundings and displays it on a screen in front of the user.

In addition, the AIST Intelligent Wheelchair gathers information about the surrounding area, so it can prevent collisions if the users doesn’t see them coming on the screen. It also detects how the user is doing, so it can send out an emergency signal if it detects something unusual.

9 - HLPR Chair

The HLPR Chair (Home, Lift, Position and Rehabilitation) is more or less a forklift that is designed to move wheelchair-dependent people around without a wheelchair. With this mobility robot, the user can move around while standing up, rotate and be helped moving up and down when going to the toilet or bed.

The HLPR Chair has been designed by NIST – National Institute of Standards and Technology. Only problem is that the users might loose their patience since it only moves 27 inches per second (that is less than a meter per second).

8 - El-E Fetch Bot

The El-E might not be a true mobility robot, but it couldn’t resist including it anyway. It can’t help you move around, but it can fetch things for you so you don’t need to move anyway.

All you need to do is to point a laser pointer at something and El-E will race to get it for you. You can also point at another location to make El-E move the item instead of giving it to you.

7 - Toyota Partner Robot

This mobility robot can not only transport you around. You can also make it follow you around and use it to transport all your shopping – or an artificial Christmas tree as seen on the picture below.

Even though the Toyota Partner Robot has wheels, it can still climb stairs since each wheel can move independently up and down.

6 - TMSK WL-16R3 Robot Legs

The TMSK WL-16R3 robot legs are designed to someday replace the common wheelchair. The advantage is that the robot legs can climb stairs and uneven ground, the disadvantage is that they look like a prop from Terminator.

5 - Kanagawa Mobility Suit

The Kanagawa Mobility Suit uses air pressure to help moving the user’s body around. Depending on the user, it might even give him enough strength to carry someone else around.

4 - HAL-5 Robot Suit

The Kanagawa Robot Suit isn’t the only mobility robot using air pressure. Another model is the HAL-5 from Japanese Tsukuba University which will help the user move around and, depending on the user, let him carry someone else.

The first picture at the beginning of this article shows yet another mobility suit from Tokyo University. Again it’s powered by air pressure, so I guess that’s the trend in mobility suits at the moment.

3 - Hubo FX-1 Chair Bot

One of the only amazing mobility robots that aren’t from Japan is this Hubo FX-1 Chair Bot from KAIST – Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. Using a joystick, the user can move the chair around.

The Hubo FX-1 Chair Bot has two big problems. First it needs an external power supply, so it can be used to travel longer than the cable allows, but at least the inventors are working on making it battery powered soon.

Second, I can’t see how the user can get in and out of the robot without a lot of help. The seat seems to be quite high up, so high that you will probably need a ladder to get in.

2 - Toyota Mobility Suit

High tech mobility robot that looks like a mech from the Transformers movie. It might be more advanced than the Hubo FX-1 Chair Bot above, but it still likes the Chair Bot more. It doesn’t look as evil and mech like as the Toyota Mobility Suit.

Just like with the Hubo FX-1 Chair Bot, I can’t see how the user can get in and out of the Toyota Mobility Suit without help.

1 - Twendy One

The other amazing mobility robots in the top 10 can only help you move around. Twendy One is different, it can help you move around and help you do almost all your household chores.

Thanks to Twendy One’s ability to understand human instructions, it can help you toast bread, prepare your dinner and find all kinds of stuff for you. Twendy One is truly the most amazing mobility robot ever.

Bonus – BEAR – Battlefield Extraction-Assist Robot

Handicapped and disabled people aren’t the only ones who need to be transported around. Wounded soldiers might also need a lift back to base, so say hello to BEAR – Battlefield Extraction-Assist Robot.

The BEAR’s two legs are designed so they can go anywhere a human can and the two hydraulic arms can lift more than 250 pounds – enough to carry a wounded soldier and all the gear attached to his uniform.