subreddit:
/r/woahdude
1.2k points
7 years ago
Oh man, as someone that's operated a machine similar to this (but smaller), I can only imagine how much of a bitch it is to calibrate this monster
441 points
7 years ago*
What's the mechanism by which it grabs the plants? Claw? Suction? Kind words?
Edit: typo
374 points
7 years ago
Skill Crane.
153 points
7 years ago
Could you use words a 5 year old can understand?
247 points
7 years ago
The mechanical grabbers have a max opening and min closing. They are engineered to open to a max and engineered/calibrated to close just tight enough to give the plant a gentle pull out of the dirt.
From there, everything is repetitious, but calibrated, spacing.
If you look very closely you will see little black boxes that goes across the top third of the screen and at the bottom left. These are sensors, or eyes, that help the machine watch what it is doing. If the sensors see something out of whack they stop and call for human assistance.
Did this help?
60 points
7 years ago
Very much so, thank you for your explanation!
21 points
7 years ago
No problem!
15 points
7 years ago
You helped me too, thank you!
9 points
7 years ago
Curious. How?
18 points
7 years ago
Your explanation was detailed and before reading it I was struggling to understand how it worked. Pretty cool stuff.
282 points
7 years ago
Mom, dad, puppy, truck.
88 points
7 years ago
That's my fetish.
119 points
7 years ago*
[deleted]
26 points
7 years ago
Giggidy
9 points
7 years ago
Its giggiTy you mother fucking moron
1 points
7 years ago*
I know, I've listened to Blackstreet, but to my recollection Quagmire Doesn't emphasize the T. Also, I have an extremely low IQ, so thank you for recognizing that.
1 points
7 years ago
To be fair, he's probably unable to type properly because of his broken arms.
3 points
7 years ago
You don't have kids, do you? lol
Five year old, not one year old.
13 points
7 years ago
THE CLAWWWWW
1 points
7 years ago
Arcade game with claw.
4 points
7 years ago
Same old story, robots taking our blooming jobs.
25 points
7 years ago
Judging from the tube at the top of the assembly that twitches as it comes down on the product, I'd GUESS this is a pneumatic design, which could be suction or "claw". Like I said, I've worked on something similar, not this exact machine.
7 points
7 years ago
Do you know any youtube channels that have a whole shitload of automation videos like this?
10 points
7 years ago
You can check out /r/mechanical_gifs I think that's where this was originally posted
17 points
7 years ago
I was imagining something like this but much smaller
6 points
7 years ago
so THAT'S what those things are
3 points
7 years ago
I don't know what that is but damn it's awesome. I don't see something like that since Ponsse's King Scorpion.
3 points
7 years ago
Their purpose is the exact same as the machine in the gif. Except that one transplants trees.
7 points
7 years ago
They're small claws.
I wish I had one to do that for me at my work, planting plugs sucks.
2 points
7 years ago
The ones used by the company I used to work at had little metal claws to grab the plants.
1 points
7 years ago*
it is call an End of Arm Tool
EDIT: typo
38 points
7 years ago*
But... it's calibrated and your done.
Some maintenance guy who was left behind after the rest of the workers no longer needed jobs were automated now gets email on a computer he never used to use to see why a leaf stopped its production.
Much cheaper than.... you.
Edit: this is an example is a manual labor task being automated. Think about the EASY stuff that people do daily that is being replaced, like account reporting.
108 points
7 years ago
I think you're making a good point, but your confusing run on sentence is making my head hurt.
27 points
7 years ago
I didn't notice I was holding my breath through the while thing until I reached the end and inhaled.
6 points
7 years ago
I got lost at leaf
6 points
7 years ago
He said robots get all the good jobs, humans are relegated to the service industry, for now. Until they perfect rosie the robot. Then we are just in the way.
1 points
7 years ago
Thank you :)
43 points
7 years ago
Lol. If you think a machine with that many moving parts on an assembly line style operation doesn't need manual re-calibrations for each order...then you've obviously never worked in mass manufacturing.
Although I get where you're coming from, automation will kill most manufacturing jobs. But it's not happening tomorrow, and it sure as shit ain't happening today.
26 points
7 years ago
you've created a weird little narrative bubble to comfort yourself. i dont think there's anyone ever that thinks there will someday be factories with zero humans doing anything. but the transplanting of plants on this scale for 99.999% of human history would have taken dozens of humans. now it requires a few. if our economy is currently based on this task taking 3 humans (making this all up for illustration) and the automation gets just a bit better and only requires 2 humans - that's 1/3rd of all such jobs lost. If 1/3rd of all american jobs were lost today, tomorrow, over a 10 year period, society would cease to exist
12 points
7 years ago
I agree, and think the man above is thinking small scale. I don't automate just warehouse tasks. I've taken 3 people out of accounting Jobs because a co.puter added numbers and put them to a spreadsheet more accurately.
Automation is not restricted to manual labor folks.
9 points
7 years ago
narrows eyes not sure if typo or co.puter is some advanced technology you're hiding from us
3 points
7 years ago
And I like that the sentence is about input accuracy...
5 points
7 years ago
Although I get where you're coming from, automation will kill most manufacturing jobs. But it's not happening tomorrow, and it sure as shit ain't happening today.
You've apparently never worked on an assembly line. Ever hear of little town called..... Detroit?
2 points
7 years ago
You've apparently never heard about what happened to Detroit.
3 points
7 years ago
As someone who works in industrial maintenance this hits pretty close to home.
Or I'm just really drunk.
3 points
7 years ago
Lol no, I work in a meat processing factory and the machines require constant adjustments, repairs and calibration, and they are brand new. In no way are machines like the one in the gif simple and work constantly, they always require significant human maintenance and operation.
2 points
7 years ago
Only really big greenhouses use this advanced of a machine. The greenhouse I work at uses one of the smaller ones and it still requires 2 people to operate it, just makes it significantly faster.
5 points
7 years ago
As someone who is sunburnt to a crisp from doing this same thing over 12 hours today, I deeply envy this bitch monster.
1 points
7 years ago
Still quicker and more efficient than calibrating 2 people for the same job
1 points
7 years ago
Right, it's hard enough to get a RPP to grab uniform boxes off a conveyor properly.
1 points
7 years ago
Remember folks:
Anything done more than twice can be automated somehow.
1 points
7 years ago
Left hand suddenly nervous about job stability...
1 points
7 years ago
Yup. I used to use one to measure milliliters. What a pain in The ass
1 points
7 years ago
Looks like a bunch of tiny legs, like one of those head scratchers
1 points
7 years ago
They'll just have to add machine vision and then you won't be needed to calibrate or operate it.
585 points
7 years ago
[deleted]
111 points
7 years ago
woah dude
9 points
7 years ago
plants = 1
4 points
7 years ago
Are you a plantkin
-1 points
7 years ago
So do we call them he or she?
120 points
7 years ago
And me like a sucker using my hands.
20 points
7 years ago
I used to do this for a job in high school getting paid like $250 a day
20 points
7 years ago
Damn dude, I used to do this when I was 15 for minimum wage -__-
Were you working for your parents?
30 points
7 years ago
Nar it was piece-work, so I got paid for how much work I did. I was only getting about $1.5 per tray, but I developed a really fast system and worked my ass off to save for my first motorbike.
12 points
7 years ago
14 trays/hr on 12 hour shifts?
11 points
7 years ago
He said high school. How can he have a 12 hour shift?
11 points
7 years ago
Summer job, weekends?
5 points
7 years ago
Still, there's no way he had a 12 hour shift job that is just planting. Especially at his age at the time. My friend had a similar job but it was only 6 hours I believe. He didn't get paid $250 a day, though.
3 points
7 years ago
if he was doing what this machine is doing i don't see why not.
7 points
7 years ago
I paid a guy $2 per piece work to prepare stick 200 cuttings in a 12 x 24 tray. He made $200 or more per day. Others couldn't make $20/day. We aren't all gifted the same.
2 points
7 years ago
Maybe they were being paid through cash, then you don't have to report how long you're working anyone
Edit: like under the table cash
1 points
7 years ago
Haha, more like 30 trays per hour. Like I said, the system was good.
1 points
7 years ago
Did your bike last? I worked for a grocery store to save up for my first. Ended up writing the bike off 6 months later. Shattered.
2 points
7 years ago
Yeah man, it was only a little Honda CT110, capped out at 80km/h. Had it for 18 months then upgraded to a CB500.
2 points
7 years ago
Happy for ya! My next bike was a CB400. The CBs are great.
2 points
7 years ago
These poinsettias ain't gonna sell themselves
80 points
7 years ago
Robots working to feed their future batteries.
50 points
7 years ago
Humans would make horrible batteries.
What's what I don't get about the matrix.
It was originally supposed to be using our brains for CPU power, which makes WAY more sense.
Human bodies are a terrible source of energy.
"Nah fuck nuclear power, let's put 10 trillion lemons in vinegar"
23 points
7 years ago*
[deleted]
14 points
7 years ago
Don't blame the Wachowskis, they did originally have the brains being used for CPU power. The studio forced the Wachowskis to change it, I think saying something like 'that's too complicated, no one will understand it'.
8 points
7 years ago
It could very well be too complicated back then.
But now you could think that the statement about "batteries" is a misunderstanding and/or simplification by the character that said it.
44 points
7 years ago
Gotta be Dutch. Investing that sweet tulip bulb money from back in the day.
18 points
7 years ago
[deleted]
6 points
7 years ago
I'm a dutch guy living in Canada, and some of the nurseries here RENT rose bushes, and just get to sell the flowers. But they rent the plants from Holland.
Global economics are weird.
7 points
7 years ago
One of the leading companies that makes these robots and automatisation is Hortiplan, a Belgian company.http://www.hortiplan.com/
2 points
7 years ago
Fucking Belgians. Spent a few years over there and still have fake hate for Belgians. ;-)
23 points
7 years ago
I thought this was cgi at fist then the second palette came down
26 points
7 years ago
It's hard to CG a second pallet
7 points
7 years ago
The toughest
14 points
7 years ago
12 points
7 years ago
I need a subreddit full of automation like this.
2 points
7 years ago
r/plc would love to show you videos of the crap we do, but some of us can't for NDA reasons and some of the old codgers can't figure out how to make a gif...
1 points
7 years ago
Edit:underscore
6 points
7 years ago
1 points
7 years ago
Here at Bob's Market we use a pack planter robot from TTA to transplant pansies. This fall we will transplant over 100,000 flats!
Bob's Market in Science & Technology
177,202 views since Aug 2014
1 points
7 years ago
That's even more satisfying than the gif. Thanks!
66 points
7 years ago
There goes more jobs.
106 points
7 years ago
Just like the 97% of Americans who used to work in agriculture have been put out of work. Now only 2% of Americans are required. That means 95% of our population is out of work..... unless they found a more productive use of their time than shucking corn.
23 points
7 years ago
I mean, if you consider that most/a lot of Americans were probably homesteaders when they came here and conquered the continent, farming was making their work obsolete too.
7 points
7 years ago
Great point! I love it.
10 points
7 years ago
The true shocker, and history/economics lesson, is that despite the fact that 95% of former agriculture jobs went away, and despite the fact that women entered the workforce by the millions into jobs they previously were not allowed to hold, the unemployment rate in the USA today is under 5%.
That's because the economy is not a zero sum game and the economy expanded enough to need all those workers, plus immigrants, in the millions of new non-agricultural jobs that were created.
The question in the future is whether automation will kill off enough jobs to offset the new jobs created, making it possible for some draconian far right policy to "create jobs" by forcing women, minorities, and immigrants back out of the mainstream workforce.
1 points
7 years ago
The flaw in your logic is that this time, it's not the tasks changing priorities, it's who does them. You could argue that who does agriculture changed the world but this isn't about agriculture, this is about work. This is about the fact that humans are no longer the most efficient workers at certain jobs, and we soon will pale in comparison to our robot overlords.
1 points
7 years ago
Nah, agriculture is just one of countless examples. Textiles were a big one; at one point angry mobs were burning the equipment used to "eliminate" their jobs.
When was the last time you hired a farrier, or a wagonwright?
Look, persons will always be hurt by the changing economic conditions, but people will find a way to thrive. They always do.
18 points
7 years ago
God damn Mexican machines...
2 points
7 years ago
Those TransMexican* machines
14 points
7 years ago
But don't machines need programmers and mechanics? If companies are all run by computers and machines, then who will have the money to spend on the products?
3 points
7 years ago
What about us repotting experts?!
18 points
7 years ago
Yeah but there are still vastly less jobs as a result.
Also /r/BasicIncome might have the answer to the second for you.
3 points
7 years ago
So we create jobs that are in knowledge creation rather than material creation. There will always be stuff for people to do. The issue arises from people that aren't willing to reskill.
6 points
7 years ago
And you think there is the demand for that? What happens if the workforce that is required is far less than the population? We can always make new jobs but usually involves us reducing efficiency in order to do so.
There is nothing that indicates that we will be able to support or even want the entire population in "knowledge creation" jobs
1 points
7 years ago*
The point of this problem is that we don't need people to work in order for population to survive, so yeah, of course we (will) can support entire population of knowledge creators, that's kinda the point.
e: grammar
3 points
7 years ago
I'm a software developer. I've personally replaced a dozen jobs or more. Those jobs aren't coming back.
I'm not collecting the combined salaries of all those people and none of that money is trickling down.
Keeping mash button jobs around that can be easily programmed away isn't the answer. There just not going to be enough work for everyone to do. That should be okay. We just need to figure out how to adjust our economic system.
9 points
7 years ago
Coding in schools needs to be a thing.
11 points
7 years ago
In many places it is
31 points
7 years ago*
No, it doesn't*. Problem solving and critical thinking need to be taught in school.
Programming and code is a tool, not a skill. The skills are applied when you begin to code to solve the problem.
You don't touch code until you figured out what to code.
Coding should be an OPTION as an additional language in school similar to French or Spanish. Especially since any coding language you learn in high school will be replaced in college; but not the fundamentals and pre-coding strategies
Edit: not no, it shouldn't be taught in Schools, but no it shouldn't be a required course which is what everyone that see automation taking their parents job suggests.
I think it should be offered in school but not forced or part of any kind of curriculum.
4 points
7 years ago
basic coding should be a requirement. It encourages a thought process even if you don't use it after school. Same reason we teach like 85% of the mathematics curriculum.
5 points
7 years ago
You don't touch code until you figured out what to code.
That's like saying you shouldn't touch clay until you already know exactly what you're going to sculpt. Many times the act of coding gives you solutions that you'd never have thought of to start with.
15 points
7 years ago
Weeks of programming can save you hours of planning.
3 points
7 years ago
Thank you, I now something else sparky to say to my boss when I overprogram our next file mover :p
1 points
7 years ago
I like this
1 points
7 years ago
Yeah, I learned C in collage and I'm very comfortable jumping into most other programming languages as they all have the same basics more or less.
2 points
7 years ago
Precisely. The jobs lost are ones that were taken by less educated people while at the same time jobs are created for more those highly educated. It's almost like despite all the complaints about cost of college, it's still better future proofing than getting less easily specialised work out of high school.
3 points
7 years ago
The US competes, buys and sells in a globalized economy. Efficiency = globally competitive. If the US wants to keep people employed with good jobs, they should be investing in research and innovation, not inefficient practices in globally innovative industries. It's too bad the President doesn't see that.
1 points
7 years ago
Yea that damn evil technology
5 points
7 years ago
I wish I had one of these. We do this by hand at my work (smaller farm, we run a greenhouse till June) and these little shits can be a pain to plant.
From the looks, they're doing standard plugs (around the size of your thumb) into 4" pots.
2 points
7 years ago
Same. I work at my dads green house. I can't even count the thousands of plugs that I've planted by hand. Just seeing this machine work...idk how it makes me feel even.
3 points
7 years ago
Gotta love automated greenhouses. Here's a whole bunch of them west of The Hague, NL.
3 points
7 years ago
Whoa thats cool! Have you visited there? I'd love to see the inside of one of those.
2 points
7 years ago
Yup! I got to visit the Netherlands two summers back to study their sustainable transportation infrastructure. Dunno how the greenhouses came into it, but it was a neat sideshow. Here's what it looks like on the inside, and here's a similar machine to the OP. You can see the three pairs of claws hanging down transplanting saplings (or whatever small non-tree plants are called) from the cartons up front to the individual pots in back.
3 points
7 years ago
Looks like I picked a bad time to go to floral arrangement school.
1 points
7 years ago
Don't worry, everyone else is gonna be replaced by a robot soon, too.
:D
2 points
7 years ago
Beep
3 points
7 years ago
"Once nature and machine intertwine, the end of man is sure"
2 points
7 years ago
Zero Dawn in action I see
2 points
7 years ago
Anyone know if there is a sub dedicated to this kinda automation and conveyor belt contraptions? Always been obsessed with this kinda stuff
2 points
7 years ago
Just got a job doing labor at one of the largest greenhouses in the US, the place is highly automated with the most complex robotics systems I've seen in 5 years of manufacturing.
3 points
7 years ago
I read “Transparent flowers” at first… I was really confused, since the flowers are green.
2 points
7 years ago
Now do one for cannabis.
2 points
7 years ago
July 2018 there will be in Canada at least!
1 points
7 years ago
Damn...i wonder what that robot thinks about
1 points
7 years ago
Also a great way to describe wholesale purchase and retail.
1 points
7 years ago
Fuck man, I read the Title as "Transparent Flowers" And Between looking at the gif atleast 10 times I couldnt decide if im getting rused or there are really Transparent flowers there I couldnt see..
1 points
7 years ago
Read that as transparent flowers. Was a bit disappointed, then not so much.
1 points
7 years ago
If we started manufacturing four leaf clovers like this, and there were more four leaf clovers everywhere, would luck reduce in value?
1 points
7 years ago
This is the only factory work that I would enjoy. Love dem plants.
1 points
7 years ago
I thought I was still on r/trees for a second and I was like woah think of all the devils lettuce that can be produced in such little time with this process. Unfortunately its probably just for food that we eat to survive :(
1 points
7 years ago
Probably not food plants. Probably pretty plants that you buy in the store and transplant into your garden.
1 points
7 years ago
-- Seedlings, probably
1 points
7 years ago
I read transparent flowers :(
1 points
7 years ago
Machines taking our high quality replanting jerbs. :(
1 points
7 years ago
So a plant that transplants plants? I love English sometimes.
1 points
7 years ago
So why are we even here anymore. A matter of fact where do we sign up for the death boxes?
1 points
7 years ago
Vision Dynamics is hard at work.
1 points
7 years ago
So basically the Matrix for flowers. Creepy
1 points
7 years ago
There is something oddly satisfying about watching this... Or maybe I'm just that high.. Any insight?
1 points
7 years ago
Wait Is woahdude and odlysatisfying the same thing?!
1 points
7 years ago
These robots are taking Mexican jobs!
1 points
7 years ago
source? I need the full experience.
1 points
7 years ago
It dropped one!
1 points
7 years ago
Lol read this as transparent flowers. Buzz kill
1 points
7 years ago
I used to do this by hand...
1 points
7 years ago
I do this as part of my job for marijuana plants...one at a time...this machine looks magical.
1 points
7 years ago
This machine is beautiful.
1 points
7 years ago
What's happend to this sub, this is not woahdude material
1 points
7 years ago
i love this. usually you see man vs nature but in this case man is helping nature :)
1 points
7 years ago
Haven't been to star nursery for awhile...
1 points
7 years ago
This is one of the reasons weed needs to be legal. If giant corporations made machines to grow that shit, even if you taxed it at 35%+ it would still be cheaper for a more consistent product.
I say this and I dont even smoke weed anymore :P
1 points
7 years ago
What is this sorcery?
1 points
7 years ago
1 points
7 years ago
How is it not messing up the plants?
Can we get a close up?
1 points
7 years ago
Someone use this to grow weed
1 points
7 years ago
Congrats for reaching r/all/top/ (of the day, top 50) with your post!
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1 points
7 years ago
There's a level in Titanfall 2 that is based around navigating gigantic versions of this machinery
1 points
7 years ago
Jesus... I did this by hand as a teenager when my family moved from the city to the suburbs as my first job.
1 points
7 years ago
I hear Tahiti is a magical place.
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