15 Research Lab › Robotics lane
Bayview, San Francisco
Actuator and joint characterization.
$1,500 to $3,000 per report
Actuator datasheets are marketing documents. Peak torque is quoted at a duty cycle nobody runs and thermal derating is left as an exercise for the customer. This lane measures the thing instead of believing it.
What you get
Joint characterization reports, $1,500 to $3,000. Torque against speed, thermal derating under real duty cycle, and backlash measured rather than claimed. Published numbers you can design against.
The E-01 development kit at $2,995, built around actuators that have been through the dyno, so the numbers in the documentation are numbers from that unit.
Endurance running, because the interesting failures are the ones that appear at hour four hundred, not hour one.
Test rigs designed and built here when you need a fixture that does not exist.
What it replaces
Commercial actuator test stands are capital equipment priced like capital equipment. For a robotics team that needs to characterize eight candidate joints once, buying the stand is roughly a hundred times the cost of the answer.
There is no established third-party actuator characterization service in the United States. Teams either build the rig themselves, which is a month of engineering time aimed at the wrong problem, or they trust the datasheet.
How it works
Send the actuator and the duty cycle you actually intend to run. You get a written report with the curves, the raw data, and a plain statement of what the unit will not do.
The counter is not open yet. Prices are posted in advance and held at opening.
Common questions
What is in an actuator characterization report?
Torque against speed, thermal derating measured under the duty cycle you specify, backlash, and the raw data behind all of it. The report states what the unit will not do as plainly as what it will.
Why not just use the manufacturer datasheet?
Datasheets typically quote peak torque at a duty cycle nobody runs in production and leave thermal derating undefined. The gap between datasheet and bench is where robotics schedules go wrong.
Do you test actuators you did not supply?
Yes. Send the unit and the intended duty cycle. Characterization is priced at $1,500 to $3,000 per report regardless of where the actuator came from.
Waitlist
The counter opens when funding closes. Prices are posted in advance and held at opening.