Ford’s seat testing robot butt is called “Robutt”

When you think of all the tech that Ford uses to build and test out components that are going into its cars and trucks, you might think of robots. I’d bet you don’t think of robotic butts for testing seats though. The robot is called, naturally enough, Robutt and it is designed to mimic a human sitting in a Ford seat.

Robutt was used for testing the new Ford Fiesta in Europe and has sat in different seat designs 25,000 times. That is about ten years worth of sitting according to Ford. The butt robot needed about three weeks to complete all that sitting.

The Robutt seen in the image here is a padded design, but there is a metallic robot buttocks that is used to measure seat comfort. That metal butt measures deflection and softness when a person sits. Robots are frequently used in the construction of vehicles, this is nothing new.

Robots paint, assemble and weld modern cars. Robots are often more accurate, and their performance doesn’t degrade over time as a human does as they tire. Ford also uses tech to design its seats that create a pressure map of a person’s butt as they sit in a seat to help design more comfort into the seats.

Ford says that the seat is one of the most tested elements in the car. This is a good thing; the seat can certainly make you not want to drive or buy the car if it is uncomfortable.

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Papi Mabele

Papi Mabele has a marketing background, he is a digital marketing expert with extensive experience in launching and building global brands in the emerging markets. Papi is also an avid tech writer, enthusiast and all round tech junkie. As a freelance writer and analyst he has been numerously published in Popular Mechanics (SA), GQ South Africa, Premier Magazine, Driven Magazine, Bloem News, Courant, The Weekly, Enthooze Magazine and PiE magazine amongst others.