A simple human task that's insanely hard for a robot 

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you are a true engineer...building an entire machine to make life slightly more boring

"Solving the 5000 pieces puzzle would take about 10 years to solve manually. Thankfully, I made this robot that can solve it in 3000 years"

I am a software engineer and a mechanical engineer. I used to work on a pick and place machines to place electronic components on empty PCBs it took teams of amazingly experienced engineers months to build such a machine. Seeing you single handedly creating the entire thing from scratch is unbelievable. Such a talented guy. With a few more like you out there no human will ever need to work anything again.

I've studied photogrammetry for surveying, so I was smiling throughout the whole section on lens distortion and parallax. Such an underappreciated science.

This man seriously has some of the most incredible feats of engineering I’ve seen. I mean, the sheer amount of work he must put into every one is just astronomical. Many thanks for sharing them!

You're a Renaissance man for sure! Not many people have engineering, software, design, storytelling, and video production skills. Looking forward to part 2!

He basically replaces all the ''Impossible'' to ''Challenging'', what an insane lad!

I work on a 600M$ satellite project and I can say the process is not much different from this. We also have integration hell, "it turns out I need to spend half my engineering effort on an unanticipated component", "the software is super slow", etc. The main difference is that once you involve many people in your project, you become very inefficient. You start having to spend the majority of your time being in meetings and writing documentation, rather than solving problems.

“Getting the camera infinitely far away is ‘challenging’ and I’d rather not attempt it” really got me 😂

I love the confidence this robot had putting the pieces down, even when they were totally in the wrong spot.

For the vibration problem, you can detect the natural frequency of the table through recording it somehow and doing a Fourier analysis. Afterwards, you can actuate the motor in a matter that prevents this frequency. That's how they make high speed stable systems.

I think my favorite part of these videos is watching it break down a challenge into as small of a piece as you think you need to and then not having a problem with breaking that mini step into a micro step if it’s not working.

As a software engineer, I can only imagine how much work it took to write the software alone, not even mentioning building the robot. Amazing stuff made here!

Stuff, I know that you're making these videos available to a wider audience by toning down the science, but I would absolutely love it if you made follow up videos where you really got into explaining all of the theory and math going on here. You seem to skip over a lot of integration hell, but I think that's the most interesting part. All the pieces you wouldn't think would go wrong, and how to fix some of them. Someone else suggested a second channel or followup videos to help do both. Sincerely, the next generation of engineers who love what you're doing

We might need a robot that can untangle Christmas tree lights… 🎄🤖

That guy is one hell of a engineer, the pure mass of base knowledge behind this is brain melting, normally a team of 10-20 guys is working on such projects.

I’ve been a professional software engineer for over 30 years and a weekend woodworker for 20. My friends consider me a “nerd’s nerd”. I can honestly say I live only in the outer suburbs of “nerdville” when compared to you. You are inspiring just in your enthusiasm to take on (and somehow SOLVE) engineering problems that would daunt TEAMS of people. Kudos to all the skills you have built and integrated so well!

It would be cool to see a small "time passed" indicator in some corner to see how long each step really takes

16:02 "FINALLY! What a pain!" This had me dying - the thrill of victory followed immediately by the catharsis of expressing how difficult everything has been up to this point. Wow. I had to rewind several times so I could continue belly laughing. This is incredible. Amazing. Why are you not working for NASA again?

I can't imagine the amount of programming needed to get this thing working

I'm a software engineer and it would probably take me much longer than 3 weeks to make all these algorithms work let alone build the thing and record everything for RU-vid. What this guy does is truly incredible. He's basically doing the work of entire engineering teams in a fraction of the time.

This seems like a whole year project for 20 engineers to work on and then eventually fail. I don't understand how a single guy can do this in such a short time. Well done.

You have mastered creating videos that cause me incredible amounts of stress from trying to imagine how much work truly goes into them. I can't wait for the next one!

It really blows my mind how smart some people are. This guy is next level!

Honestly, as an engineering student I would LOVE a series that explains everything and the math involved

Classic engineer, "It'll take a month to do something, so instead I'll take several months to build something to do it for me." I wholeheartedly approve 👍

This is one of those channels that I hate having to wait so long between uploads, but every time a new video comes out it’s so technically impressive I’m surprised we get more than one video every 2 years

Hey @stuffmadehere, I work in a very advanced semiconductor fab that is nearly completely run via robots. I saw your interesting concept about belt layouts for you gantry system and wanted to offer a much more simplistic solution. You stated that your issue lies within moving the beam when it has a heavy motor attached. With the equipment I work on we have the same problem except on a much larger scale. Our masts/beams/carriages weigh thousands of pounds. Our solution to this problem, a rack and pinion system. Extremely rigid, fast, and accurate. You could very easily 3D print both the rack and pinion, attach it to a small electric motor and be able to maneuver much heavier payloads with much greater accuracy and stability compared to more traditional a traditional belt and pulley method. Plus it would be much easier to program your carriage movements without having to calculate individual motor resistance etc. Just food for thought, I love your content so very much and figured I’d offer what little bit of applicable knowledge I have on the subject to help make your life easier or possibly aid an advancement in a future project. Ciao :)

I’m a professional in my field and people say I’m smart. But when I watch your channel I feel like I have never known anything and that there’s far more in world than could ever be learned in 10,000 lifetimes.

First he shrunk the kids now he’s completing puzzles Edit: I wrote that comment before I watched the video. I’m a little more than halfway through and this dude is amazing. He is just solving one problem after another while building this thing, like a true engineer. Love to see it. You came a long way from shrinking those kids

Been waiting for 2 months for part 2…..can’t wait to see what integration hell we’re in for this time.

"Why would I have spend time having fun?" This man spreads a great message.

The amount of problems this man solved for a single project. Pure genius.

*patiently awaiting part 2*

The density of information in this short video is astounding. What a genius!

Dude, I have an engineering degree and I feel like a pre-schooler watching this guy, hes a genius.

Said this before, saying it again: you need a second channel that goes into more detail on the concepts used without necessarily losing too much time explaining the math in detail for people without an engineering background. I'm sure there are enough engineers watching you to make it worth your time :). I still absolutely love the toned down versions for a general audience, but I feel like I'm missing a lot of interesting bits by the time the video's finished.

As an amateur coder I can only imagine the amount of euphoria he finally succeeded in the assembling the test puzzle. Engineering is fascinating and easily the most useful/worthwhile skill to learn. It is a combination of almost every subject matter and takes immense patience and unrivaled perseverance. Well done!

i absolutely love how you show your struggles and fails. it makes me feel better that even though im failing, not even a genius like you could do things on your first try. so its ok to fail, and what i'm doing is ok, because i'm always able to improve myself like you and create a working project in the end

This guy is on a whole other level from other RU-vid builders.

Another stunning video, as always

This has definitely become my favourite channel!!, I'll be waiting for part 2!!

I love how you can appreciate each step of solving the problem. It is really inspiring to see you take it one by one without losing your patience. Respect man, love your work !

If there's anything I've learned from this channel, it's that every problem can be solved with a gantry.

Can’t even wrap my head around the skills need for a project like this, so amazing ❤️😊

Bro you literally inspire me every time I look at your channel. You are the reason I am pursuing Biomedical Engineering and wanting to solve complex health issues for people just like you solve complex random goals that you set for yourself.

For the vac nozzle you can simply use a Pick & Place machine nozzle (like from Juki) with a wide mouth for ICs. Your work shed is more than impressive.

Thinking about executing this hurts my head so much. Litterally every aspect sounds so complicated, and having to tie all of those together neatly sounds impossible. You are insane.

The pain that this man goes through to engineer all of this is incredible

Cool to see the bright light background to detect shape. Couple years back i made something like it at work to get shape outlines for products we have to draw.

I have been waiting for next part since this video came out and i check the channel daily.

I love that we live in a world where someone this talented can spend their time doing something this crazy and we can all learn and appreciate it.

It's very rare to see such pure genius and intellectual brilliance so publicly. You and your channel are astounding.

Aside from the fact that you're very, very good at engineering, I really appreciate how many people are tickled by seeing things like this. It gives me back some hope in humanity ^^ And even for a native German speaker like me with a slightly above average level of English, it's easy to understand because of the simplicity of your explanation PS: watched the video the second time today and I´m still amazed to the max =D

what impresses me the most is your ability to turn complex ideas and making them easier to understand

I love how making the table was just a side quest on this mission. Most content creators would have a 30 min video of just that.

"Why have fun when I can build a robot to have fun for me?" -the mission statement of the channel

I can't believe I missed part 1 of this! Just watched it. Now I get to see part 2 again! Thanks Stuff Made Here for making engaging and innocent videos!

I love engineers. They look at things so silly. As a carpenter, we wouldn’t be anywhere without they’re silly ways

Oh no, you're going to put me out of a job. I have tons of solid color puzzles it could practice with if you need more test subjects.

It’s incredible for him to think of these engineering feats in such a short time, AND to explain it easily so casual viewers can understand it

Im getting excited, its coming up on the 2 month mark which means were gonna see something awesome soon

This is my first time seeing one of your videos. I had a smile on my face the whole time. So peaceful and interesting. You have a beautiful soul sir!

Bro you’re resilience is just on another level. I’m working on table that uses a coreXY mechanism and I got stuck and after like 6 hours of no progress I genuinely considered giving up. You’re ability to push through problems is amazing.

As an engineering student, these videos made me feel so down on myself. Shane's pure brilliance and intellectual fortitude honestly made me think of switching career paths. That is, until I read the comments of several veteran engineers singing his praises as well. Made me feel better that I did not need to match Shane's genius to be an engineer, but rather admire it. Like always, I am so blown away by anything and everything you choose to make.

Yeeees. I've worked with big CNC machines before and seeing that you had the vacuum-table trick up your sleeve made me happy

got shivers and cried a bit near the end. So much applied knowledge

Im an engineer, I generally can see and intuitively understand what you're doing on the mechanical side, but I would love a follow up video talking about the details of the software and complexities that arent fit for a normal length youtube video.

I'm an electrical engineer myself. I'm truly blown away by your videos. You're easily the most talented, well rounded engineer I've ever come across. I have never seen somebody so greatly apply engineering material into a final product. You deserve all the success in the world. Wish the best for you and your family. I feel dumber than a box of rocks watching your mastery take shape 🤣.

I've only seen your stuff super abridged but I am thoroughly impressed with all the steps you take to get things to work properly. Your videos give me a better appreciation of engineering!

Absolutely love the belt solution!

As incredible as the builds always are on here, and as helpful as the explanations are, the little jokes are the cherry on top. The fake Amazon review, the 4th screen news story about puzzles being considered torture by the UN.. Every second on this channel is so well thought out.

14:08 my old engineering firm had an internal challenge to write an algorithm that could solve a puzzle very similar to a jigsaw. the managers had to stop the tournament because no work was getting done! the only result was that our senior most tech fellow (an absolute genius) declared that solving the puzzle is "computationally complex!" He was also the only one to submit a working answer... on paper! he had spent every night for a few weeks working out an algorithm on paper in his notebook. most of us couldn't even map the problem into a solvable state or prove if it was NP hard or not. When nerd sniping goes wrong lol

3 months later, where's pt 2!

I was slowly going insane waiting for this next video haha! So awesome, can't wait for the next one. Thanks!

Man, really helps you appreciate how amazing our brains are. A 2-year-old human can do a 3x3 puzzle pretty reliably.

"Its the future. Why would I spend my time having fun when I can build a robot to have fun for me" - best opening line ever.

The most quality content on RU-vid hands down

Super fun video, your stuff never disappoints! I have an idea using this program: Solve the world puzzle of Pangea maybe islands included using a standard map.

I just cant begin to imagine how much effort making something like all by yourself takes. You're so profound in so many fields its actually jawdropping. Building such a thing would take TEAMS of people working non-stop and yet you're taking on this mammothian task single handedly, my respect for your work is indescribable. 🙏

You mentioned not wanting the pieces to move around and I was like "tacky / rubber surface". And you're all like, "no, let's drill lots of holes and use a powerful vacuum" 😅 Still, this is awesome. You are awesome.

Your work is freaking awesome man. The only thing I hate about this channel is that I didn't know about it sooner .. Honestly, great and inspiring work. Keep it up 👏

Oh man I love these videos so much, can't wait for part two!

This man holds my attention span longer than I can hold a conversation

"This will allow me to see when it jams up" You know he's a fellow engineer when he doesn't even think if it'll jam. He already knows it'll happen.

Its incredible that you can make something so hard so intresting and simple

I absolutely love the way you explain things and the level of detail you go into when solving the design problems. It is really neat to see the engineering going into it. I'm surprised you looked at a vacuum and suction before looking into reducing acceleration / jerk settings on the controller for the stepper motors. Stiffening your structure and smoothing out your motion are usually the first places to look before looking at active holding. Hope you keep making videos. Thanks for sharing!

I've said this before, and I'll say this again. This is the best channel on youtube. I just hope this guy is getting paid enough so that he never stops with these kinds of videos

These videos blow my mind. Well done Shane!

Your videos help me scratch the itch I have to buy tools and create things. I have watched every video on your channel and have never been more entertained/found a channel even close to this satisfying.. EVER. You are truly brilliant. I hope you keep the videos and builds/creations coming. I feel like I've binge watched you and am waiting for season 5 to come out on Netflix. Also this is coming from a civil engineer who stares at boring stationary things all day.. Thank you for what you're doing!

The most amazing task that is done here is the insane design capability of this engineer.

I've watched a lot of his videos, but for some reason this one really struck me with just how advanced his engineering skill really is. Every piece of this is a mini-project that he tosses off as if it's nothing, and then it comes together with enough precision to make it all work. As a software guy, I'm super curious how he's going to make a feasible solving algorithm.

Amazing.. as usual.... just thinking about writing the software makes my brain hurt!

I like the hidden "I'm slowly going insane" thing, funny

I’m an mech engineer and I am blown away you were able to complete this project. Making me feel really dumb and lazy over here lol. Or maybe if I didn’t have a real job and more free time what kind of absurd projects I could figure out how to build

As a software dev, I am definitely looking forward to part II. Algorithms are our bread and butter. The software alone involved in this project would make a great interview question to see how somebody thinks and breaks down a problem

It’s honestly overwhelming to think about the amount of technical thought and labor that goes into each step of these projects. I work as a software engineer and even getting a properly functioning search feature implemented into our app was difficult enough. I couldn’t imagine creating an ENTIRE puzzle sorting robot let alone the sort algorithms. But seeing you in action really inspired me. I signed up for Brilliant back when I saw your baseball bat video but stopped doing the lessons after a month or two. Now seems like a good time to get back on it and start exercising my brain. I could never imagine being on your level mentally, but with enough effort, I’m sure even a guy like me can achieve some pretty amazing things! Thanks for the motivation!!

i like it how you show all the failures and the real frustration.

honestly I aspire to be like you. To have learned so much in life; just wish up an idea and make it a reality. Maybe one day I'll be able to do the same...