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Lego robot submersible steered with Xbox 360 controller

An engineering student has built an underwater vehicle using a Lego Mindstorms NXT and a pair of NXTBee chips.

Michelle Starr Science editor
Michelle Starr is CNET's science editor, and she hopes to get you as enthralled with the wonders of the universe as she is. When she's not daydreaming about flying through space, she's daydreaming about bats.
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Michelle Starr

An engineering student has built an underwater vehicle using a Lego Mindstorms NXT and a pair of NXTBee chips.

(Screenshot by Michelle Starr/CNET Australia)

NXT, which is a programmable robotics kit, allows the inventive to make little Lego robots, while the chips allow for wireless communications.

The student, known as Brane, used the components to make a steerable submarine for his final-year engineering project.

The robot is not actually waterproof, simply sealed with epoxy and powered by two lead-acid batteries attached to the robot's base. It is then controlled by an Xbox 360 controller, hooked up to a laptop.

Since it can only be underwater for short stretches of time — Brane said 20 minutes on his YouTube page — we can't imagine what the practical applications might be, but we kind of want one anyway.

Check it out in action in the video below.