The ‘Power Driven Articulated Dummy’ project was under Contract No. NAS 9-1370 and ran from May 22, 1963 through July 31, 1965. It was originally built for Nasa’s Manned Spacecraft Center by the Illinois Institute of Technology.
The reason for a test dummy was officials hoped to use it during design and testing of a spacesuits, which might otherwise be painful, tedious or even dangerous for human beings.
The 1965 robot was able to simulate 35 basic human motions and used sensors to gather data on how the human body acted in a pressurized suit – but it never made it off the ground due to its tendency to leak oil.
Only two of these robots were created, the one selling for $80,000 and another that is owned by the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum.
