Stringman, an $800 open-source room scale gripper robot

A closer look at Stringman, an $800 open-source room scale gripper robot

What Stringman is and how it moves

Stringman is an open source, room-scale cable-driven gripper robot that reaches across a room using four motors with lines anchored in the ceiling corners. The gripper hangs from those lines and is moved by changing line lengths, so the lifting force is shared across motors and payload capacity scales with combined torque. The project publishes mechanical CAD, PCBs, and control software and is OSHWA certified.

What you can actually do with it

Install anchors near ceiling studs or columns, hang the anchors, connect the lines to the gripper, then run a five-minute calibration that adapts Stringman to your room. You can teach behaviors from the UI, use default models for grasping and target selection, collect training data from the UI, and control the robot via a Python API and an MCP server geared toward agents. There are also default models compatible with networks like Pi.05, JEPA, and Multitask DiT.

Who will find Stringman useful

People with cluttered floors who want a robot that works from above, home labs that need a room-scale ferry for parts between workcells, and classrooms wanting hands-on examples of inverse kinematics, telemetry, and imitation learning. It is also useful for researchers testing cross-embodiment models because datasets and a MuJoCo controller-in-the-loop sim are provided. Installation needs a room with ceiling attachment points and a computer to run the controller.

Questions people ask about Stringman, an $800 open-source room scale gripper robot

Do the lines stay in the room when installed?

Yes; while parked they sit up near the ceiling and can be detached leaving a small cleat on the wall.

Can it work in rooms with fans or low fixtures?

Yes if anchors are mounted at or below the fan blade level or if the work area is restricted to avoid low-hanging objects; if the room center contains low-hanging objects it cannot be installed.

Can I control it remotely?

Not by default, but you can bind it with neufangled.com/playroom to operate it remotely and revoke access later; the company says it does not store robot information forwarded through its servers.

Stringman, an $800 open-source room scale gripper robot was shared on NexURLs by Nexis on November 4, 2026, in Shopping & Finds.