Chad Johnson – Grain Weevil

We moved to Nebraska to be closer to my wife’s family 20 years ago! This eventually led us to Aurora where I began working at the Edgerton Explorit Center.

Currently, we are creating a grain bin safety and management robot that directly engages the surface of the grain. Grain bins are dirty, dangerous workplaces. We keep that farmer with a shovel out of the bin by leveling, breaking crusts, doing inspections and feeding grain into the extraction augers.

We are working towards bringing a complex robotics solution to market that includes autonomous capabilities, product safety and reliability challenges, and the fact that a grain bin is no place for a human or a robot!

Two fun facts about me are:

Fact #1: I graduated from the University of Kansas with a degree in elementary education – and participated in the decathlon on the track team – Rock Chalk.

Fact #2: I had never been inside of a grain bin before we started building the Grain Weevil robot.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/chadjohnson72/

@Grain_Weevil

https://www.grainweevil.com

If I had five minutes to prepare a lecture, I would teach a lesson on the process of innovation and the value of including students in all aspects of the process.