The school rush has died down and businesses are starting to close for the day in the small Gippsland town of Yinnar, but residents still pause a while to take a look at what's been happening in a small, local workshop.
For a regional town of just over 1,000 people, located about two hours east of Melbourne, the big breakthroughs from a small team of local inventors over the past couple of months sparks curiosity from passers-by.
The team from Outlook Industries, most hailing from their hometown of Yinnar, continue to work into the late hours to finish their next big project — a surveillance robot.
Luke Townsend, Michael Saulle, and Hasitha Hewawasam are inventors creating a brand new on-ground surveillance system for the Australian Defence Force (ADF) called GUS ADF Version 1.
GUS proposes to reduce human risk by continuously monitoring perimeters while military personnel are out on duty.
"GUS is a totally new technology," said army veteran and project manager Luke Townsend.
"We made contact with the Australian Defence Force and showed them some really good examples of how a system like GUS could be used in a conflict, like what's going on in Ukraine. That really got their attention."
Invention with a cause
For the team of inventors, working together as Outlook Industries, the purpose of creating surveillance drone technology such as GUS is to help save lives.
"Necessity is the mother of invention," said Mr Townsend, who was previously a captain posted overseas in the Australian and British armies.
"In places such as Afghanistan, the guys will be overwatching a position to see what the opposition is up to. But they've only got a certain number of spots to overwatch that position, which is generally on the high ground.
"So the enemy could regularly shell that position. There will be bombs falling. With GUS, it doesn't care that it's being shelled. It just gets rocked around.
"With a soldier it's serious. Their lives are at stake."
Mr Townsend said GUS ADF Version 1, which stands for Ground Unmanned System Australian Defence Force, differs from other surveillance systems because of linger time.
"You can have an aerial drone and you can put it out over an area. But even for the very best of the aerial drones it will only stay over a territory for maybe 24 hours, then it's got to fly back," Mr Townsend said.
"But with our GUS technology, you can drop him off and he'll watch the area for 50-odd days. It's an order of magnitude more capable in that regard. You can just leave GUS there and it will keep on watching."
It's not the first time Mr Townsend has developed his idea for surveillance technology.
The team created another GUS in 2022 as an anti-poaching surveillance drone to help save threatened animals targeted by illegal poachers.
The anti-poaching invention won the Best Land Innovation in a pitch-style event at the 2022 Land Forces International Land Defence Expo in Brisbane, which attracted the Australian Defence Force to the Yinnar-based Outlook Industries for the brand-new GUS.
The current GUS system is set to be completed by April 2023.
Juggling family time while inventing
For Michael Saulle, lead fabricator and designer, being part of the GUS surveillance invention project has been part of something bigger.
Mr Saulle hopes he can inspire his 12-year-old son to make a difference through invention.
"I want to show my son that it is possible to achieve something that's going to be left behind to help others," he said.
"This project is not just about work. It's about being able to show my son and family that I helped on a project that helped stop rhinos from disappearing, or helped save human lives."
It's a busy schedule for the 40-year-old, who also works at the nearby Loy Yang power station, helps run his family farm, is a String Buster musician, and volunteers at CFA in his spare time.
"It takes a lot of support from my family at home to be able to facilitate what I do," he said.
Mr Saulle and Mr Townsend grew up in Yinnar together and were always "playing around with crazy ideas over the years".
"It doesn't seem real that our surveillance robot idea is actually happening," Mr Saulle said.
"I've been roped into Luke's crazy schemes since about grade two. It was about 2005 that we started tinkering with the idea of the first GUS and it's grown from there."
Mr Townsend said the idea of a surveillance robot such as GUS first came about while he was on duty in East Timor.
"Michael and I have always been wingmen," he said.
"Then I went off and joined the Australian army and Michael would come to visit me whenever I was posted."
He said they were always working on GUS as a hobby in the background.
"We were having to do clearing patrols around the bases. Seeing that was difficult because it was difficult for the guys to perform this role while being safe," Mr Townsend said.
"This was the time when I started wondering about being able to create a little robot that will stand in front of the guys and patrol the area without those human risks involved."
Inspiring future rural inventors
According Mr Townsend and Mr Saulle, the Yinnar community has been extremely supportive of the team creating the GUS project.
"We walk out onto the main street, see everybody every day, and sometimes have to keep the door shut to get any work done," Mr Saulle said.
"Everyone pops in to say hello and shares ideas with us. Even the local butcher comes up to us with generator ideas."
For Hasitha Hewawasam, a doctor of robotics and project manager at Outlook Industries, helping build the GUS surveillance system was a part-time project while studying a PhD at Federation University Gippsland.
"Since childhood I was always interested in new innovations. I have been building robots since I was 10 years old so this doesn't feel like work to me," Dr Hewawasam said.
"Luke had the idea to build GUS and needed some support for the electronics and programming. He asked me to come help him with the project for a couple of days and I ended up working with the team for over a year."
Aside from the long hours working on GUS as a team, the Yinnar inventors say they hope to inspire young people from their community to think big when it comes to innovation.
Accessibility to cutting-edge tools may be a downfall to living in a rural area, but Luke Townsend says there are other advantages for young inventors.
"On farms you have access to a lot of old tools and rubbish. You can build things, cut things apart, and hammer things together," Mr Townsend said.
"You have access to stuff to muck around with, and space. That gives young people that freedom in their minds to create things.
"Coming from the country, this freedom has helped us in our lives and our dreams of becoming inventors."
