Infantry Exoskeleton Carries 200 Pounds



Lockheed Martin's Human Universal Load Carrier (HULC) is an actuated exoskeleton that helps a soldier carry up to 200 pounds of weight on its frame. It senses the direction that the user wants to move, and then moves in it. In the links, you find a video from the company showing the HULC in action.

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-01/robotic-super-soldier-suit-gets-more-juice |YouTube Video | Image: Lockheed Martin

In combat, that would be a bad item to #1 fail and fold up crushing your legs or #2 fail and let 200lbs of gear pull you to your death.

Hmmm. I would be scared to wear it. But give me a Mech to drive and then we can talk.
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It's nice to see they are trying to find something to help our fighting men and women.Since each unit will most likely cost millions of dokkars I'm sure they will work out the kinks the other commenters pointed out.
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I wonder how this would be for people with muscular dystrophy and other muscle wasting disorders... I'd love to be able to regain the ability to walk with ease. I imagine there's a lot of crossover potential with this technology.
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When I was a baby journalist in the Army (late 80s - early 90s), infantry troops complained that they had too much gear to carry. So instead of making the gear from high-tech lightweight materials or combining items (ala multi-tool concept), they simply gave them a bigger rucksack.

This is just today's version of the bigger rucksack. And more battery-operated crap to have to rely on.

Like Shannon said, I would like to see the concept applied to helping physically impaired people walk.
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I like how every time something cool is created, people start whining about it. Also you know they actually put things like this through testing to eliminate the possibility of failure. God damn, stop being so pessimistic about everything.
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