Battle of the US super-soldier robot suits hots up with XOS 2.0 Two rival firms in the USA are vying to develop military exoskeletons - powerful motorised robotic suits intended to endow soldiers of the future with superhuman strength and other abilities. The XOS inventors from Utah, generally seen as running second to California's HULC*, have now rolled out a new "second generation" version …
"And frankly, to a soldier who will routinely be carrying not just flares but grenades, ammo, handheld rockets etc, the danger from exploding or burning li-ion batteries might not seem a big deal."
Personally I think an exploding power supply would be a MAJOR deal when carrying around those items!
This post has been deleted by its author
Probably not a forklift replacement. Forklifts work pretty well, they can hoist a couple of tonnes much higher than a guy in a suit can and can move pallets further and faster than a guy in a suit.
Balancing 2 tonnes at arms length might be an issue for the suit wearer even if they could lift it.
Electric battery powered forklifts are well established and don't often explode an an actinic flash.
This might be usable for lighter (still heavy) loads that don't come on pallets, like shells and missiles.
You'd be surprised how hard it is to set fire to petrol, and especially diesel. Shoot a car in the petrol tank and it makes a hole, hollywood explosions notwithstanding. Shoot a l-ion battery and it is almost guaranteed to go bang. That's the difference.
Petrol is volatile when it's in a gaseous form, but in a liquid form it's relatively non-volatile. That's one of the reasons it's so great as a fuel, as it can be stored in a relatively safe form that has a very high energy density. As long as the future exoskeleton has a nice high impact non-metallic tank to sore the fuel in it'll be safer than lugging around a pack of batteries that have a not insignificant chance of spontaneously exploding.
How about a small (heavily armoured) wheeled trailer with a generator on it trailing behind?
Any terrain (ie maybe stairs) that was unsuitable for the trailer could potentially be picked up by the XOS and carried.
Add a heavy weapon such as a minigun and maybe ammo feeding from the trailer and you could have a pretty mobile heavy weapons unit with only one person.
I'm sure they considered it.
Only problem with that is if the umbilical gets cut or the trailer gets taken out by a RPG, mine, 50cal round the suit would be instant dead weight on the solder. And you can bet that the trailer becomes a primary target as soon as it come into view.
With these kinds of weapons systems it is always better to have everything in one package, saves Armour weight and reduces total target profile.
Another option might be some kind of broadcast power system like Tesla tried to do. One big mobile transmitter for a unit of XOS equipped soldiers. Of course then the transmitter becomes a primary target in any engagement but if the range was good enough it could be well back from the conflict.
Honestly, they need to focus on the civilian applications of these objects first. Once they get them perfected to civilian standards (not too hard), they can focus on the up-armoring, mount points for gear, mobility issues, etc. Military standards are way more exacting than civilian ones, why not try to get a base market for it going then work on improvements and gain more interest that way?
Wait, that would make sense.
Most engines generate waste heat, and internal combustion engines are among the worst. Assuming 5kW of useful power to the suit, you are dissipating on the order of 10kW of heat from the engine alone, with more being lost at friction points in the suit. Not only will that fry your tush, it will show up beautifully on any IR views! Hardly combat-ready.
This kind of technology needs a reasonably sized nuclear battery that can deliver enough power to keep it going indefinitely.
Once the power problem is solved we reach a scenario like fighter jets are in today - do they really need people inside them at the controls ? They could be controlled by an operator remotely. That would open up a whole new world of warfare.
one slight problem tho - the artist-impression pictures show the unit being used to lift weights too heavy for a regular unassisted person to lift. well if you have a weight held in outstretched arms which is heavier than what can be supported by the vertical axis, you're gonna just topple over forwards everytime. Guess thats why those things are shown soley by artist-impression drawings.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
