Robotic Suit Gives Shipyard Workers Super Strength

H

HardOCP News

[H] News
Joined
Dec 31, 1969
Messages
0
So what happens when your super suit fails while you are in the middle of picking up something super heavy?

The exoskeleton fits anyone between 160 and 185 centimetres tall. Workers do not feel the weight of its 28-kilogram frame of carbon, aluminum alloy and steel, as the suit supports itself and is engineered to follow the wearer's movements. With a 3-hour battery life, the exoskeleton allows users to walk at a normal pace and, in its prototype form, it can lift objects with a mass of up to 30 kilograms.
Click to expand...
 
Seems like a massive waste for just 66 pounds... I know they are going to get better over time, but building out suits for 66 pounds is silly...
 
Warstopper said:
Seems like a massive waste for just 66 pounds... I know they are going to get better over time, but building out suits for 66 pounds is silly...
Click to expand...

Carry around 66 pounds for 3 hours and get back to us on that.
 
Yeah, at this point I think they're targeting work efficiency/anti-fatigue. I would imagine though we'll see something like this with 150 Kilogram capacity in the next 10 years.
 
Just what we need, longshoremen with Hulk strength and questionable affiliations.
 
Still a long way off of this
Aliens-screenshot-544x309px.jpg
 
jpm100 said:
Carry around 66 pounds for 3 hours and get back to us on that.
Click to expand...

Who carries 66 pounds around for 3 hours straight?

It is a valid question. 66 pounds is not a whole lot for laborers. I used to carry 2 50 lb bags every couple of minutes when I worked at a grain store back in high school. Maybe South Koreans just aren't as hearty as Americans.
 
SRTie4k said:
Who carries 66 pounds around for 3 hours straight?

It is a valid question. 66 pounds is not a whole lot for laborers. I used to carry 2 50 lb bags every couple of minutes when I worked at a grain store back in high school. Maybe South Koreans just aren't as hearty as Americans.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I can't think of too many instances where you'd have to hold that much weight for a prolonged period of time. As a systems administrator I'm required to be able to lift over 70 pounds. Not hold it indefinitely granted, but that suit seems like a big pain for that amount of weight. I could see it being useful when it actually helps people do things they absolutely couldn't on their own.
 
I think you people are missing its application - it isn't to hold and carry items around for long periods, it's to move chunks of formed and fabricated metals/heavier equipment from one location to another, perhaps dozens or hundreds of times per day - and that's a lot faster when you have a guy standing there who does it piece by piece rather than stacking and waiting for enough to make a forklift run worth it, and likely cheaper than the assosciated cost of running an entirely automated line to the end distro point.

Yes you can pick up a 60lb item and move it 20 feet away no issue. Do it several thousand times per day and then tell me theres no point to this.
 
FigherAce124 is on the right track, I believe. This is more about efficiency and cost savings than it is about anything else. If the workers don't need to stop for as many breaks, don't slow down, don't have to wait for a forklift or other machinery, then that'll be more money for the corporation. Of course, the workers will likely never see any kind of a raise from it... just the demand to be more efficient little bees.
 
well for one thing asians arent nearly as big, bulbous, and obese as the avg american
and 60lbs is quite a bit to fumble around with for hours. especially if you wanna keep your back in good shape.

i forsee an army of exobuilders building our futuristic societies and mega structures that we all have seen in conceptual art.

should be an interesting future ahead.
 
wear 28 kg of equipment to lift 30kg... anyone else see how silly this sounds? :) I realize this is probably "prototype" stuff, but yeah...

meanwhile you could get a pallet jack and hold up 2500kg and move it around as well :)
 
3 hours of use before needing a charge. I wonder how easy it is to swap cells, or how fast it can be charged if you can't. I suppose you could just swap units every three hours, but this also seems a little inefficient for something that's supposed to boost efficiency. Like I said, I can see this being quite useful once refined and enhanced. In its current state, not as much. (a good stepping stone to something better though I guess)
 
I could use this a Walmart lifting those damn 24 packs of soup.....
You might think your bad until Walmart makes you lift soup =)
 
So how many years until we get Elysium exosuits? I'd rather skip that and go strait to Mech, personally...
 
What happens if it fails?
Click to expand...

"So. Why do they call you "Corner Pocket?""
"Because I had an exosuit fail on me and blew my balls down into my socks when it broke my back."
 
A mass of 30 kilograms? I truly turns one into a superman does it not?
 
News flash! Hackers took control of nearly 50,000 exo-skeleton wearing workers in a Korean manufacturing plant, and have taken over the city using unwilling citizens... :D
 
raz-0 said:
A mass of 30 kilograms? I truly turns one into a superman does it not?
Click to expand...

:D Indeed it does... Indeed it does...

I have the energy of a bear, that has the energy of two bears!!!!
 
Breaking News: The exo-skeletons have become sentient and are currently breeding with the local populace. Hundreds have died and no cigarettes can be located in the vicinity.
 
sfsuphysics said:
wear 28 kg of equipment to lift 30kg... anyone else see how silly this sounds? :) I realize this is probably "prototype" stuff, but yeah...

meanwhile you could get a pallet jack and hold up 2500kg and move it around as well :)
Click to expand...

The weight of the gear supports its self, so there's no added weight.
 
Dont forget you can have 160cm 100lb Korean chips working hard manual labor
 
sfsuphysics said:
wear 28 kg of equipment to lift 30kg... anyone else see how silly this sounds? :) I realize this is probably "prototype" stuff, but yeah...

meanwhile you could get a pallet jack and hold up 2500kg and move it around as well :)
Click to expand...
Who's putting the stuff on the pallet jack?
 
TorxT3D said:
well for one thing asians arent nearly as big, bulbous, and obese as the avg american
and 60lbs is quite a bit to fumble around with for hours. especially if you wanna keep your back in good shape.

i forsee an army of exobuilders building our futuristic societies and mega structures that we all have seen in conceptual art.

should be an interesting future ahead.
Click to expand...

Obesity does not help one to lift weight. Sixty lbs really isn't that much. I still give this a big "meh."
 
Galvin said:
The weight of the gear supports its self, so there's no added weight.
Click to expand...

Maybe not, but it's still not going to be perfectly synced up with human motion. It will still likely feel somewhat cumbersome. Maybe that's an acceptable tradeoff, but it would bother me. Might as well use other forms of equipment if it still feels like equipment.
 
J3RK said:
Maybe not, but it's still not going to be perfectly synced up with human motion. It will still likely feel somewhat cumbersome. Maybe that's an acceptable tradeoff, but it would bother me. Might as well use other forms of equipment if it still feels like equipment.
Click to expand...

I'm also not totally knocking the idea of this either. Just this initial implementation.
 
Can't wait to see more of these in action.
We've come a long ways in the last few years with them.
 
Burticus said:
So how many years until we get Elysium exosuits? I'd rather skip that and go strait to Mech, personally...
Click to expand...
Ionno i remember raytheon buying up an exosuit company awhile back, im sure with DARPA money they can make something suitably creepy for just lifting heavy objects.
 
/still waiting for the world to shift it's proper attention toward building robots that can perform meaningful work at the Fukushima site over the next century.
 
jpm100 said:
Carry around 66 pounds for 3 hours and get back to us on that.
Click to expand...

I had to unpack, lift, and rack 24 fully loaded 16 drive raid arrays at 70lbs each, 4 4U servers at 80lbs each, and several switches for a project in my lab, in one day. While this thing might have been a bit of a help, I can certainly lift and carry 66lbs on my own for more than three hours. It does seem like a waste of money and resources right now, but it is a good first step.
 
Semantics said:
Ionno i remember raytheon buying up an exosuit company awhile back, im sure with DARPA money they can make something suitably creepy for just lifting heavy objects.
Click to expand...

The big restriction for higher capacity is the energy source. This one is restricted to a 3 hour battery life and 30kg because of batteries. If they had lighter, smaller, higher capacity batteries, they could build it bigger and stronger.

Our first, foremost concern right now should be battery technology. We could do so much more if we could shrink energy storage from current levels.
 
dgingeri said:
I had to unpack, lift, and rack 24 fully loaded 16 drive raid arrays at 70lbs each, 4 4U servers at 80lbs each, and several switches for a project in my lab, in one day. While this thing might have been a bit of a help, I can certainly lift and carry 66lbs on my own for more than three hours. It does seem like a waste of money and resources right now, but it is a good first step.
Click to expand...

And you went home and decided to play Tennis the rest of the day cause that kind of labor was nothing and you didn't even break a sweat?

Maybe you can tell yer boss yer job is way too easy and he should make you work double shifts or let you carry an extra 50lbs lol.

You guys seriously don't see the application of fatigue reducing equipment? Methinks anything that improves productivity or reduces work stress/injury can be a good thing.
 
Wierdo said:
And you went home and decided to play Tennis the rest of the day cause that kind of labor was nothing and you didn't even break a sweat?

Maybe you can tell yer boss yer job is way too easy and he should make you work double shifts or let you carry an extra 50lbs lol.

You guys seriously don't see the application of fatigue reducing equipment? Methinks anything that improves productivity or reduces work stress/injury can be a good thing.
Click to expand...

That's silly! Of course I/we can see the POTENTIAL benefits. I see nearly no benefit at all from something that can only hold 30kg, and only do it for 3 hours. Especially if it's bulky. In the example above racking raid arrays, switches and servers, this type of equipment would actually get in the way more than anything I think. Being able to bend, twist, and slide into tight spaces is necessary when racking equipment, especially in a smallish DC. I can't see this being nimble enough for that job.

For other jobs maybe, but they still need to get the spec up. You can get all excited about this if you want, and it is in fact pretty cool, but IMO it's not useful yet.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top