Powered Exoskeleton

Powered Exoskeleton (1965)

General Electric creates a superstrength suit.

". . . You don't have to think about it . . . you just wear it and it takes orders directly from your muscles."

The powered exoskeleton is a good case of life imitating art. Robert A. Heinlein's 1959 novel Starship  Troopers described warriors in powered suits. The idea was used again in the Marvel Comic Iron Man, with a man inside a powerful homemade iron suit.

General Electric

Hardiman

 The idea struck a chord, and General Electric took up the task of turning it into reality. By 1965 they had produced "Hardiman," the first powered exoskeleton.

The idea behind the device was to produce a robot that reacted to the natural muscle movements of the wearer. It was designed to act like a "second skin," albeit one that weighed as much as a car. Hardiman was a 3/4 - ton monster, designed to lift 1,500 pounds (680 kg). Unfortunately, the team never managed to get Hardiman working. Any attempt to power up the full-frame caused a "violent and uncontrolled movement," and as such, the machine was never fully turned on with a person inside. One arm of the behemoth did wor, lifting 750 pounds (340 Kg) as predicted, but this was as far as the project went. The challenges in making such a monster work in a controlled way, without crushing the human inside, made it impossible to build a practical product.

• An operator demonstrates the Hardiman's arm the one part of the behemoth that worked reliably.