Lockheed Martin is developing for exterior skeleton type powered suit for US soldiers

Lockheed Martin powers up battlefield soldiers Externally framed type powered suit "K-SRDWe announced. It is the aim of greatly improving the strength of the infantry which is also important in the modern war.

New Lockheed Martin Exoskeleton Helps Soldiers Carry Heavy Gear - May 16, 2017
http://news.lockheedmartin.com/2017-05-16-New-Lockheed-Martin-Exoskeleton-Helps-Soldiers-Carry-Heavy-Gear

FORTIS Knee - Stress Relief Device
http://breakingdefense.com/2017/05/k-srd-exoskeleton-gives-overburdened-troops-a-leg-up-literally/

Lockheed Martin has already developed externally framed powered suit for workers called "Fortis". Fortis is a powered suit that supports workers with a support frame and reduces the load of bending and stretching exercise on the knee.


In the following movie, you can see how you actually use powered suit developed for the purpose of reducing work load.

Lockheed Martin's "Fortis" Exoskeleton in Action - YouTube


Lockheed Martin has announced the newly released powered suit "Knee Stress Release Device (K-SRD)" for soldiers on the battlefield. Pentangon (the US Department of Defense) is implementing the strategy "third offset strategy" to preserve American military superiority, and K - SRD is part of that program. It is being developed with the goal of enhancing the ability of soldiers using robotics engineering and artificial intelligence.

Soldiers on the battlefield need to carry guns and heavy luggage. Robots for transporting goods have also been developed, but the role played by human infantry is important, as we can not deal with situations such as going up and down stairs or going down the slope. For this reason, K-SRD has been developed for the purpose of reducing infantry effort.


Based on the fundamental technology of powered suit Fortis, K - SRD carries knee actuators and on - board computers. It detects that bending and stretching exercise of the soldier's knee is detected by computer control and it assists according to exercise. It aims to reduce the burden of the harsh mission required of soldiers, to lengthen the travel distance, such as kneeling, crouching, pulling heavy loads and pulling ropes.


In experiments, bending and stretching with a weight of 185 pounds (about 84 kilograms), average soldiers average 20 to 25 times, while K-SRD wears more than 50 times I succeeded in stretching. Perhaps in the near future, the day will come when it becomes common for soldiers to wear powered suit and hit a mission.