TALOS Exoskeleton Program Fails But Silent Electric Dirt Bikes Could Work Out

Patrick Tucker at Defense One has reported that James Smith, SOCOM’s acquisition executive has stated that the Special Ops Exoskeleton is nowhere near ready for use in combat.

There have been improvements in lightweight body armor and improved helmet displays.

There are tests of partial suits to help support walking and running with heavy loads.

In 2018, the Army began evaluating Lockheed Martin’s ONYX exoskeleton. The ONYX supports the knee joints when carrying heavy loads over uneven terrain. ONYX uses less power than a full-body exoskeleton. The current design is able to achieve 8 to 16 hours of operation over realistic terrain. If the tests are successful the suits could be used in the field as early as 2021. It is likely that the partial suits will be used in warehouse and supply chain situations for support personnel. It will take years before they are ready for combat situations.

The soft exosuits are also not ready and are struggling to provide a 20% boost in the efficiency of movement.

The batteries are not good enough to power the exoskeletons and will not be ready in the next 10 years. There is the lightweight Liquid Piston engine, but they still are quite noisy. There would need to be a mix of the light-weight engines and batteries. Batteries would be used when soldiers need to be quiet.

The military will test the $3000 to $5000 lower-body booster. They make running and long marches easier. They will take it off before they start fighting. The system will enable people to run 4-minute miles.

These partial exoskeleton systems seem less useful than silent, all-electric dirt bikes.

The Zero MMX can run up to 90 miles on one charge, weighs 275 lbs. and can carry up to 355 lbs. It has top speed is 85 mph with a sustained high speed of 70 mph. This would be less than one minute to cover one mile.

Special Operations Forces have been working with the DARPA to develop light, silent dirtbike for operations.

On electric the SilentHawk produces about 55 decibels of sound, or the equivalent of a typical spoken conversation.

The TALOS exoskeleton was originally conceived as protection for a human commando to breach a door and save hostages in a room full of terrorists. Special Forces can use various robots and other weapons for safely and quickly breaching doors.

SOURCES -CNAS, Army Times, Defense One

Written by Brian Wang, www.nextbigfuture.com

30 thoughts on “TALOS Exoskeleton Program Fails But Silent Electric Dirt Bikes Could Work Out”

  1. I don’t know; what’s the expected distribution of wind speeds over the area? If 50 mph winds are to be expected at least once a year, then I agree it was inexperience; but you’ll always have to design your moorings to take lateral forces up to a certain amount, and then sometime the lateral forces will exceed that. That’s why insurance companies exist.

  2. Look, I am a technical man, private pilot also. I would like to go to Mars. But let’s not confuse science fiction with reality. Fiction does not require money. Reality does! Con artists from Holland promising suicide trip to Mars for a few dollars if you are lucky? Financed by TV reality show? Elon plans to colonize Mars soon while laying off people at Tesla? To establish a Mars colony of 10,000 people may cost trillions of dollar. Even to setup a habitat on Mars and safely transport dozens of people there one way may cost $100 billion. What if they murder each other? Likely some will go crazy due to confinement and boredom.
    Meanwhile, back on Earth, we have the giant issues of ruining the Earth with overpopulation, nuclear annihilation, and high-IQ robots putting us into gas chambers.

  3. As I am rooting for the Hopper, I hate to see this. Having said that, maybe SpaceX could hire some professionals experienced in fabricating stainless steel so that the thing did not look like a kid’s tin foil toy in the history books!

  4. Here’s what you need for BFR landing feet. telescopically extending fins that come out on landing so you can land on any rocky surface…. maybe you could make the fins go up and down as well as in and out to adjust for unflat hilly surfaces on other planets…

  5. Technically, at the point where they launch, they’re actually using the attitude thrusters to keep it from toppling over while somebody gets on board. So it wasn’t a matter of being afraid, it was actually happening.

    Tremendously exaggerates the force Martian winds can apply, I think.

  6. Nice segue into pushing your agenda. It’s not important, a Mars colony several years down the line will be self sustaining. Besides, Russia has had strike-anywhere capability since the 70s at least.

  7. Positive side: no casualties due to the nosecone blown over…. On the way to Mars, much bigger accidents likely to happen…. In fact, the entire Mars colony will perish if nuclear war breaks out on mother Earth…

    How about nuclear disarmament prior to colonizing Mars? A single Russian hydrogen bomb can annihilate the entire NYC metro area with 12 million people.

    Article: Russia tests new nuclear weapons that can strike ANYWHERE on the planet and wipe out an area ‘the size of France’ in military video footage
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-5985985/Russias-new-nuclear-weapons-able-wipe-area-size-Texas-France.html

  8. I think this wind blow over is proof that Elon should change the shape of starhooper to the shape of the millennium falcon…

  9. The funny part about starwopper blowing over is that it’s the exact same plot for “mars” movie with matt daemon…where they abandon the mission because they are afraid mars winds will blow over the ship

  10. Three ways to do it, safe, cheap or fast, pick two.
    Get some more welders and plate workers they are common.
    Add worked on spaceships in cv 🙂

    But yes this shows that they need lots more infrastructure as an launch site

  11. Ouch! On the bright side, if they had made it of composite, there wouldn’t be any chance of fixing it.

  12. Damb right … there is fast and cheap … then there is careless fast and cheap. Someone should lose their job over this.

  13. I’m sort of surprised that 50mph winds were not accounted for. This site is on the coast, and the terrain around there is very flat(I’ve been to the area).
    At least this shows the structure of the rocket is light, and has plenty of drag with the wind from the side, as it will be during reentry.
    Seriously dude, tie down the feet!

  14. I think they are 1 month behind now but i hope other things that wernt ready have time to catch up to the busted cone. I assumed engine intergration was the main bottle neck. We need a killer chop shop body crew just pull the dents lol.

  15. I think it was just the nosecone. They could probably fly without it…it isn’t really going very far…it’s just going to do some little hops. Prettier with the cone.
    Good thing they did not make it full size, then it would definitely be a big repair because the whole thing probably would have come down.

    I wonder if they got bad cable like they got bad parts before. What was it that was too weak, they got before?

    I’d feel better if we knew for sure that this was just the nosecone. I’d like to see a picture of the rest of the thing if it is not on it’s side.

  16. Tho it is sure to attract a lot of noise, to me this just reeks of “lack-of-experience”.

    Any competent assortment of engineers (even if not “rocket scientists”) could almost trivially calculate on cocktail napkins the slipstream forces of 50 MPH (22 m/s) wind around the Big Old Stainless Steel Can; figuring that, then the net force is easily calculated. The mass-moment and center-of gravity, and leverage angle come next.  

    And from any of those engineers that happen to have a hobby in sailing, then it must be remember that tall, big SAILS need to have their MASTS anchored from the top, to the bottom-and-sideways by taut guy lines. For stability. To keep from being “blown over”.  

    Inexperience.  

    It happens. 
    Just saying,
    GoatGuy

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