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The Guyver may (I am unsure) not truly count as an exo-suit. Rather, the host and armour fuse to form a unique lifeform = the Guyver. It isn't something worn.

Should this page actually be listed under Powered Suit or Powered Exoskeleton? Also, there not exactly fictional. Power-assisted exoskeletons have been developed since 1948, when a Russian biomechanicst named Nicholai A. Bernstein thought up plans for an above-the-knee, electric-motor driven prosthesis to provide movement to casualties of war, but was never implemented.

The first functional exoskeleton was built by G.E. in 1968 and was called the Hardyman. It's closely resembles the Aliens Power Loader and is hydraulically powered. The problem with the design was that it's hydraulics required almost a room of pumps and bladders.

The Russians experimented with a few more designs, but a Yugoslavian scientist named M. Vukobratovic came up with the first anthromorphic exoskeleton to restore basic movement to paraplegics in 1972. A similar product named Gehhilfe by the German prosthetics company Otto Brock was also developed for the same reason in 1990.

Today, there are several projects towards a cost-effective and reliable powered exoskeleton. Tsukuba University's HAL (Hybrid Assistive Limb) project aims to provide assistance to impaired patients. Berkley's Lower Extermity Exoskeleton or BLEEX is a similar project, but is also being developed for military applications. Kanagawa Institute of Technology's Keijiro Yamamoto's Power Assist Suit (a New Scientist article also goes into detail on Kanagawa's Power Assist Suit) takes an unusual approach by using computer-controlled air bladders and is being developed for use with nurses to care for Japan's aging eldery.

BTW, there should be a mention of the different control methods: Master-Slave, Electro-Conduction, (currently fictional) Direct Neural Induction. YoungFreud 04:27, 9 Jul 2004 (UTC)

---

Who is that guy that has his own suit that can withstand the force of a bear? I believe he's in Canada and has several suits worth a few million each.

That suit wasn't powered. It was just really protected. --Aqua 22:43, Jan 26, 2005 (UTC)

That doesn't answer his question though. He wants to know who that guy is. 64.236.245.243 14:46, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

His question about an armored suit is inappropriate for a powered exoskeleton discussion page. Simply Google bear proof suit. You'll get your answer.--ColorOfSuffering (talk) 06:35, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reorganized

Couldn't stand it, so I rewrote the "In fiction" section. Mostly I just organized it, and deleted redundant parts. Only thing I wasn't sure of was the discussion of power systems, which seemed oddly emphasized, but I couldn't think of anything good to do with it so I left it. There was a lengthy discussion of the different power armors worn by different societies in a WarHammer. I thought that level of detail was more appropriate on a specialized page, so made one, moved it there, and added a link at the discussion of the game. Hope this helps. --Stuart Strahl (talk) 15:38, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Erm...

"Bubblegum Crisis, probably the definitive Japanese "mechanized armor" series, features vigilante/mercenary women making use of powered armor with large phallus-shaped helmets, symbolizing the deeply patriarchal nature of Japanese society and culture."

http://perso.numericable.fr/~netoyeur/divers/mangas/bubblegum-crisis_front.jpg

Now you go and tell me where THAT helmet is supposed to be phallus-shaped.

Uh, look at it from the side? From the front it appears to have a heavy overhang.

"There is a general difference in style between Japanese-style and Western-style powered armor. Japanese powered armor tends to be sleek and more refined, with the equivalent of a car's outer body to cover vital internal systems. Western powered armor is much more modular and rugged in appearance; internal machinery is left partially or entirely exposed, granting easy access to systems for rapid maintenance and repair, as well as making it easier for an operator to custom-modify a design."

I don't know, but these lines bug me a bit. I don't really like the national attribution to the two styles, as I've seen examples of both the "sleek and refined" style and the "modular and rugged" design in Japanese and Western designs, rendering any attribution moot.--YoungFreud 21:11, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Although admittedly it's a generalization, there is a demarcation in design philosphy/design. You have noted that there are examples of either kind; these are exceptions; i.e. a Japanese anime can use "Western-style" powered armor, and an American scifi can use more sleek "Japanese" powered armor/"Mecha", but this doesn't change the fact that they are more generally used in one field or another.--->I'm not saying it's a "national" attribution at all. It's just that western scifi doesn't tend to use Mecha as much as Japan does.

I could accept an reintroduction to the paragraph, as the two styles and the examples do need to be said (I think BGC needs to get back here, but it would do better as an example of "sleek-and-stylized"). I'd use the paretheses like you did here for the styles ("Western-styled") and/or recognize it as a generalization. I might also include the links to the real robot and super robot, as the seperation in Japanese anime heavily influenced the break-up of "Japanese-styled" powered armor. It's said that Kunio Okawara designed VOTOMS to look as if they could be made now (i.e. 1970s-80s) using mass industry, and others have gone for the realistic-looking and modular powered armor such as Studio Nue (Starship Troopers and MADOX: Metal Skin Panic), the designs of Yukata Izabuchi (Patlabor, Gundam 0080, and Gasaraki) and Hajime Katoki, and Kow Yokoyama's Maschinen Kreiger ZbV 3000.--YoungFreud 22:45, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)

The Armored Troopers are too big to be powered armor, but too small to be "real robot" genre. The VOTOMS are about 3.9 metres each, and they have trouble in passages that are of human size. I recall the main character using a large cargo elevator to take his VOTOM through a building. When inside the human-sized passages, the movement of the VOTOM was impeded by the tight fit of the corridors.

+++ Sidenote +++

The Hardyman built by G.E. has a possible homage in a 1995 Stephen Norrington movie called "Death Machine". As part of the movie's premise, a fictional CHAANK Armaments Corp. was developing a project called "Hardman", where listed MIA combat vets were brain-wiped, and loaded with combat skills via some type of neural interface, and fitted into a electrically powered exoskeleton, suprisingly similar to Tsukuba University's upcoming HAL-5 (electric motors at the joints, computerized backpack, plastic buckles to hold it in place).

That wouldn't be the first one. A Hardyman-style powered suit is displayed in the Matt Helm spy film, The Ambushers, and the power loader from Aliens is widely derived from the Hardyman project.--YoungFreud 05:02, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Article structure

I don't really like the structure of this article. May I suggest that the first section be about powered armor in real life (attempts, research, concepts, reasons etc.) and the second section be about powered armor in fiction? Beowulph 22:33, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Hardiman

I created the page Hardiman when it didn't show up in a search.I see it was discussed on this talk page however.I don't know if I did any good with it though,it might need to be merged with this page.--Technosphere83 23:44, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Powered armor

I don't think this is a good title when talking about general powered exoskeletons. Powered armor is only one application,Hardiman was never intended to be used as an armor.Neither is the HAL.

Powered armor should be a sub section if anything else.--Technosphere83 10:13, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

I think powered exoskeleton should not redirect to exoskeleton, but have this and the hardiman articles be combined under powered exoskeletons. and if one day there is real use of powered armor, then we can break that off as a new article then. --1698 19:58, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Moved to Artificial powered exoskeleton

I've gone ahead and moved the article to Artificial powered exoskeleton, since that is what the article is about. I've also started the merge from Exoskeleton. ··gracefool |☺ 03:29, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rewrite

So, I did some sorting, it looks a bit more structured now. Do you still think it should be rewritten? --Koveras 21:11, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. It doesn't need a complete rewrite anymore, but it still needs a lot of work, especially of the real-world stuff. There are weasel words in the intro, and there could be a lot more written about real-world research. A picture of BLEEX would be good. ··gracefool |☺ 22:44, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Handicapped

Until I edited this article, it don't mention the possible benefits it maight have for people like Stephen Hawinkg.Myrtone (the strict Australian wikipedian)(talk)contributions

[edit] Image

This image at the top of the article is awfully amateurish; are we really sure it's from DARPA? I'm skeptical that a conceptual artist working for them would produce such an amateurish image. It'd be appreciated if someone would find a better image to place here.

        - Isn't it from a videogame?

I don't think that DARPA is going to spend a whole lot on art. --Theredstarswl 03:22, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Thats a real image from darpa, see the sarcos video at the end of the section. My complaint now is that the first part of this article looks like boiler plate from theyshallwalk.org and there is nothing about sarcos except for the video link. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.237.70.115 (talk) 06:47, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] RE: Samus' Power Suit

Technically, she can somersault and jump to high heights without her Power Suit, as seen in Metroid:Zero Mission. It's mainly there for life-support, weapons systems, and increased moobility and defense. It's a bit of a minor,nerdy edit, really.

Do we have any solid sources on this? I mean, we can see her abilities in a game, but what we really need is some sort of technical documentation from Nintendo to verify the features of the suit. Zero Mission is rather silly when she is out of her suit, because she somehow manages to keep all her energy tanks and everything. Even if she could naturally jump that high, the energy tanks should have been part of her suit, not part of her body! I don't think we should treat that bit of Zero Mission as authoritative. -- Lilwik 09:03, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] This article

..starts by mentioning that DARPA are looking into it, and then spends three Bibles listing all the damn manga flicks where an exoskeleton has appeared. I propose a split with one stub dealing with actual exoskeletons and one list dealing with the cruft. Joffeloff 23:31, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

I feel similarly about "first concept" sentence:

The concept first appeared in fiction in Stratemeyer Syndicate's Tom Swift and His Jetmarine novel and was later popularized in science fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein's novel Starship Troopers. 140.109.169.15 11:03, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

In my (admittedly humble & subjective) opinion, the article really starts out on a poor footing. That definition in the first sentence is self-referencing. It reads that powered exoskeletons belong in a subset of themselves determined by usage. The statement that "most of the technology needed to the make concept viable is readily available" is qualified by the exceptions of control, power, and motive elements. The only additional element that I can think of would be protection/life support (so maybe it could be two). Either way MOST of the elemental concepts remain to be solved (according to the the information in that first paragraph). The most that I can make out of the first paragraph is that although no PRACTICAL implementation is yet to enter production, the concept itself has not yet been shelved as impractical. I guess there is not much of a middle ground between impractical and pretty darn handy. Maybe that could be a good starting point for then highlighting all the fictional implementations as opposed to the dearth of actual applications. 203.202.144.223 02:23, 3 April 2007 (UTC) Oops, sorry, wasn't logged in. LowKey 02:26, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes. This technology looks much more useful for old people who tend to fall over than for soldiers, lets start there. That separates the powered and exoskeletal elements of it which the article is titled as, from the powered armour aspect which it isn't - if one wanted to write about the powered armour Johny Rico of Starship Troopers fell in love with, call the article "powered armour". Coriolise 13:31, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Why Artificial?

Are there any natural powered exoskeletons?

Not for humans. Natural exoskeletons are like the shells on lobsters, and crabs, or the exoskeletons on insects. I wouldn't call them "powered", but they are natural. 64.236.245.243 14:45, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree. The "Artificial" should be dropped from the name as natural exoskeletons are not powered. --Dunkelza 18:46, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] HEV suit

Does this really qualify as powered armour? As far as I'm aware it provides a layer of physical armour and an additional shield generator, but does it actually augment the wearer's strength in any way?

The HEV suit is generally left in the background, a sort of explanation for anyone wondering why a scientist might fight hordes of super soldiers on his own. It's been debated as to whether it has a helmet or not (Half-Life 2 features a "suit zoom," yet the helemt is never shown in any art). Sprinting and holding your breath in game drain the suits energy, suggesting that it supports these functions.

[edit] Research speculation edit

I am going to take out the paragraph that begins, "Powered exoskeletons however will be probably be screened out..." because it contains somebody's speculation and doesn't belong in the section on research. (It also makes me wish people who get all their exposure to sf through popular video games and movies would read a book once in awhile, but that's neither here nor there.) Transentient 20:08, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] More Real Life Examples

This article is merely a stub for real and fictional powered suits. The two topics should have different articles. Also there isn't much research done on the real powered suits as there are lots of projects going on and only a few are mentioned. Maybe its a matter of updating this article but Bleex 1 and Bleex 2 are not mentioned and from some of the online research I found that Sarcos has also a second model its testing. Sarcos however is keeping its second model under wraps. Japan has also a few projects going on. This outdated link http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/oct05/1901 has much more info on exoskeletons than this wiki article has. 24.83.178.11 03:50, 31 January 2007 (UTC)KnowledgeSeeker

[edit] The Trojan

Troy Hurtubise made a modern full body suit of armor called The Trojan. However, it isn't powered but it might be worth mentioning in the recent developments section. It seems like a step in the right direction. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPS2l5fQ55A 65.40.239.99 18:13, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] starcraft

Don't the protoss use powered armour as well?

Yea they do. Zealots, and Dragoons. Malamockq 23:32, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Also the Terran Marines and Firebats. anonymous —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.251.129.237 (talk) 20:55, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Technically, they seem to be more bionics more so than "powered armour", considering one of the Zealot upgrades augments the joints in their legs, allowing them to move faster, with no armour alterations. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 166.214.174.237 (talk) 12:10, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] PAPSIS

Could someone here review the Papsis, "Powered Armor Portable Stealth Invasion System," article? I just found it and it needs to be rewritten. I'm also not sure if it is in fact a real project, or just an editor's original idea.--24.57.157.81 02:24, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Uber-nerd in this corner

I have been designing a power suit (it's purely theoretical at the moment however) and Have been trying to work some kind of piezoelectric power circuit into it. basically The suit (more mecha like really) and am thinking of a aluminium-iridium-osmium alloy as the main armor plating of the suit, with a more flexible buckminsterfullerene (carbon nanotube) material for the underlying material for the smaller (human size ) models, with small armor plates all over the place. no exacts yet, but I am really influenced by the TAU (I placed the original comment about them in, some one nicely neatened it up and made it coherent XD thanks.) and have been thinking of railguns in miniiature forever. feel free to comment/leave suggestions etc. 208.52.112.70 01:26, 4 March 2007 (UTC)Avatar of Nothing

Well, i would suggest a layer of Aerogel, since its ability to hold up to large amounts of weight and its ability to insulate heat, could prove very valuable in a number of situations(Such as possibly being able to stand up to an explosion, or surviving in sub-arctic temperatures better perhaps?). Oh, and some form of safe liquid/gel cooling system could be quite useful for keeping the user from being baked alive ;). Just some thoughts ^_^ 166.214.90.17 (talk) 14:14, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Hal 5

I find it amusing that this article focuses on fictional powered exoskeletons and barely mentions the only real available one (the HAL). Furthermore it details none of the physics and science behind the real suits. I'm nominating it for a complete rewrite.--Energman 12:17, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I think this page deals mostly with fictional versions of power armor because until recently, they were thoguht to be unfeesabile or impracticle. In effect, they WERE fictional. The page for Raygun also deals mostly with fictional rayguns, as there are very few actual rayguns to speak of. Even today, REAL powered exoskeletons are only in the developmental stages, if that. I think the page is fine where it is, since there isnt much info on this new technology yet. So unless we want to split the page in two, with something like Powered exoskeletons in fiction to cover fictiona versions.
- The HAL5 is ready for sale and use. Give me a few to find a link --Energman 21:09, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Bold textMY EXOSKELETON.

ok after reading alot of what you guys have written i feel like i must interveen and say something, modern day exoskeleton aren't powered at all ( well not combat ones anyway). i know this because i have a major role in the personal development of a combat exoskeleton.

it consists of a one piece suit that is made up of high density triple weive kevlar (which gives amazingly good protection from bullets, blows and explosions, nomax fibres (which protects against fire and corrosion) and rubber (which makes it water proof and a great electrical insulator). also a thick shock lining which is used to absorb the energy produced (except on joints to maximize mobility)

the helmate is the same but with a state of the art rebreather/gas mask ... no oxygen tank needed. we're also trying to develop nano communication either in the suit or in the soldiers ear (play metal gear solid for an idea of what i mean) but it ain't going well.

also we use a every strong metal that is uneffected by magnetism of corrosion (like titanium but cheaper) to add support and protection to areas that need it e.g. ribs,spaulders and fore arms.

plus we studdied the "stress zones" of the body to know what parts need extra help in absorbing shock e.g. feet.

this lead to an almost perfect combat exoskeleton that doesn't require a power source and it's light to.

Oh, wow, a random guy on the internet that's supposedly involved in the development of military equipment...that can't spell and just seems to dump a lot of pseudo-scientific fanboy crap in his WHOLLY LEGIT statement. Go fap about what you think military exoskeletons will be somewhere else after you get a spellchecker, moron.

Hope he's not in charge of checking the spelling for the project.

Nah, he's the test subject. He doesn't need to know how to spell. If you actually read what he typed you'll see that the theory behind it is almost flawless.

Oh by the way, you spelt mooron wrong...mooron.

I don't know whether to laugh or cry at this last comment. If you're being serious, you're a complete fucking idiot (or a MORON if you prefer) and I hope you never breed. As for the "theory it is almost flawless" says who? Some sort of citations would be nice instead of you just saying that you don't know shit about engineering combat armor and you think this sounds good. If triple-weave kevlar was so great at stopping bullets, then why is it that ceramic plates are the standard for being able to stop high-speed rifle rounds? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.31.3.198 (talk) 18:20, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Split

I propose that a separate "Powered Armor in Fiction" article be created to clear the cruft out of this one. Noclevername 21:44, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

Again, I dissagree. Because for the most part, powered exoskeletons are a fictional concept. Untill they gain wide-spread use, is there a need to seperate the fictional from the much smaller "real" examples? (Animedude 20:33, 19 April 2007 (UTC))

I've re-written the summary to make it more readable and concise. 16-May-2007 220.253.18.17 15:47, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Stelarc

Why this article do not mention Stelarc, an artist who has done some kind of exoskeletons?

--juhtolv 07:04, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Too much fiction

I find it very irritating that in this and in many other articles there is a brief description of the factual content, and then a very extremely detailed list of mentions in fiction which dwarfs the factual in size. Should we not be concerned with the factual in an encycolpedia, and trivial things like the excessivly detailed list of fictional mentions be put in some other publication such as "wikiList" or whatever? 80.2.209.109 23:29, 10 November 2007 (UTC) roguechef664 Hey has anyone read the C.A.D.S. books by John Sievert? they use powered armor in a post-nuke U.S. some interesting ideas anyone from DARPA reading? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.105.118.97 (talk) 21:36, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:Uchu no Senshi.gif

Image:Uchu no Senshi.gif is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

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If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 07:50, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Fiction cruft

Could we at least fork it so it doesn't clutter the article? It used to be okay when 'powered exoskeletons' were only found in star wars movies - now the real thing is on its way, and the scifi stuff ruins the article. --Joffeloff (talk) 20:41, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Seconded. I am fine with the fiction page, but it needs its own article and this should only relate to IRL exoskeletons. --Sergeantgiggles —Preceding comment was added at 00:55, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Second paragraph

"A wide medical market exists in the future as prosthetics to provide mobility assistance for aged and infirm people." This sentence is just laughable, though the whole second paragraph needs complete rewrite. Now it sounds as if the exoskeleton are already in mass production and use. And it's too soon to claim that they will be used in the future. —Preceding unsigned comment added by King Klear (talk • contribs) 18:19, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Believed by who?

No cite, moving this to Talk for now.

"It is believed that the United States Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and other organizations have been researching the use of exoskeletons for a variety of purposes, but progress has been limited and the actual utility of such systems both in combat and practical situations is still debated (with no systems known to have reached more than prototype status)."

-- I thought that this was really too egregious to just slap with a ((fact))^{[citation needed]} tag. Please cite this before returning to the article. -- 201.37.230.43 (talk) 21:11, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

http://www.newscientist.com/blog/technology/2006/10/exoskeleton-update.html Aparantly, THEM. An Polpualr Science, Popular mechanics, DARPA itself... It's just a secret YOU. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.100.56.249 (talk) 06:43, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Merge from "Powered Exoskeletons in fiction"

The "in fiction" article is mostly a list of miscellany (WP:INDISCRIMINATE), and only the lead is really...moderately...encyclopedic. I think the article should be merged here where it can be sourced better and the list part removed.--_{ZXCVBNM (TALK)} 23:20, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

The Powered exoskeletons in fiction article can be sourced and improved where it is now. It was split out a year ago for reasons that are still valid now. See Talk:Powered exoskeleton#Fiction cruft. 84user (talk) 10:40, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Influence of SF

Should arguments from this article be included? Milburn, C. “Nanowarriors: Military nanotechnology and comic books.” Postprints 2005: 1828. Turkeyphan^t 18:45, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

Any opinions? Turkeyphan^t 15:33, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Fiction to be moved

Many of the inspiration and proposed uses of powered exoskeletons have been explored in fiction. One of the most famous has been Tony Stark in his Iron Man suit with Marvel Comics. In Metal Gear Solid, Solid Snake's old friend, Gray Fox, is revived after being killed in an explosion and put into a powered exoskeleton for experimental purposes. Masamune Shirow, a manga author, has explored the issue in depth within Appleseed and other works. Another popular example is the mecha in the long running anime series Gundam.

I removed the above uncited paragraph from the Current exoskeletons section. Once sourced, it could be merged to Powered exoskeletons in fiction. 84user (talk) 10:40, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

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