The Future War-machine?
It's a bright and sunny Saturday morning, and I got to wake up late! I think that working has made me enjoy the simple pleasures in life just a little more. I mean stuff like being able to wake up a late in the morning, watching TV, and even just being able to laze around in the afternoon and play computer games.
When I was in secondary school and junior college, I used to love to play this game called Mechwarrior. It was a great game until a certain "mega software company" bought over the license and made it into a not so nice game. All the same the idea of sitting in a 70-ton mech and squashing puny troops around me gave me some form of sadistic pleasure. Luckily, it all existed only in the gaming arena, until now that is.
A company in Japan has developed a 3.4 metre tall, 1-ton bipedal exoskeleton. They call it the Land Walker. Not much of a name, and not really as imposing as the mechs in the game, but it's a start. Unfortunately, the Land Walker holds true to its name and "walks" at a pace of 1.5 kmh. Now considering we guys are expected to run our 2.4 km run in about 12 mins, I'd say that the machine is excruciatingly slow.
How does it look like, well take a look.
It definitely does look a lot like the light-mechs in the mechwarrior game, and it does come mounted with a gun (that shoots squishy rubber balls), so it would definitely prove to be an imposing foe to face on the battle field. All it needs now is funding and time, so that it can move faster and carry better weapons.
Hopefully, this machine won't only be used for war, but for protection. Imagine fire-fighters equipped with such a machine, or policemen in such an exoskeleton guarding buildings, or even construction workers using these to move beams around, the possible uses of such a machine are endless.
Most importantly, I think such a machine would currently come in useful in places like Iraq where the troops are being killed everyday. Although I don't really support the war in Iraq, I do pity the troops there and I hope that they can get better protection soon...
Click here for the full article.
When I was in secondary school and junior college, I used to love to play this game called Mechwarrior. It was a great game until a certain "mega software company" bought over the license and made it into a not so nice game. All the same the idea of sitting in a 70-ton mech and squashing puny troops around me gave me some form of sadistic pleasure. Luckily, it all existed only in the gaming arena, until now that is.
A company in Japan has developed a 3.4 metre tall, 1-ton bipedal exoskeleton. They call it the Land Walker. Not much of a name, and not really as imposing as the mechs in the game, but it's a start. Unfortunately, the Land Walker holds true to its name and "walks" at a pace of 1.5 kmh. Now considering we guys are expected to run our 2.4 km run in about 12 mins, I'd say that the machine is excruciatingly slow.
How does it look like, well take a look.
It definitely does look a lot like the light-mechs in the mechwarrior game, and it does come mounted with a gun (that shoots squishy rubber balls), so it would definitely prove to be an imposing foe to face on the battle field. All it needs now is funding and time, so that it can move faster and carry better weapons.
Hopefully, this machine won't only be used for war, but for protection. Imagine fire-fighters equipped with such a machine, or policemen in such an exoskeleton guarding buildings, or even construction workers using these to move beams around, the possible uses of such a machine are endless.
Most importantly, I think such a machine would currently come in useful in places like Iraq where the troops are being killed everyday. Although I don't really support the war in Iraq, I do pity the troops there and I hope that they can get better protection soon...
Japanese machinery and robotics manufacturer Sakakibara-Kikai has released the first genuine bi-pedal exoskeleton – a landmark event and one which is certain to attract a lot of attention for the company.
Mechanatrons and BattleMechs have long been the subject of scifi books, comics and movies with the promise of cyborg technology popularised by the smash sixties television series “The Six Million Dollar Man.”
We’ve previously seen some celebrated exoskeletons in films such as Alien (Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley takes out the Queen alien in an exoskeleton), Star Wars (the AT-ST Imperial Scout Walker) and RoboCop (the ED209), but until now, the nearest thing we’ve seen in the metal was the 3.5 metre superhero exoskeleton Enryu from Tmsuk in Japan.
Click here for the full article.
posted by CS at 10:55 AM
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