Lockheed offers ready-to-go supersoldier exoskeleton

Summary

February 27, 2009: Lockheed has unveiled a new exoskeleton called the Human Universal Load Carrier (HULC). It can be strapped to a soldier and is capable of carrying loads up to 200 lbs with "minimal effort". It has a "marching" speed of 7 mph and a "burst" speed of 10 mph. This system only supports the legs and body, excluding the arms.

Source

Bibliography

1. Original article

Game and Story Use

• Powered exoskeletons like this could become standard issue for soldiers from advanced nations in a Twenty Minutes Into The Future setting.
• This system could allow soldiers (or adventurers…) to carry much heavier weapons than usual.
  • You'd need to add power assist to the arms, or at least some kind of servo mount to carry the mass of the thing (and probably to soak up the recoil as well) … possibly along the lines of those harness arms that the gunners wear in Aliens. For the time being, however, it might well make it easier for soldiers to carry the water and ammunition that they need (usually the heaviest bits of their kit) - and probably more electronic cruft and the power supply to support it.
  • Downside being that when the soldiers run out of battery life/fuel cell fuel/whatever they'll be even more helpless … at least if they just stick to using it to schlep extra kit they can always cache the excess with the exoskeleton and keep going.
• This could find itself forming the basis of power armour before the world is very much older.