Really surprised that the article doesn't mention PowerSkips (aka powerbocks or jumping stilts), the remarkably similar product which were invented around 1999 and featured in the 2008 Olympic closing ceremony.
They're pretty common, with several manufacturers making them to this day under different brands. Several of my friends own a pair.
I knew these as Powerizers and my friend and I used to play around on them. They were a lot of fun. Indeed, this is what's missing from this article. My guess is that Seymour was trying to do it with extensional springs, and Powerizers replaced those with fiberglass compressional springs and they were simply way better.
I've always wondered what the efficiency of movement is on these things, specifically WRT fatigue of the user/rider... in that I have often wondered by soldiers arent equipped with things like this.
Would walking around on patrol in a place like Afghanistan be more or less better if you were wearing these.
Can they be added to the bottom of the exoskeleton legs which allow relief from part of the weight of a pack - but then adding faster movement when wearing the exo-legs+pack?
I have a pair. You do move faster, jump higher, etc-- but that energy doesn't come out of nowhere. You're adding big weights to the ends of your legs and running, jumping, etc. It's definitely sports equipment, and it's a heck of a workout. It also works a lot of muscles that aren't especially large on the average human, particularly the anterior tibialis on the front of your shin, in order to control your movements.
Overall I can't really imagine it being good for the endurance-style activities for which humans are already quite well designed. In Afghanistan, at least for combat patrols, you might also have the problem of being taller (ie, a better target) and not being able to quickly take a knee, stumble, or go prone and get back up (ie, much much better target).
it looks like jumping stilts allow you to deliver a lot more energy in a short period - for instance, running up to 25mph, or jumping over cars - but you pay for that with significantly increased calorie burn and the use of many more muscles.
So, probably really not what you want for endurance activities such as foot patrol.
In addition, the springs in them need to be calibrated for the weight they're supporting, and they top out around 240lb / 110kg. So you'd need extra heavy duty ones for soldiers with packs, and then you couldn't use those once the packs had been removed.
Maybe if you had a situation where you needed a couple of soldiers to dump their packs, don a pair of these that they'd been carrying, and run somewhere really fast ... ;)
In related news, the Russian Army investigated gasoline-powered 'rocket boots' for soldiers. Because of course they did. Sadly they didn't work out too well.
"One result of the Russian space agency testing was a calculation that the energy in calories used to move the two-pound boot at a run would exceed the energy input from the gasoline engine. That meant, it was more tiring to run with the motorized footwear than without it, undermining the original rationale. Only if the weight could be reduced to below 2 pounds per boot would the wearer have a net energy gain. So far they have failed at this."
Also,
" 'The worst situation is when the spark fires as the runner just lands, and the force of the blast is absorbed by his body,' Mr. Garipov explains flatly."
Maybe not the best idea. (Although I reckon if you outfitted them with modern electronic ignition and a sensor to ensure that they'd bottomed out and begun recoiling before ignition, you could do a lot better...)
I've seen robots use brushless motors as replacements for springs, but with an adjustable spring constant. I wonder whether motorized jumping stilts would be practical. The motors could also add some power to your jumps.
Does the motor add force, or absorb force to regenerative-braking-->energy?
A fly-wheel-compression system on a brushless alternator would be an interesting addition to a spring-ish based stilt-prosthetic. Let it pump an alternator in the unit to create power for all the gear over time/distance?
> it looks like jumping stilts allow you to deliver a lot more energy in a short period - for instance, running up to 25mph, or jumping over cars - but you pay for that with significantly increased calorie burn and the use of many more muscles.
I wonder if they could be used for more efficient exercise.
Yep, one of the jumping stilts manufacturers actually uses that as a selling point: you burn way more calories, and wind up with a massive silly grin on your face :)
Walking around the rocky/hilly/mountainous terrain of Afghanistan you want to reduce carrying weight and keep a low, stable, very firm footing, rather than increase performance at a cost of considerable added instability.
The best thing the US military could do for soldiers in those circumstances over the next ~20 years, is reduce the enormous carrying weight they deal with now. Any sort of added foot instability (poor grip, too much boosted height, unnatural added spring force, wrong materials, too much cushion, etc) is very dangerous in a war zone.
I can't help but wonder if a technology that made it easier for them to carry the weight they do today, would just result in a heavier base load as additional items are suddenly identified as 'essential'.
This. Look at the historical average combat load of a soldier vs average height and weight of the same soldier. You’ll find the combat load is always just a little more than you think should be possible for extended periods of time.
Source: was in the infantry and spent some time reading up on it a decade ago
The best thing the US military could do for soldiers in those circumstances over the next ~20 years, is reduce the enormous carrying weight they deal with now.
I thought that was the point of the "dog" robot from Boston Dynamics. Are those too expensive for deployment?
They're pretty common, with several manufacturers making them to this day under different brands. Several of my friends own a pair.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jumping_stilts
To be fair, jumping stilts don't use quite the same mechanism as Bionic Boots, but the results are almost identical.
There was clearly a market for this invention - and somebody else actually filled that market very successfully.