Hardiman was the first attempt to build a practical

powered exoskeleton A powered exoskeleton, also known as power armor, powered armor, powered suit, cybernetic suit, cybernetic armor, exosuit, hardsuit, exoframe or augmented mobility, is a mobile machine that is wearable over all or part of the human body, pro ...

, by

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) is an American multinational conglomerate founded in 1892, and incorporated in New York state and headquartered in Boston. The company operated in sectors including healthcare, aviation, power, renewable en ...

between 1965 and 1971. The machine was intended to allow the wearer to lift loads of 1500 pounds (680 kg) with ease. The project was led by the

engineer Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who invent, design, analyze, build and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while considering the limit ...

Ralph Mosher, who had previously worked on the

Handyman A handyman, also known as a fixer, handyperson or handyworker, is a person skilled at a wide range of repairs, typically around the home. These tasks include trade skills, repair work, maintenance work, are both interior and exterior, and are so ...

. The project was not successful overall. Any attempt to use the full

exoskeleton An exoskeleton (from Greek ''éxō'' "outer" and ''skeletós'' "skeleton") is an external skeleton that supports and protects an animal's body, in contrast to an internal skeleton (endoskeleton) in for example, a human. In usage, some of the ...

resulted in a violent uncontrolled motion, and as a result, the exoskeleton was never turned on with a person inside. Mosher wrote of these difficulties in designing a powerful machine functioning as an extension of the human body, noting that a machine lacking the ability to receive and interpret force feedback would be very likely cause the machine to destroy whatever object it was interacting with in performing the task at hand. According to General Electric's Hardiman Project Report from 1969, "When turned on power to operate the shoulder joint, the arm lurched and the elbow would not operate."Haridman I Arm Test
Hardiman I Prototype Project, December 31, 1969 Further research concentrated on one arm. Although it could lift its specified load of 750 pounds (340 kg), it weighed three quarters of a ton, just over twice the liftable load. Without getting all the components to work together the practical uses for the Hardiman project were limited.

References

External links

Do You Even Lift, Bro? Hardiman Was GE’s Muscular Take On The Human-Machine Interface
GE Reports, August 25, 2016.
General Electric: The Story Behind the Real ‘Iron Man’ Suit
GE Reports, November 23, 2010.
Hardiman I Project. Report. (1 May 1971)
Robotic exoskeletons 1960s robots Robots of the United States {{robo-stub