Exoskeletons Will Make Work Weightless

This is the EksoWorks industrial exoskeleton

and the point of it is to let somebody who looks like me

take something that looks like this,

which is a Milwaukee grinder, and hold it over their head

for a long time as though it didn't weigh anything.

EksoBionics grew out of a defense funded project

to make a load carrying suit for military applications.

But the company is best known for a spin-off,

a powered, therapeutic exoskeleton that people

who are paralyzed or suffered strokes can use.

Now the company is going back to its roots in a way

with an exoskeleton built to make

difficult human jobs a lot easier.

Ekso isn't the only company getting into exo suits

but they are one of the first to build one

aimed more at construction workers than special forces.

[Blue Sleeve Guy] Put a large metal bit in the front.

Sure.

And then work it actually for more than five minutes.

Now we see why I went into journalism.

That's right.

I got to try out the suit at Ekso's

Richmond, California factory.

It's adjustable, for people from five foot four

to six foot four, it weighs about 16 pounds

and it feels a bit odd at first.

You could not twerk in this.

It just would not...

You may not be able to twerk without it so...

I wouldn't recommend it, let's say.

The Ekso industrial suit is made for heavy industry

and construction, it's less Tony Stark's Iron Man armor

and more the Power Loader from Aliens.

Back then they had the idea of exoskeletons

for industrial applications and the interesting thing

about that is Aliens was scheduled in the year 2020

so in our minds we got five years to get to that.

[Adam] But the Ekso suit is still pretty far

from Ripley's Alien Slayer.

This thing is actually completely analogue.

Our industrial exoskeletons are,

our first round of products, are actually passive,

so there's no electronics, there's no battery,

so there's nothing to be plugged in

which makes it pretty exciting.

[Adam] But then how do they fly and shoot laser beams?

There's no laser beams, there's no, we don't have

the Arc Reactor yet like Tony Stark.

No, so...

[Adam] It seems like a missed opportunity,

I just have to say.

Well we keep asking for it,

but no one has developed it yet.

Totally different, up is now completely easy,

like I would stay like that for hours, right now.

I could even heft a 40 pound grinder like a sword.

And the whole premise is that we provide

a parallel load path so we have the tool,

there's a gravity balancing arm that mounts to the chassis

and that chassis has a load pass

that goes all the way to the ground

so the user inside doesn't feel any of the weight,

the pay load goes down through the structure to the ground,

and they're just there to maneuver and move the tool around.

But there might be competition soon.

Salt Lake City's Sarcos is developing a powered

full-body suit but what I want to know is,

will it have a fencing function?

I can fence for hours.