Hyundai's Exo-Skeleton Makes Everyone an Iron Man

suits are often billed

as a way to give us puny humans iron man abilities.

Hyundai has simpler ambitions for its line of power suits.

In this case, just to help weaklings like me

lift heavy objects with ease.

The car maker says it also sees

mobility as going beyond vehicles.

Engineer fitted this suit, H-MEX,

to a patient in Korea, Mr. Yoon,

who was paralyzed from the waist down,

after a power gliding accident.

It's remarkably small and light.

It can be worn over normal clothes

and controlled by buttons on the crutch handle.

A patient leans forward and slightly away

from the leg that they want to move,

and the motor in the suit does the rest.

The battery lasts about four hours

and top speed is a kind of slow stroll,

at one and a half miles an hour.

Hyundai is eyeing a market for similar suits

for older people who find walking difficult

to give them back some freedom.

H-MEX can climb the stairs so it should get them

from the house to their self-driving cars, for example.

The early versions are adjustable for people

between 5' 5'' and 5' 10 so, I'm a little too big to fit.

But H-WEX fits me just fine.

This back-hugging robot is remarkably light

at just eight pounds, again with a battery

that lasts about four hours, and it's designed

to prevent back injuries in manual laborers.

Hyundai is far from the only company

looking at exosuits, but thinks

it can use what its learning from building

smart and electric cars to get this type

of extension of mobility to market by 2018.

So, watch your back Tony Stark.

I'm coming for you as soon as I move these boxes.