Iron Man Super Suit

i thought this top be the most appropriate thread to post this in, and i would like some feedabck and ideas from you guys and gals.
I watched Iron Man on the weekend again, and man!!!
That suit and the technology. Wouldn’t it be great to be able to have this type of suit?
Now i know there will be guys that want to abuse and get nasty about the thread(probably) but i would like a civil discussion and ideas.

I’m not talking and don’t care about the exoskeleton suit the US military is developing. I’m talking about the real deal, like on Iron Man one.

Now obviously there are a couple of problems technology-wise.

1. power supply for the computers to run and simulate the muscle movements, Heads-Up-Display in the mask and voice enabled computing and

2. Secondly fuel supply for the fight boots, stabilizer beams and propulsion beams system.

Now obviously there are a couple of things to consider. The suits look and feel won’t be difficult to build and make look exactly as it is in the movie, but it’s all about the technology, so let us start and look at our options.


1. Power supply to the suit for complex computer systems and muscle movement replication systems.

Now here there could be a couple of options, but all of them have various issues.

Option 1 Hydrogen Fuel cell. If it could be produced on this small a scale, could supply power for the suits computing systems. The problem is size and sustainability

Option 2 Nuclear Fusion. Now here the main problems are a stable and retained reaction and heat insulation. The suit would have to be able to sustain temps up to 20 000*C which is a lot

Option 3 Zero Point Energy supply system. Now about this I’m no expert, but maybe you guys can help out with this, I also believe(form what I understand) could be the energy source that would suffice in supplying enough thereof for the fight boots, stabilizer beams and propulsion beams..


2. Fuel supply for Flight system
Now obviously assumptions have been made that the power and energy contained in a nuclear power plant is needed to supply enough power and energy for this type of pulse rays, flight stabilizers and flight boots. (Not to mention the PLACE TO KEEP/PUT THE FUEL TO BURN for 2-3 hour long flight time etc.)

Now let’s bypass all the nuclear power, hydrogen power and look at Zero point energy.

I we could harvest Zero Point, (energy like the Arc/Ark Reactor in Iron Man) this would mean we have an unlimited amount of power/energy available to us. Now if it were possible to transform this energy to act as a fuel, then we could have all the power, fuel needed to sustain and increase the thrust potential of these fight boots and stabilizers.

I know there will be people that think this is insane and this type of suit would never be able to be built. But, I say if they can put a man on the moon, they can build this type of suit.
So if there are any of you guys out there that would like to contribute in a good way…feel free, and let the gray matter throw around a few chemicals and ideas on this type op suit

How will you power this suit and energy supply for sustained fight

[edit on 8-7-2009 by GerhardSA]

HONEY! WHERE IS MY SUPA SUIT?

Your what?

WHERE IS MY SUPA SUIT?

Originally posted by GerhardSA

I know there will be people that think this is insane and this type of suit would never be able to be built. But, I say if they can put a man on the moon, they can build this type of suit.

Okay... That's a valid argument you know! But it actually took the Apollo program $25 billion to happen!!

Nano technology is your best bet - artificial nano-fiber muscles that contracts with application of electricity or utilizing the Casimir Effect.

I think Iron Man's flight systems are based off nuclear or plasma-based jet propulsion system. Such very bulky and huge engine has been built and tested before in real life. Scaling it down with miniature nuclear reactor is quite feasible - if you could actually build a tiny nuclear reactor. It doesn't give you space flight capabilities however(and neither was the movie counterpart).

Just to address you power issue, cold fussion is back on the table once again with still some issues with stability but since cold fusion does not require heat, that would eliminate the problem of controling a heat issue.

Food for thought

I dont know lots about cold fission. Would (if you could build a reactor that has a 8cm diameter) a cold fission reactor have enough power to sustain flight, and not only computer systems onboard. remember, this is like a plane(when in flight) albeit very unstable one, thus lots of computing power would be needed to sustain and keep the un-aerodinamic suit in the air at hight speeds. then there are weapon systems.
i woud like to know...its a facinating idea, this of that typ of suit...imagine at a government would pay for something with the capabilities that the Iron Man suit has

Iron Man?! Poppy cock! How about Nano Man!

The suit it self wouldn't be made of iron, it would be made of nano-muscles! These nano-muscles are made from memory alloy (titanium and nickel), each individual one acts like a flexible muscle, imagine an entire suit created of this stuff? The strength would be immense, how fast could you run? How high could you jump? billions of muscles working in unison, controlled by electric pulses being sent around the suit.

news.thomasnet.com...

EU's thread recently about DARPA's micro-scale fusion reactor cold sort out all kinds of power problems but for flight, how about just a glider? With this suit, running and jumping are far more powerful, combine this with a form of glider and I don't see why this couldn't be used as a form of flight, combine this again with some form of sustained flight, maybe small thrusters, used for quick course changes etc

As for more down to earth power, how about just using some sort of piezoelectric effect buit into the suit, souls of the feet, palm of the hands? The power output would be nominal, but as long as your wearing the suit, standing in it or moving, it should provide basic power, for maybe the HUD at least.

Just a few ideas for you to build you suit.

EMM

The problem with a glider is speed. Iron many can fly at supersonic speeds. He can keep up with a F22 fighter jet.

Iron man suit cant keep up with F22. but can out accelerate it. top speed as in movie is about Mach1.2 (as in comics). thanks for the imputs guys

this nano muscle tech is really cool..anyone have more info on this..
probably ownt have the bullet and punishment tollerance that the iron man exo has

Augmented Strength could be achieved easier with a product made by a company called 'Shadow Robot Company' - www.shadowrobot.com...

They provide an air muscle which would be ideal for such a system, providing the sensor side of things (monitoring and controlling muscle movement - translating human movement into matching air muscles movement) can be achieved reliably and robustly.

Check it out - www.shadowrobot.com...

Thats my idea for strength amplification.

reply to post by GerhardSA


Here's something similar:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Put me in a cave with advanced weaponry of every sort......and I'll build you an Ironman suit!!


Seriously, I think the wacky Canadian with the Bear suit should team up with an equally wacky japanese robotics guy and make this a reality!

Things like a super soldier power suit, advanced beam weapons, railguns, and even flying cars are not practical now due to what you already mentioned - a power source.

If someone invented (and was able to produce without being assassinated by the oil companies) an energy source similar to the one in Iron Man, whether it's through zero point energy or otherwise, it would revolutionize the world without a doubt.

We would quite literally transform within a matter of a few years I think into a futuristic sci-fi-like civilization with flying cars, amazing devices, etc., because the electrically-powered technology to make all this possible exists, but requires too much energy to be practical currently.

So as to this post, it's fun to think about, but so are flying cars and a million other sci-fi things. But as it is now, it's not going to happen until someone invents a revolutionary power source. So, if you want to make it happen, work on a power source

Give the japanese and DARPA five years and you`ll see stuff not far away from an iron man suit.

Japanese:


American:

Yeah if the OP hasn't seen those videos, especially the DARPA one, definitely take a look at those. This video is a little better than the one posted of the DARPA suit:
www.youtube.com...

The Japanese suit isn't really an Iron-Man type thing though. It seems to be more for helping disabled people than anything else, mainly since it's not really that strong and it doesn't have reinforcements like the DARPA suit that removes all stress entirely from the human body (it's more like strap-on joint motors).

The DARPA exoskeleton on the other hand is a full and true exoskeleton, much more powerful and nimble and basically better in most every way than the Japanese suit except you'll notice that in the videos it runs on an external power supply due to the massive strength output. They plan to run it on some kind of portable power generator (I think it might be in the field testing stages from what I recall), but this still brings us back to the power supply issue for a true iron-man type suit and so many other futuristic technologies that haven't quite become practical yet.

Still, pretty exciting stuff I think. Considering that the DARPA suit should be able to carry 400 pounds with no stress whatsoever on the human "operator", it's interesting to imagine what could be done with 300 pounds of armor plating and 100 pounds of a weapon and ammunition.

[edit on 29-7-2009 by ac500]