Great Power Technology.

Chapter 260 Go directly to the brain computer? ?

(The last chapter was 260, I made a typo again)

Early the next morning, Ye Zhou followed Chen Hao to an army base near Rongcheng, where Ye Zhou finally saw the domestically produced mechanical exoskeleton that he had been curious about.

According to the plan that Chen Hao had communicated with the military in advance, this visit was divided into two parts. The first part was for professional soldiers to mount the exoskeleton to demonstrate tactical actions, and the second part was for Ye Zhou to try it himself.

Various types of equipment have already been arranged on the shooting range, including combat vehicles, artificial obstacles, artillery shells, dummy wounded, etc., all of which will be used as props to demonstrate the performance of the mechanical exoskeleton in the future.

The soldiers participating in the demonstration had already assembled. Ye Zhou and Chen Hao stood aside, accompanied by several army cadres. Before the demonstration started, they were briefly introducing the content of the demonstration to Ye Zhou.

"Mr. Ye, the subsequent demonstration will mainly have several parts. We will divide it according to the function of the arms. Now it is mainly divided into the following categories: infantry, artillery, logistics, and medical soldiers. Among them, the artillery is the most important. Others The use of mechanical exoskeletons is not particularly perfect for the time being, and some tactical actions cannot be adapted, especially high-intensity tactical actions, such as climbing, jumping, etc., have relatively large limitations."

Ye Zhou nodded. He had expected such a situation, so he was not disappointed.

The current mechanical exoskeletons generally use two systems. The first system can be simply called the load system, that is, the deceleration system. Real-time force feedback disassembles the force of a single position through the servos scattered in different positions of the mechanical skeleton, and transmits it to other parts of the body, or directly to the soles of the feet.

The other system is the motion system, which is based on series elastic drive. After the force impedance control system calculates the joint force feedback, it drives a high-torque DC motor to store the elastic device inside the machine—generally speaking, the spring. , and then use the spring energy to realize the accelerated movement of the joints, and the final result is to achieve labor saving and acceleration during ordinary movements.

Simply put, the weight system allows the user to lift heavier objects, while the movement system allows the user to jump higher and run faster.

But the problem is that the complexity of the movement system is much more complicated than that of the weight-bearing system, especially in the speed of re-storage, even the direct-drive drive with the highest power density, several times higher than the muscle density, in terms of reaction speed It is also slightly slower than the muscles, so this causes the user of the exoskeleton to experience a slight lag when performing fast movements.

If you want to describe this kind of lag, the best example is the kind of three-person board activity that most people have played on the Children's Day event at school. Everyone's feet are fixed on the longboard at the same time. Before reaching synchronization, the stagnation felt by the person who started it first is the stagnation feeling of the mechanical exoskeleton now.

However, theoretically speaking, this kind of delay can also be overcome through training --- this involves the problem of the two sets of muscle memory that Ye Zhou mentioned before.

Just as his thoughts were wandering, the rehearsal on the shooting range not far away had already begun. Ye Zhou regained his thoughts and began to watch the rehearsal seriously.

The artillery was the first to appear on the stage. I saw a soldier who was not too tall walked up to the ammunition box, firmly held the edge of the ammunition box with his hand, and then with a little force, the ammunition box with a length of more than one meter was easily lifted.

"This is the ammunition box of the D30 122mm howitzer. It contains 3 rounds and the ammunition weighs 22 kilograms, which means that he can lift objects weighing more than 70 kilograms at one time without any pressure. And Mr. Ye, look, it is as good as the previous generation of machinery. Unlike exoskeletons, this exoskeleton has greatly improved its flexibility and work error rate."

"The main reason is that the speed of human-computer interaction has become faster --- because we have changed to a stronger motor."

Ye Zhou nodded. He could see the movements of the artillerymen on the shooting range. Just as the expert beside him said, compared to the clumsy and slow exoskeleton devices he had seen on the news, this time he What you see is obviously too strong.

At least, in the process of the artilleryman performing his whole set of movements, none of the links were particularly mechanical, and even looked at it as a whole, giving Ye Zhou a sense of flowing water.

The shells were loaded into the chamber, but the soldiers did not fire on the spot, but continued to demonstrate other operations such as issuing plows, manpower towing the artillery, and rapid transfer of the artillery in an emergency.

From these operations, Ye Zhou could clearly feel that the strength of a single soldier had been amplified a lot, and some movements that were originally impossible to complete became easier in their hands.

Afterwards, the displays of the logistics and the medical soldiers were similar, but the quick horizontal stretcher on the back of the medical soldier caught Ye Zhou's eyes. It stretched out like the courier box on the back of the courier in Death Stranding. The body of the wounded is automatically fixed by the locking mechanism of each part, freeing up the hands of the medical soldiers, and the outer wall also undertakes a part of the protective function.

However, other than that, Ye Zhou really didn't see any new highlights.

After the demonstrations of these three arms were completed, Ye Zhou's long-awaited demonstration of infantry combatants finally began. The soldiers on the shooting range were equipped with modified exoskeletons, and a single-body model of unknown model was carried on their backs. A soldier recoilless gun, an Avant-12 individual anti-aircraft missile, a 95 light machine gun, an OTS-11 integrated system rifle in his hand, and various ammunition and other explosive equipment hanging on his chest. The whole one is Fire monster!

Slightly bloated soldiers ran between various shooting positions on the shooting range, trying to shoot the weapons on their bodies one by one, and the targets set in the distance were blown to pieces.

Seeing this scene, Ye Zhou couldn't help but sigh.

I haven't paid attention to the development of the army in the past few years. I didn't expect their lack of firepower phobia to have developed to this extent.
4 types of weapons are aimed at medium-sized armored ground targets, helicopters, group infantry, and conventional infantry, and each weapon can play a vital role.

Especially the recoilless gun that looks a bit like Gustav, which is not light at first glance. It is really hard to imagine how the rabbit can equip this kind of thing to the individual level.

After all the demonstrations were over, Ye Zhou basically figured out the flaws of the current exoskeleton.

As he thought, delay is still the biggest problem. When the infantry is fully loaded, their whole body bears more than 60 kilograms. The load system and the movement system must work synchronously, which brings huge collaborative pressure.

Therefore, when this soldier performs some fine movements such as lying down, crawling, overturning, and jumping, he often appears extremely cumbersome.

After frowning and thinking for a while, Ye Zhou asked:
"Why put so many weapons on one soldier?"

The commander around him froze in place.

Why?

This seems to be a question that touches the soul. He has many reasons, but he can't say it for a while.

After pondering for a few seconds, he opened his mouth and said:
"Mr. Ye, our consideration is this. From the perspective of the development direction of modern warfare, the distance of engagement has been continuously shortened. From the queuing and shooting in the 17th century to the 19 to 300-meter engagement in the 500th century, it has been developing continuously. Up to now, the combat range of light infantry has a tendency to develop beyond the visual range."

"So, based on this trend, coupled with the increase in the degree of mechanization, we generally believe that it is not meaningful to pursue the high mobility and concealment of individual infantry combat units, and the most important thing is the ability of individual infantry to project firepower. "

"We want a soldier who can fight both tanks and aircraft to form a fully functional combat unit."

"To form such a combat unit, the number of weapons a soldier can carry is very important. As you can see, the final result is like this."

"is that useful?"

Ye Zhou asked curiously.

"Judging from the exercise we conducted some time ago, to be honest, it is very useful. After a light infantry platoon achieves sufficient firepower advantage, with a reasonable command, it can completely pose a major threat to the traditional mechanized infantry company. We even There was a case where a squad destroyed 4 tanks and [-] helicopters of the opponent."

"That exaggerated?"

Ye Zhou's eyes widened. It's not that he doesn't understand military affairs, and he also knows the importance of firepower for light infantry operations, but he didn't expect that the result of firepower superiority would be exaggerated to such an extent.

The commander nodded and replied:
"It's an exaggeration—of course, the cost of individual soldiers is also very high. Basically, two or three soldiers are equivalent to a multi-purpose vehicle. However, we don't really care about the cost now, because no matter how expensive the weapons and equipment are, we can It is mass-produced, but if the personnel are lost, there is really no way to replenish them."

"That's true. Well, I'm going to try your exoskeleton first."

"It's already been prepared for you."

While speaking, the commander brought Ye Zhou to the edge of the shooting range. In order to let him fully experience the whole process, he did not arrange other personnel to assist, but let Ye Zhou put on the mechanical exoskeleton himself.

During this process, Ye Zhou encountered no difficulties at all. He found that the human factors engineering of this exoskeleton was much better than he imagined. The degree of freedom of each joint had reached an extremely fine level. And the wrist is also made full of freedom.

This makes the whole wearing process extremely smooth, coupled with the control of the intelligent system, each part can be automatically locked and adapted after confirmation, and the total time spent from the beginning of wearing to the end of the preparation does not exceed 5 minutes.

The weapon mounting is also extremely user-friendly. The movable bracket behind you is controlled by the console on the inside of the arm. Press the corresponding mechanical button, and the hanger behind you will automatically unfold and be sent to a position where it can be picked up.

Ye Zhou tried to operate it a few times, started running back and forth on the shooting range, and even tried to do a few jumping movements. Then he found that it was not that simple to adapt to this set of operation logic.

For example, according to the intuitive operation, you only need to bend your legs and unfold them for a jump, but in the heavy-loaded state, this exoskeleton has an additional energy storage process, which leads to a fatal problem:

He couldn't jump while running.

This alone has severely limited the diversity of tactical actions.

After using it for a while, Ye Zhou basically summed up the problems of this mecha.

The action delay is long, the energy storage process is long, and the flexibility is still insufficient.

Therefore, this is what really led to "the reason why you can't walk after removing the exoskeleton", not the "difference in motion force feedback" that Chen Hao judged before.

Ye Zhou walked back to the edge of the shooting range, and while removing the exoskeleton, he said to Chen Hao who was waiting on the side:

"I verified a great man's famous saying today: Without investigation, there is no right to speak."

"What do you mean?"

"You'll know when you come over and put it on and walk around. The root cause of this exoskeleton is not the power assist system, but the force feedback system."

"From force feedback to power assist, we are still using pure physical conduction at present, just like playing three-person board. The people behind must first feel the force of your leg lift before they can lift their legs synchronously."

"The longer the delay in this process, the greater the difference between the operation logic and the normal state of motion logic. The final result is that if the armor is removed, you will not be able to walk."

Hearing Ye Zhou's words, the commander on the side nodded repeatedly.

"That's right! That's the problem! The feedback from our fighters is mainly about this problem."

There was a look of surprise on his face. Although he didn't know the background of the young man named Ye Zhou who came today, judging from the performance of the other party, there was a high probability that he was a big boss in the field of exoskeleton, and he was specially sent here to solve the problem. of.

Thinking of this, he immediately asked:

"Boss Ye, is there a way to solve this problem?"

Ye Zhou pondered for a moment, then answered:

"I'm really not a professional in this field, so I can't make too many suggestions on specific technical details, but I think we can start from two directions."

"The first one is to take the route of artificial intelligence, record the user's exercise habits through the central processing unit, make a model of the exercise state of a single muscle and muscle group, through continuous data collection and machine learning, and finally achieve an artificial intelligence-based The movement of the front muscle group predicts the user's next move."

"This kind of logic is equivalent to what is said in martial arts. When looking at a person's moves, don't look at the hands, but look at the shoulders. The reason is the same."

"However, the technical level required by this kind of artificial intelligence is too high, and I estimate that it will be difficult to achieve in the short term."

"So, I have an idea. Although it looks fantastic, it has basically been applied and is said to be a pretty good idea."

"you say!"

The commander stared at Ye Zhou closely, as if he was afraid that he would run away.

Ye Zhou coughed and said:
"Engage in the neural control system, skip the force feedback directly, and use the neural electrical signal to synchronously control the mechanical exoskeleton."

(End of this chapter)