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Robotic suit gives shipyard workers super strength

newscientist.com

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Re: Robotic suit gives shipyard workers super strength

#11

Post by gk1 »

anigbrowl wrote: post #2

"At the time, most of the yards we toured were significantly more advanced in robotic welding than the US yards performing naval ship construction, and had been for a long time," Gene Mitchell, the retired US Navy officer who led the research told New Scientist. That's depressing. I don't know why many US industrial firms seem so slow to do their own training, but instead complain about a shortage of skilled workers.…

Commercial shipbuilding in the US has long sailed. The industry leaders are now Japan, South Korea, and China. Nobody in the US is even trying to keep up, because there's no way to compete with the cheap labor force and efficient yards of those countries. For the most part, the only ships still being built in the US are for the military.

Re: Robotic suit gives shipyard workers super strength

#12

Post by dvcc »

XorNot wrote: post #8
thret wrote: post #3

Let's be honest, if these things become commonplace in shipyards - we are all going to want one.

There's pretty much no reason not to use them everywhere. Every construction site on the planet would benefit from augmented workers. A ridiculous amount of heavy lifting is still involved in putting up just normal buildings, and an injured worker is a big cost and set back.

Family is in heavy construction, and I think there might be a bit of a misconception on what holds workers back - its not weight.

The most common complaint that I hear is that between climbing and harnesses, flexibility suffers. Adding in an exoskeleton would probably not be the best idea in that case.

Re: Robotic suit gives shipyard workers super strength

#13

Post by angersock »

vonklaus wrote: post #7

I think this is an amazing and inevitable outcome. However, sort of disappointed by the 60 kilo max. I feel like these suits need to be an ordwr of magnitude better than humans to be viable. There are certainly people who can lift 125lb objects. I understand that fatigue and uniformity factor in, but it will be great to see 300lb+ suits

That's overengineering--being able to consistently lift 60-100 kg. would be quite useful.

Re: Robotic suit gives shipyard workers super strength

#14

Post by anigbrowl »

gk1 wrote: post #11
anigbrowl wrote: post #2

"At the time, most of the yards we toured were significantly more advanced in robotic welding than the US yards performing naval ship construction, and had been for a long time," Gene Mitchell, the retired US Navy officer who led the research told New Scientist. That's depressing. I don't know why many US industrial firms seem so slow to do their own training, but instead complain about a shortage of skilled workers.…

Commercial shipbuilding in the US has long sailed. The industry leaders are now Japan, South Korea, and China. Nobody in the US is even trying to keep up, because there's no way to compete with the cheap labor force and efficient yards of those countries. For the most part, the only ships still being built in the US are for the military.

China has a cheaper labor force, but Japan and South Korea? And how does this fit with their intensive use of robots, which are presumably meant to reduce labor costs?

Re: Robotic suit gives shipyard workers super strength

#15

Post by lchengify »

gk1 wrote: post #11
anigbrowl wrote: post #2

"At the time, most of the yards we toured were significantly more advanced in robotic welding than the US yards performing naval ship construction, and had been for a long time," Gene Mitchell, the retired US Navy officer who led the research told New Scientist. That's depressing. I don't know why many US industrial firms seem so slow to do their own training, but instead complain about a shortage of skilled workers.…

Commercial shipbuilding in the US has long sailed. The industry leaders are now Japan, South Korea, and China. Nobody in the US is even trying to keep up, because there's no way to compete with the cheap labor force and efficient yards of those countries. For the most part, the only ships still being built in the US are for the military.

I was shocked to hear this so I did some research. As it turns out, it has a lot to do with foreign subsidies, similar to solar power.

Apparently up until 1981, the US had the Construction differential subsidy program [1][2] that subsided shipbuilding construction. During the Regan administration, the US eliminated subsidies whereas countries in Asia did not. Now the top 10 shipbuilding countries are in China, Korea, or Japan [3][4].

Outside of a few exceptions, such as a 1920 law forcing US-based natural gas to only be transported on American made/manned ships [5], the US shipbuilding industry has one customer: the military. Without additional subsidies it's unlikely the US can effectively compete with places like China, which continue to increase subsidies for shipbuilders [6].

In this political climate (especially post-Solyndra, post ethanol-subsidy) I think it's unlikely the federal government would increase subsidies for a private industry. On one hand, this might not be a bad thing: Chinese-subsidized industries don't always work out the way they planned (e.g., the construction of ghost towns). However if the military doesn't keep the industry up-to-date technologically, a shipbuilding tech gap could form, which might impact national security.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Range_Shipbuilding_Program

[2] http://www.marinelink.com/article/shipbuilding/the-future-am...

[3] http://www.marineinsight.com/marine/marine-news/headline/top...

[4] http://thediplomat.com/2012/11/u-s-navy-take-notice-china-is...

[5] http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/09/20/boom-in-natural-gas-pro...

[6] http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/12/09/us-china-shipping-...

Re: Robotic suit gives shipyard workers super strength

#16

Post by grecy »

hudibras wrote: post #4
anigbrowl wrote: post #2

"At the time, most of the yards we toured were significantly more advanced in robotic welding than the US yards performing naval ship construction, and had been for a long time," Gene Mitchell, the retired US Navy officer who led the research told New Scientist. That's depressing. I don't know why many US industrial firms seem so slow to do their own training, but instead complain about a shortage of skilled workers.…

US Navy personnel who tour the newest generation of Korean and Japanese warships are universally astounded by the high quality, attention-to-detail, and overall great design. Without exception, our sailors come off the ships blinking and asking "Why aren't we buying these?"

Totally anecdotal - I've seen a lot of foreigners react in the same (but opposite) way when they come to the US.

i.e. driving on major roads around NYC, visiting schools, looking at houses, etc.

"Wow, it looks like it's half finished"

"Everything is so dirty"

"It's all covered in graffiti and falling down"

etc., etc.

Re: Robotic suit gives shipyard workers super strength

#17

Post by hudibras »

anigbrowl wrote: post #14
gk1 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Commercial shipbuilding in the US has long sailed. The industry leaders are now Japan, South Korea, and China. Nobody in the US is even trying to keep up, because there's no way to compete with the cheap labor force and efficient yards of those countries. For the most part, the only ships still being built in the US are for the military.

China has a cheaper labor force, but Japan and South Korea? And how does this fit with their intensive use of robots, which are presumably meant to reduce labor costs?

Both Japan and Korea used to have cheaper labor costs and they used that advantage along with manufacturing improvements to maintain their industries to the present day through economies of scale and lack of competition from other countries (once they've been driven out of the industry, like the U.S. and Greece).

It's roughly analogous as if the rise of Honda and Toyota in the 1960s ran all the U.S. car manufacturers out of business.

Re: Robotic suit gives shipyard workers super strength

#18

Post by delbel »

vonklaus wrote: post #7

I think this is an amazing and inevitable outcome. However, sort of disappointed by the 60 kilo max. I feel like these suits need to be an ordwr of magnitude better than humans to be viable. There are certainly people who can lift 125lb objects. I understand that fatigue and uniformity factor in, but it will be great to see 300lb+ suits

I have a neighbor who is 68 years old with a small build and routinely lifts and moves 250lb 18-24' horse gates all by himself. He hired me for a few days for help him do a large horse gate move and I blew out my back on the third day. I have a large build (235lb 6'1"). I have no problem lifting two 50lb feed bags even though I am out of shape. I was very surprised that that this device could only lift 60 kilos (132lb). I wonder what the battery life is and/or if it is coupled with a power source/cable.

Re: Robotic suit gives shipyard workers super strength

#19

Post by hudibras »

lchengify wrote: post #15
gk1 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Commercial shipbuilding in the US has long sailed. The industry leaders are now Japan, South Korea, and China. Nobody in the US is even trying to keep up, because there's no way to compete with the cheap labor force and efficient yards of those countries. For the most part, the only ships still being built in the US are for the military.

I was shocked to hear this so I did some research. As it turns out, it has a lot to do with foreign subsidies, similar to solar power. Apparently up until 1981, the US had the Construction differential subsidy program [1][2] that subsided shipbuilding construction. During the Regan administration, the US eliminated subsidies whereas countries in Asia did not. Now the top 10 shipbuilding countries are in China, Korea,…

You're completely right.

The U.S. is so far ahead of the rest of the world in almost all defense technologies that it's a hard pill to swallow politically that there could be one relatively-small segment (non-nuclear surface warships) that we'd be better off actually buying from our closest allies.

We export so much defense equipment to our allies, that you'd think it would be okay to maybe possibly import one thing that's built better and cheaper elsewhere. But no, we'd rather subsidize our shipyards to continue churning out ships designed in the 1980s...

Re: Robotic suit gives shipyard workers super strength

#20

Post by wwweston »

anigbrowl wrote: post #2

"At the time, most of the yards we toured were significantly more advanced in robotic welding than the US yards performing naval ship construction, and had been for a long time," Gene Mitchell, the retired US Navy officer who led the research told New Scientist. That's depressing. I don't know why many US industrial firms seem so slow to do their own training, but instead complain about a shortage of skilled workers.…

Businesses that don't effectively externalize costs are at a competitive disadvantage to those that do, right?
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