The Suit-up Possibility
Exploring the likelihood of a real-life version of the Iron Man suit
In 2008, no other movie hit the theatres with more hype than Marvel’s Iron Man did. It’s no understatement to say that this film changed the formula for the superhero genre after sweeping the box office as one of the highest-grossing film series ever. Therefore, it’s only natural for us to wonder if the technology the playboy billionaire used has the potential to become reality. The answer is, although possible, we are not at all close to achieving it.
Flashy stuff like flying and bombs aside, there are certain basic things overlooked by us in the series that has to be set up for the suit to be functional in real life- like shock-absorbers, prevention of backlash from thrusters, movement of joints and a way for the wearer to breathe inside a suit which is completely sealed off against air, water and pressure.
These difficulties, however, did not stop some genius geeks and superhero scientists from trying to design the suit anyways.
Watching the Iron Man movies was plenty of inspiration for several fans to build the suit. Among the successful ones, Wayne Berendhuysen built a lightweight suit made from 3D printed parts of foam. He also installed jetpack thrusters by hooking up small carbon dioxide tanks to solenoid valves, activated by switches within the suit on the wrists, to replicate the repulsor beam technology in the movie.
Likewise, hitting over two million views in just two days, the video of Adam Savage and his team building the Iron Man suit is something to watch out for. The final result was a suit made of 3D printed titanium parts sporting a jetpack thruster with which the pilot can take off and hover a few feet off the ground. Although it might not survive the Hulk Smash, the suit can definitely take several bullets without damage.
But one common shortcoming these suits had was that, unlike Tony’s Arc reactor, there was no fuel source good enough to power it for extended use. You can’t really take off on a superhero mission with several tons of fuel attached, can you?
The Arc reactor is basically a miniature fusion reactor; a device that produces electric power from the energy released when smaller atoms collide or fuse to form bigger ones. But here’s the catch- it produces zero or minimal waste energy. Unfortunately, unlike in the superhero universe, no reaction is 100% efficient in real life. The amount of energy released in the form of heat should’ve turned Tony to ash before Thanos even had a chance to snap his fingers.
Thermodynamics aside, another main issue is the size. Even the smallest working nuclear reactor to ever be built is the size of a large truck.
On the other hand, one of the prime features, unique to the Iron man suits, is the Repulsor beams. Although the Marvel universe does not provide much explanation about how it works, we can say that it repels whatever it hits using high density muon beams. The repulsors also double as a propeller, providing thrust for the suit at incredible speeds without inertia, completely ignoring Newton’s third law.
But before we conclude that we can’t make the suit, there are some things that we did manage to accomplish- one of those being holographic displays. Until recently, some kind of material like water or smoke was needed for the light from the system to bounce on. But Aerial Burton, a Japanese company, devised a holographic projector that uses a plasma laser to float 3D images in mid-air.
Raytheon, an American conglomerate, developed an exoskeleton capable of effortlessly lifting 90 kgs. Additionally, it reduces fatigue while performing physically taxing tasks like planks and push-ups. Still, in its rudimentary stage, it is not as capable as the iron man suit to carry tanks’ load of firepower, yet it can certainly be put into use by military troops to load missiles and supplies without the help of large machines.
Thirdly, even though JARVIS is lightyears ahead of our current AI technology, even being able to understand Tony’s jokes and sarcasm, some countries are already integrating the systems into drones and combat technology to identify enemy targets.
Individually, we have several technologies that equal the ones Tony Stark incorporated in his suits. But putting them together compactly in a suit without it becoming heavy for the pilot is the real challenge. Moreover, the incentive required for designing such high-end machinery requires a huge amount of money to be invested with absolutely no guarantee of it becoming a success.
Tony’s creations may seem perfectly possible theoretically, but unlike ours, the comic world has no limitations in terms of creativity as well as physics. Right now, the extent of our technology might only be on par with the Hammer industries and not Stark’s- the bare minimum. What we need is several years’ worth of innovating and putting the innovations together. We are limited by the technology of our time. But once we do figure it out, this might just change the world.
