Development and assessment of the Canadian personal load carriage system using objective biomechanical measures

The Defence Research and Development Canada--Toronto managed a collaborative team of designers, biomechanists, ergonomists and military stakeholders in the development of a new personal load carriage (LC) system for the Canadian Forces. Ergonomics design principles using objective measurement tools and user-centred feedback from soldiers were considered essential to system development. The purpose of this study was to provide a detailed report of contributions by biomechanical testing to the final design of the final Canadian LC system. The Load Carriage Simulator and Compliance Tester were used to test design iterations of: three fragmentation vests, seven tactical vests and three iterations of the backpack. Test data were compared to a data pool of seventeen previously tested systems. Results indicated that the objective measures helped the design team by: (1) quantifying and understanding the consequences of various design changes; (2) predicting soldiers' responses to design changes in skin contact pressure, force and relative motion; (3) objectively comparing design iterations to other systems; and (4) providing information quickly so that ideas and recommendations could be incorporated into the next design iteration. It was concluded that objective assessments added valuable information not easily interpreted from human trials. However, objective assessments cannot replace human trials for feedback on functionality and features.