To combat the injury of soldiers and increase the rate of fire of the Howitzer, Eckhart will research and develop an automated system to handle projectiles, removing the soldier from the operation, eliminating the chance of muscular-skeletal injury and increasing the speed at which a single projectile is loaded into the firing device. This system will lower a shell from storage onto a simple shuttle, the shuttle would transfer the shell underneath an upper staging nest where the fuse would be loaded and then rammed into the barrel. While the fuse was being installed, the shuttle underneath would transfer back to get another shell to have it ready to lift into the upper nest for installing the fuse, process repeats. Eckhart's primary research tasks will be in understanding the exact needs of the government for this project as well as understanding the details of the systems we will be working with. Our team will speak directly with the soldiers who work with the Howitzer to grasp their first hand experience and primary needs.
