Design of Ergonomic Assault Vest for Indonesian Army with Modular Concept

Assault vest is one of crucial products for Indonesian army infantry soldiers to support their activities in the battlefield. Despite its importance, however, the design of the assault vest of Indonesian army was not considered Ergonomics aspects. Based on the deep interview and questionnaries distributed to 30 Indonesian Army infantry soldiers, the current design was not really comfortable and limit the freedom of movement in the battlefield. Because of this, this research aims to design a modular assault vest for Indonesian army infantry that considering Ergonomics aspects. The object of this study was the 411 Infantry Batalyon / Pandawa located in Salatiga City, Central Java Province, with a total sample of 30 active infantry soldiers involve in this study. The research was conducted by using Nordic Body Map method, questionnaire, deep interview, and TAFEI (Task Analysis for Error Identification) as well as Kansei Engineering. The prototype was built to test the proposed assault vest design. A physiological test using the physiological test method of Dr. Woldemar Gerschler was conducted to test the prototype and then the results of the data (VO2) are tested by applying t-test statistical analysis to see whether the proposed assault vest design will have better performance than existing assault vest. Physiological tests were carried out by 23 respondents who were members of a football club. The test indicate that the proposed design show better result in terms of oxygen consumption.