MER-C in 2007?

arezn99 · Mar 5, 2005

MER-C in 2007? The both rovers MER-A (Spirit) and MER-B (Opportunity) perfectly operate on Mars and produce a lot of good s science information. Now I suppose it is clear to all that rovers are very effective means of exploration of Mars. According to NASA, next rover will be launched towards Mars in 2009. How long will MER-A and MER-B operate? One year, two years at best … What about MER-C, a replica of MER-A, that would be launched in 2007? There is no such NASA mission at all! But what if MER-C will be an international effort? The costs of such project can be shared among international partners and if a part of each partner will be less one hundred millions dollars I guess there is possibility, though quite little, of realization of MER-C. USA will make MER-C. How much will it cost? Can anybody who knows budget of MER-A and MER-B to score these costs? Russia may provide a Proton (or Soyuz/Fregat) rocket to launch MER-C towards Mars. Europe may fund and organize all the work with MER-C after landing on Mars. Japan and Canada may also participate in MER-C. Maybe, there are other, better variants of the international effort. Any thoughts?

novi · Mar 5, 2005

Mer-A and Mer-B were designed for the purpose of investigating if water once flowed over Mars. Sending a Mer-C would not benefit to that purpose, so there is no need to send Mer-C. Altough I admit it could send back some nice pictures from other Martian areas. But the big next thing is to investigate if life existed/ exists and a MER is simply not equipped well enough to investigate that.

yurkin · Mar 5, 2005

If MER-C was to be launched it would be the engineering model that they are using at JPL now. It’s an exact replica of the ones on mar right now, minus the science package and a few other components. It would be great if it could be some day launched, but traffic to mars is getting busy. So it will probably end up at the Air & Space.

tychotospace · Mar 6, 2005

MER-c with same instruments? better add instrument to detect life <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /> and target landing on where methane and waterice is found.

spacester · Mar 6, 2005

I think this is a great idea. Yes, we want to continually advance the state of the art and pursue new scientific questions with new robotic capabilities. But at some point in time, shouldn't we take advantage of existing designs? The cost of the MERS is largely in the design effort. The design is in the can, copies can be built quite affordably. How about MER-C on the Moon? Would it survive the night? <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

thalion · Mar 6, 2005

On the one hand, it would be a good idea, because it's available. On the other hand, though, since MER-C is an engineering model--a useful thing to have when you want to test out new software, or simulations to see what's going wrong with the rover, if any--they would probably have to build yet another rover, MER-D for a new engineering backup...

spacester · Mar 6, 2005

". . . no atmosphere . . ." Really? I saw right here on sdc a very long thread about the atmosphere of the moon. Musta not read it carefully enough . . . J/K of course. Certainly the landing system would have to be changed, as in duh! But if the rover was gently and lovingly placed on the lunar surface, would it survive the 14 * 24 hour long night period? Before the MER missions, even though I predicted tremendous success, not even I thought they could go for this long. I would've answered this question with a solid NO! But they're proving to be tough little guys, so I gotta wonder . . . I would expect something would fail due to extreme cold, but as I remember what I can about the components, I'm not thinking of anything that would necessarily fail. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

yurkin · Mar 6, 2005

Would it survive the night? The night would be easy. It would never survive the day. Spirit was overheating when it got warm on Mars. I don’t think you would need another engineering model. In the past year the MER drivers have gotten a lot of practice.

liquidspace2k · Mar 6, 2005

i'm not sure the batteries would last 14 days on the moon, the batteries would probably drain and then probably wont be able to recharge, unless the rover has more battery storage power. The landing system would have to change too. but just the rovers themselves i think the batteries would be a big problem.

mikejz · Mar 6, 2005

From: http://pages.preferred.com/~tedstryk/lunokhod2.html The Lunokhod 2 rover traversed the LeMonnier crater sending back images and other data. Here is the mission description from the NSSDC: The Luna 21 spacecraft landed on the Moon and deployed the second Soviet lunar rover (Lunokhod 2). The primary objectives of the mission were to collect images of the lunar surface, examine ambient light levels to determine the feasibility of astronomical observations from the Moon, perform laser ranging experiments from Earth, observe solar X-rays, measure local magnetic fields, and study mechanical properties of the lunar surface material. The rover stood 135 cm high and had a mass of 840 kg. It was about 170 cm long and 160 cm wide and had 8 wheels each with an independent suspension, motor and brake. The rover had two speeds, ~1 km/hr and ~2 km/hr. Lunokhod 2 was equipped with three TV cameras, one mounted high on the rover for navigation, which could return high resolution images at different rates (3.2, 5.7, 10.9 or 21.1 seconds per frame). These images were used by a five-man team of controllers on Earth who sent driving commands to the rover in real time. Power was supplied by a solar panel on the inside of a round hinged lid which covered the instrument bay, which would charge the batteries when opened. A polonium-210 isotopic heat source was used to keep the rover warm during the lunar nights. There were 4 panoramic cameras mounted on the rover. Scientific instruments included a soil mechanics tester, solar X-ray experiment, an astrophotometer to measure visible and UV light levels, a magnetometer deployed in front of the rover on the end of a 2.5 m boom, a radiometer, a photodetector (Rubin-1) for laser detection experiments, and a French-supplied laser corner-reflector. The lander and rover toget

thalion · Mar 7, 2005

Actually, I think sending a modified MER to the Moon would be a great idea. However, it would (ironically) be considerably more expensive, since retrorockets would have to be used. For the increased cost, I'd rather go for a nuclear rather than solar-powered rover, just to (hopefully) minimize the effects of the large temperature swings. A solar-powered lunar MER wouldn't worth the added cost IMO, as the greater stresses imposed on it would limit its lifetime relative to if it were placed on Mars.

grooble · Mar 7, 2005

I read somewhere that beginning in 2008 NASA will launch 12 consecutive robotic missions to the moon, as a pre-curser to the manned missions.

teije · Mar 7, 2005

Why limit another MER mission (to mars) to just MER-C Launch C, D, E, possibly more. Spirit and Opportunity taught us more than we ever dreamed, but they have only visited a couple of sites. There are plenty of interesting spots where we can learn just as much about mars besides Gusev and Meridiani. And indeed, costs would be limited to Manufacturing, Launch, and Operations. Still not cheap, but a lot cheaper than designing a new rover. Give the MSL a head start with more MER's in 2007/8 Sounds good to me. Teije

radarredux · Mar 7, 2005

> Why limit another MER mission (to mars) to just MER-C Launch C, D, E, possibly more./i> IMHO, there are two elements to the mission: the delivery platform and the scientific instruments. The delivery platform is everything necessary to get the scientific instruments to their location -- rocket, heat shield, parachute, airbags, rover, solar panels, etc. The scientific instruments include cameras, Mini-TES, Moessbauer Spectrometer, etc. I would like to see future MER missions with new scientific instrument suites, perhaps even having them revisit the same areas as previous missions but with new tools/instruments. One minor note: the current MERs were launched at a 15-year minimum Earth-Mars energy cycle, and their mass was about the maximum the rocket (Delta II ?) could handle. This might prevent an equivalent lander from being launched using the same booster for a number of years.

dan_casale · Mar 7, 2005

I thought they stopped making Delta-II's. Which leaves the Delta-IV family, but I'm not sure how a Delta-II and a Delta-IV compare, or if a Delta-IV medium would be required.

chmee · Mar 7, 2005

It seems strange to me that after developing and proving a very effective and robust rover, that they would not continue with this same design. As someone already said, much of the cost of the MER program was in research and design. Now that it is proven, let's make lots of copies od Spirit/Opportunity and explore much more of Mars' surface for a relative bargin! We do not need to have the same instruments on them as the current rovers, new instruments that are mission specific could be added. It has always amazed me that NASA and the other space agencies are always coming up with unique, never used before designs, that are not used again even after a very successful mission. Let's do it like the 'ol days of the Surveyors and Rangers where you stay with a proven design and make incremental improvements with each new ship. You save a great deal on R&D and get more science! The EDL system of MER is very robust, and could be used for other Mars lander / rover missions. However, will be abondonded for the new "crane" EDL system for the next Mars rover, which IMHO is risky and expensive

najab · Mar 8, 2005

AFAIK they are still making Delta 2's, primarily for NASA's Discovery missions actually. They aren't making any more Delta 3's though.

holmec · Mar 8, 2005

Speaking of scrapping off dust, I hope they put a small blower on top of MER-C to blow away the dust from the solar panels. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "SCE to AUX" - John Aaron, curiosity pays off </div>

holmec · Mar 8, 2005

Absolutely. The MERS rover platform will most likely be our standard rover design just change out parts to adapt to specific missions. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "SCE to AUX" - John Aaron, curiosity pays off </div>

holmec · Mar 8, 2005

I wonder how the operating procedures of the opearting crew of the MERs will change in the future. Aparantly their families suffer because they have to operate at Mars days as opposed to Earth days. Maybe newer software could possible help bridge the gap. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "SCE to AUX" - John Aaron, curiosity pays off </div>

ktotam · Mar 8, 2005

the mission team has switched to earth time back in april 2004

holmec · Mar 9, 2005

Yes. But more importantly is why. Apparantly they felt they had to have the martian times to be able to use time as wisely as possible. After the primary mission, the 90 days, they felt they were in long haul mode because then did their mission and they did not know how long it will take for the rovers to die. So Ill modify my question. In the future will they want to have operating crews on the planet's time or earth time, knowing what we know now? <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "SCE to AUX" - John Aaron, curiosity pays off </div>

centsworth_II · Mar 9, 2005

"In the future will they want to have operating crews on the planet's time or earth time...?" Future missions that do not rely on solar power and are more autonomous (more brain power) will probably allow for more flexability in the scheduling of Earth-side support. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

MER-C in 2007?

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