Mars rover news - Page 17

01101001 · #**481** (**permalink**) 20-August-2007, 02:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by beethovenspiano

Any martian weather updates?

No. Not since the August 16 update for Spirit.

The updates proceed with typical rhythm for this part of the mission.

If current trends continue it will be a long slow clearing of the sky over many weeks. The Unmanned Spaceflight topic: The Storm tracks it as well as anything else. Not much happening in there, or on Mars.

01101001 · #**482** (**permalink**) 21-August-2007, 07:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 01101001

The updates proceed with typical rhythm for this part of the mission.

Now's time for another.

NASA MER Mission Status: Spirit

Quote:

Even though the Martian sky above Gusev Crater continued to clear, solar power levels on NASA's Spirit rover remained fairly constant as dust settling from the atmosphere accumulated on top of the solar panels. Activities remained restricted. Measurements of atmospheric opacity, known as Tau, dropped from 3.6 on Martian day, or sol, 1283 (Aug. 12, 2007) to 3.3 on sol 1286 (Aug. 16, 2007), generating power levels of 301 watt-hours (100 watt-hours is the amount of energy needed to light a 100-watt bulb for one hour).
[...]
The forecast for the next week is for no new dust storm activity, based on weather reports provided by Malin Space Science Systems, the builder of the Mars Color Imager on board the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The camera is being used to monitor conditions on the red planet. Skies are expected to continue to clear over the next couple of months.

Nicolas · #**483** (**permalink**) 21-August-2007, 08:40 AM

I was thinking, would it be possible to put the rovers on a slope and give special wheel commands or something that make it vibrate and hopefully get rid of some dust that way, or are the dust levels too small and sticky for anything like that to work? Or are vibration commands impossible anyway (because the wheels can't turn fast enough, aren't powerful enough, I don't know)

Doodler · #**484** (**permalink**) 21-August-2007, 01:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nicolas

I was thinking, would it be possible to put the rovers on a slope and give special wheel commands or something that make it vibrate and hopefully get rid of some dust that way, or are the dust levels too small and sticky for anything like that to work? Or are vibration commands impossible anyway (because the wheels can't turn fast enough, aren't powerful enough, I don't know)

Burns power, and in that dry environment, there's probably a static electric component to the clinginess of the dust that all the shaking you could manage wouldn't resolve.

Nicolas · #**485** (**permalink**) 21-August-2007, 03:49 PM

So we'll wait for the next lucky dustdevil hit.

01101001 · #**486** (**permalink**) 21-August-2007, 04:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nicolas

So we'll wait for the next lucky dustdevil hit.

It's more the generally windy conditions that create dustdevils. It doesn't take a vortex to clean a rover.

01101001 · #**487** (**permalink**) 22-August-2007, 07:00 PM

It looks like Opportunity is making fresh tracks, seen through somewhat dusty lenses.

Exploratorium, 2007 August 22: Opportunity Rear Hazcam

(Others, 2007 August 22)

Edit: According to the route maps at Unmanned Spaceflight, Oppy moved closer to Duck Bay, covering about 2/3 of the distance it kept during the many weeks of the storm.

01101001 · #**488** (**permalink**) 24-August-2007, 07:42 AM

Daily Update - 8/23/07
Brightening Skies Bolster Opportunity
Opportunity Status for sol 1256 - 1265

Quote:

Opportunity is healthy and remains perched near the rim of "Victoria Crater." The rover was on a low-power schedule that alternated between a 3-sol plan and a 4-sol plan.

Tau (atmospheric opacity) has begun to stabilize this week at around 3.7, resulting in solar array energy between 230-240 watt hours. Therefore in the upcoming week, the team will return to nominal planning.

Nicolas · #**489** (**permalink**) 24-August-2007, 09:36 AM

And yet some more experience in working on Mars gained by the twins!

Dragon Star · #**490** (**permalink**) 24-August-2007, 12:38 PM

Hope they never design something this rigorous for warfare.

I can't believe they survived.

Nicolas · #**491** (**permalink**) 24-August-2007, 01:07 PM

Mars tries a lot, but the rovers win

.

Sticks · #**492** (**permalink**) 24-August-2007, 01:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dragon Star

Hope they never design something this rigorous for warfare.

I can't believe they survived.

don't you mean robust?

01101001 · #**493** (**permalink**) 24-August-2007, 06:11 PM

Spirit Update 2007 August 23

sol 1288-1294, August 23, 2007: Spirit Tries to Coax Dust from Microscopic Imager

Quote:

The rover remained healthy as the Gusev Crater region continued to emerge from the recent storms. Gloominess caused by suspended dust in the atmosphere remained high but continued its downward trend. Dust falling out of the atmosphere continued to accumulate on the solar panels, limiting power gains from decreasing atmospheric opacity, known as Tau.

Between the rover's 1,288th and 1,291st Martian days, or sols, of exploration (Aug. 18 and Aug. 21, 2007), Tau values went down from 3.2 to 3.0. During the same time, the accumulation of dust on the solar arrays rose from 0.664 to 0.640 (a dust factor of 1.0 corresponds to a perfectly clean array). Solar energy on sol 1291 (Aug. 21, 2007) was 313 watt-hours [...]

Martian weather reports as of Aug. 22 indicated a lull in afternoon storm activity on the red planet, with no new storm activity visible within a few thousand kilometers of either Mars rover site. Skies remained dusty and were expected to continue to clear slowly.

01101001 · #**494** (**permalink**) 25-August-2007, 12:25 AM

Opportunity has pulled up pretty close to the lip of Victoria Crater at Duck Bay.

Navcam thumbnails sol 1271

They might just be trying to catch some good wind to get and keep the falling dust off. But, maybe they're starting to think about taking a toe dip into Victoria.

01101001 · #**495** (**permalink**) 25-August-2007, 03:26 AM

The press releases keep coming. The writers must have been frustrated by the quiet storm.

NASA JPL news release: Mars Exploration Rover Status Report: Rovers Resume Driving, August 24, 2007

Quote:

After six weeks of hunkering down during raging dust storms that limited solar power, both of NASA's Mars Exploration Rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, have resumed driving.

Opportunity advanced 13.38 meters (44 feet) toward the edge of Victoria Crater on Aug. 21. Mission controllers were taking advantage of gradual clearing of dust from the sky while also taking precautions against buildup of dust settling onto the rover.
[...]
No new storms have been lifting dust into the air near either solar-powered rover in the past two weeks. Skies are gradually brightening above both Spirit and Opportunity. "The clearing could take months," said rover Project Scientist Bruce Banerdt. "There is a lot of very fine material suspended high in the atmosphere."
[...]
One reason the rover team chose to drive Opportunity closer to the crater rim was to be prepared, if the pace of dust accumulation on the solar panels increases, to drive onto the inner slope of the crater. This would give the rover a sun-facing tilt to maximize daily energy supplies. [...] The next day, a favorable wind removed some dust from Opportunity's solar panels, providing a boost of about 10 percent in electric output. This forestalled the need to hurry to a sun-facing slope.
[...]
Spirit drove 42 centimeters (17 inches) backwards on Aug. 23 to get in position for taking images of a rock that it had examined with its Moessbauer spectrometer. The rover team is planning additional drives for Spirit to climb onto a platform informally named "Home Plate."

01101001 · #**496** (**permalink**) 06-September-2007, 07:20 PM

JPL press release image: Opportunity

Quote:

Dust Busting on Mars

Mars doesn't have a power grid for running a vacuum cleaner, but the red planet has a way of sweeping things clean. Recently, the Martian wind tidied up a mess on Opportunity's robotic arm, which had become caked with dirt during recent dust storms. Extending that newly cleaned arm may bring new discoveries soon. With spic-and-span solar panels boosting solar power, Opportunity may have enough vitality to venture into Victoria Crater, the largest yet explored by either rover.

01101001 · #**497** (**permalink**) 08-September-2007, 01:14 AM

NASA JPL Press Release: Mars Rovers Survive Severe Dust Storms, Ready For Next Objetives 2007 September 7

Quote:

This week, Opportunity has been driving about 130 feet toward its planned entry point. The route will provide better access to a top priority target inside the crater: a bright band of rocks about 40 feet from the rim. "We chose a point that gives us a straight path down, instead of driving cross-slope from our current location," said Paolo Bellutta, a JPL rover driver plotting the route. "The rock surface on which Opportunity will be driving will provide good traction and control of its path into the crater."

For its first foray into the crater, Opportunity will drive just far enough to get all six wheels in; it will then back out and assess slippage on the inner slope. "Opportunity might be ready for that first 'toe dip' into the crater as early as next week," said JPL's John Callas, rover project manager. "In addition to the drives to get to the entry point, we still need to conduct checkouts of two of Opportunity's instruments before sending the rover into the crater."

Instrument problems?

Quote:

The rover team plans to assess if dust has impaired use of the microscopic imager. If that tool is working, the team will use it to observe whether a scanning mirror for the miniature thermal emission spectrometer (Mini-TES) can function accurately. This mirror is high on the rover's camera mast. It reflects infrared light from the landscape to the spectrometer at the base of the mast, and it also can be positioned to close the hole in the mast as protection from dust. The last time the spectrometer was used, some aspects of the data suggested the instrument may have been viewing the inside of the mast instead of the Martian landscape.

"If the dust cover or mirror is no longer moving properly, we may have lost the ability to use that instrument on Opportunity," said Steve Squyres of Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., principal investigator for the rovers' science instruments. "It would be the first permanent loss of an instrument on either rover. But we'll see."

01101001 · #**498** (**permalink**) 11-September-2007, 05:45 PM

I think Opportunity is eyeballing (as best a robot can eyeball) her entry route into Victoria crater now. She's poised very close to the first close approach to Duck Bay done months ago.

Other Navcam images from sol 1289

Pancam images from sol 1290

Edit: and, Spirit status:

Spirit Finally Arrives at Home Plate!

Quote:

After remaining beyond the margins of Home Plate ever since exiting its northeast edge on Sol 774 (March 7, 2006) to survive the first winter on Mars, Spirit finally climbed on top of the elevated, circular plateau that scientists believe is volcanic in origin.
[...]
By collecting data at all these sites, scientists hope to interpret the geologic structure of Home Plate, determine how the rock chemistry changes from one side to the other, and elucidate a fracture that crosses the plateau from west to east. Along the way, the rover will take images of the south face of "Husband Hill" to the north and outcrops known as "Goddard" and "von Braun" to the south.

In recent months, rover handlers have been naming local features and targets around Home Plate for deceased members of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. Because Home Plate is bowl-shaped, scientists have decided to name features on top of Home Plate after things served in bowls. Stay tuned for upcoming yummy descriptions!