Curiosity - The Next Mars Lander

[FoolKiller]

Basically, another lander mission is headed for Mars. The Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) Curiosity will hopefully launch in November and arrive in August of 2012.

As I understand it, the one thing that stands apart is the size of this thing. It is big as far as Mars rovers go. For comparison, here is a mockup that JPL did:

Now, what makes the size important is how you land it. It's bulky and heavy. It is 9 feet long and weighs 1,984 pounds (900kg). So, think about a Mini Cooper. Now land that thing safely from space.

This presents us with what is being called the Sky-Crane Landing System. I have heard about this and tried picturing it in my mind, but no luck. It sounded...complex. Fortunately on Universe Today I ran across a CGI video put together by JPL (let's ignore the sound in space bits, shall we?). Here is the article and video:

http://www.universetoday.com/84648/watch-how-curiosity-will-land-on-mars/

Entry, descent and landing is the big moment for any Mars lander mission, and the big honkin’ Mars Science Lab and its sky-crane landing system will truly be unique. This brand new video from the Jet Propulsion Lab shows how MSL, a.k.a Curiosoity will land on the Red Planet in August of 2012. Doug Ellison, part of the team who worked on this computer generated video told Universe Today that the scenes from Mars shown here were created from real elevation data from the HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, and the outcrop of rock that Curiosity visits is based on Burns Cliff, visited by Opportunity in 2004.

When they started working on the video, the real rover wasn’t as close to completion as it is now. “The oddity is that we had to finish our virtual rover ahead of the real rover!” Ellison said. “The rover and other major components were derived from simplified CAD drawings, combined with lots of photographs of the actual hardware under construction.”

I asked Ellison how he and his colleagues create the scenes of events that haven’t happened yet.

“We were not starting from scratch, as we collaborated with the same team responsible for the earlier MSL animation you may have seen, (created about two years ago)” Ellison said. “People from different elements of the project helped steer us on how their elements of the project work. We then worked through a review process with those teams to make sure we get both how it looks, and how it works, as accurate as we can, whilst still being engaging.”

“The EDL team especially were a thrill to work with,” Ellison continued, “urging us to reflect the dynamic, violent nature of landing on another planet. They commented that once it’s on that Atlas V and on its way to Mars, they never get to see it at work. This animation is the thing they can show to friends and family to say ‘This is what I do’.”

Ellison said his team is working on a longer and more complete movie that should be finished with the next few months.

But for now, enjoy this thrill-ride along with Curiosity!

For more information about MSL’s landing, here’s a link to a detailed PDF all about EDL.

"Can I ride it, Mom? Can I? Can I?"

Seriously though, I think I see about a thousand things that can go wrong. It looks incredible and will be an amazing feat of engineering, but what if one or more of the propulsion jets on the crane doesn't fire?It seems to rely on undamaged heat shields, high altitude parachute, hovering jet propulsion, and a motorized pulley system. That is multiple systems that are all expected to work after 10 months in interplanetary space. There is a good record for that, but atmospheric entry is a rough situation.

Hopefully some robotic space travel experts can explain the system more and make me not feel as if over $2 billion are about to create a new crater on Mars.

All that said, it seems less crazy than tucking it inside a giant ball of balloons.

Anyway, this got me excited because I am very interested in space and am constantly amazed at the engineering abilities of the human mind. If this works I can see the Sky-Crane having a lot of potential. Could you orbit one of these over the moon to make putting equipment there a one way trip, making a manned mission, or even a future outpost cheaper?

Anyway, for more details on Curiosity, here is the Wiki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Science_Laboratory

 

[PeterJB]

I've always loved the thought of them discovering fossils in the Martian soil, as I feel that is far more likely than finding any living specimens, unless their is extraterrestrial life which functions off matter other than Oxygen and Water.

 

[Keef]

Is it just me or is that the most impressive delivery system ever devised?

 

[wfooshee]

Impressive if it works. Holy cow.

So let's see: Arrive at Mars after 30-some weeks in space. Jettison part of the craft, no longer needed, now left with shell and heat shield.

Maintain stable attitude during atmospheric entry. After atmospheric braking is achieved, deply parachute, and jettison heat shield. Nothing really new yet.

Descend a bit under the 'chute, and at a certain altitude drop the payload out of the shell, your 2 billion dollar ship is now free-falling.

No, wait, light the rockets space around the frame. All of them light properly and on time so you don't pitch over indo a mindless tumble.

Now you've got a rocket lander, only slightly more complicated than the Lunar Module that actually carried humans over 40 years ago.

But you can't land under the rocket engines because the dust kicked up would obliterate all the delicate surfaces of your exposed lander.

So you go into a hover and lower the lander by spooled cable, which also works perfectly, for the first time ever tried in history.

When the lander touches down, hopefully before the crane thing runs out of fuel, the crane thing somehow lets go of the lander, or the lander lets go of the rocket, whichever, and the rocket flies off and crashes. Hopefull after letting go of the lander.

Which still has to go through its own startup tasks, unfolding solar panels, extending arms, etc.

Just how the smack do you test such a system??!?!?!

I thought the bouncy-ball system was weird, but I guess this thing is just too heavy for that.

 

[Robin]

This is my favourite shot of Curiosity, its HUGE!!!

One of my favourite space achievements made in my lifetime was the Pathfinder mission with the little Sojourner Rover (aka the microwave on wheels). Spirit and Opportunity were equally impressive and its great and Nasa is still going ahead with this rover programme.

Robin.

 

[PeterJB]

Impressive if it works. Holy cow.

So let's see: Arrive at Mars after 30-some weeks in space. Jettison part of the craft, no longer needed, now left with shell and heat shield.

Maintain stable attitude during atmospheric entry. After atmospheric braking is achieved, deply parachute, and jettison heat shield. Nothing really new yet.

Descend a bit under the 'chute, and at a certain altitude drop the payload out of the shell, your 2 billion dollar ship is now free-falling.

No, wait, light the rockets space around the frame. All of them light properly and on time so you don't pitch over indo a mindless tumble.

Now you've got a rocket lander, only slightly more complicated than the Lunar Module that actually carried humans over 40 years ago.

But you can't land under the rocket engines because the dust kicked up would obliterate all the delicate surfaces of your exposed lander.

So you go into a hover and lower the lander by spooled cable, which also works perfectly, for the first time ever tried in history.

When the lander touches down, hopefully before the crane thing runs out of fuel, the crane thing somehow lets go of the lander, or the lander lets go of the rocket, whichever, and the rocket flies off and crashes. Hopefull after letting go of the lander.

Which still has to go through its own startup tasks, unfolding solar panels, extending arms, etc.

Just how the smack do you test such a system??!?!?!

I thought the bouncy-ball system was weird, but I guess this thing is just too heavy for that.

I imagine it's possible on Earth. While the weight of the craft will be roughly 330kg on Mars, the thinner atmosphere will provide less resistance so the craft will probably fall at a similar rate.

 

[Touring Mars]

Curiosity

Just as well there are no cats on Mars...

This is my favourite shot of Curiosity, its HUGE!!!

One of my favourite space achievements made in my lifetime was the Pathfinder mission with the little Sojourner Rover (aka the microwave on wheels). Spirit and Opportunity were equally impressive and its great and Nasa is still going ahead with this rover programme.

Robin.

Great pic... that thing is massive.

 

[BlisteredHand]

Anyone else getting up at 6am on Monday to see this thing try and land?
Looking forward to it.

 

[TankAss95]

I'll make sure I watch it.

Good luck to MSL. 👍

 

[Brett]

 

[FoolKiller]

From the Cool and Amazing Photo Thread:

I am not a morning person either, but the plan is to stay up and watch it live.

I may stay up, but it depends. I'm contemplating going to the Street Rod Nationals that day and then it's my brother-in-law's 30th birthday. I might be a bit exhausted and I need to get up by 6:30 for work (~5 hours after the scheduled landing). Besides, knowing my luck, if I stay up to watch then they will have one of those instances where it lands successfully but the system boot up is off by an hour because a room full of geniuses forgot to carry a one or something. So by the time the whole world gets to see it all of the US will have gone to bed, but I will be too intrigued to stop watching.

Honestly, it's best for everyone else if I set my DVR and then go to bed.

 

[Dennisch]

I saw it last night how this landing system operates, and the first thing that popped in my head was: this is going to fail. So overcomplicated. I know that there work some pretty smart people at Nasa, but this system is just a bit over the top. But I really hope it will work just fine, as this is probably the most complex piece of hardware shot into space. I want true HighDef pics monday morning!

 

[CodeRedR51]

Here's my post from the Space in General thread:

For those that don't know, the NASA Curiosity Mars Rover will be landing on Mars at 1:31 a.m., EDT on Monday August 6th.

Everything you need to know about the landing is HERE, and of course it will be covered live by NASA.

I'll be watching on the NASA TV channel.

I will of course be staying up to watch it, since that is 10:30pm my time.

 

[FoolKiller]

I saw it last night how this landing system operates, and the first thing that popped in my head was: this is going to fail. So overcomplicated. I know that there work some pretty smart people at Nasa, but this system is just a bit over the top. But I really hope it will work just fine, as this is probably the most complex piece of hardware shot into space. I want true HighDef pics monday morning!

I think part of the problem is the size and weight. It is too heavy for a parachute to do more than slow it down in Mars' thin atmosphere and the bouncy balloon method would require a massive balloon made out of very tough materials.

Basically, you have to figure out a way to safely land a fully intact Volkswagen, covered in fragile bits, from space in an atmosphere that at its most dense is less dense than the highest peaks on Earth, and there is no body of water to splash down in. And, you have to prevent the landing from kicking up a dust cloud that could affect solar panels, sensors, or moving bits. Eventually you reach a point where the simple ideas just aren't enough.

Fortunately, Mars also has a lower gravity, so a rocket propulsion type system should be able to work. Depending on the fuel used, rocket propulsion can work with no atmosphere, so in theory the goal is to just approach Martian escape velocity. With the crane setup you can overcompensate a bit then lower the rover at a speed that would provide landing impact within known tolerances whether your crane is slowly falling or slightly rising. And it provides what is likely the only way to prevent kicking up a lot of dust.

That said, yeah, there is a lot that can go wrong. By the time it touches down it will have been shaken, stirred, chilled, and baked, and you have no way of predicting local atmospheric conditions at the time of touchdown when you are programming the landing sequence. You will have some time to make adjustments on approach due to available satellite data, but there is no on-the-ground radar system to give you exact data, and even then there is a limit to how much you can alter the sequence when you have a specific target zone and interplanetary travel has a large amount of intricate free flight involved to get everything just right.

 

[Zenith]

*ignore

 

[Zenith]

The lander is complicated and over the top because it needs to be. NASA tends to avoid making ludicrously complicated landers for teh lulz.

Testing: Most of these systems were tested small scale and full scale at NASA Ames Research Center. We can account for Mars' different atmosphere by calculating the Reynold's Numbers based on previously acquired data.

Heat Shield: There's no reason for the heat shield to be damaged, so that's not really a worry. The ablative compound (PICA, if I recall correctly...) has been thoroughly tested and hasn't failed us yet.

Rocket Thrusters: The entire lander is too heavy (~4.5 tons) and large for the airbag system and parachutes alone are nowhere near effective enough, that's why the thruster system is there. It uses the crane drop because we don't want to have thrusters kicking up dust and messing up the sensors on the lander or Curiosity itself. This could lead to catastrophic failure, see Iranian Hostage Crisis.

People seem to be most skeptical of the thrusters on the powered descent and sky crane. The control system is well proven and the rocket thrusters are very reliable. This business of them not lighting at the same time is pretty unlikely and the internal balance system is extremely good at righting itself. It's worth remembering that we've been practicing our rocketry for decades. When you've got a "special present" to deliver to Moscow, you make damn sure it won't land in New York City.

Parachute: The parachute is by far the biggest worry. Despite what "7 Minutes of Terror" might have you believe, there are lots of backup systems and redundancies in the module to prevent "Game Over." The parachute doesn't have this luxury.

The chute deploys at Mach 2.2 and will separate at Mach .8. "Traditional" parachutes such as this are stable at supersonic speeds and stable at subsonic speeds, but downright scary at trans-sonic speeds. There's also the chance that the chute never fully deploys and we dig another crater.

Truthfully, nobody really has a good understanding of the aerodynamics of parachutes. Sometimes they open, sometimes they don't. We have difficulty understanding why. We have parachute designs that are more proven than the one on the MSL lander, but they weigh too much. The MSL chute is relatively unproven. Early prototypes shredded in the NFAC Wind Tunnel. Once again, this is the part that people are nervous about, not the thrusters.

The movie is trying to make the whole landing look exciting rather than paint a realistic portrayal. JPL wants to be Stark Enterprises...

Skepticism is good, it's important to understand that all of the crazy things that happen in those 7 minutes were determined to be more likely to succeed than any other option.

 

[Dan_]

This will be one of the most amazing accomplishments for NASA in the recent years, I wonder if they plan on scaling up the skycrane (evidently, they would need a bigger rocket... SLS?) in order to land portions of a base for future exploration, or even digging equipment in order to build a safe structure for the explorers that are yet to come.

Nevertheless, if this thing can land 1mT on Mars, it can put a decently sized ISRU experiment there too. Manufacture and store methane or even oxygen there and we may see human exploration of the red planet as something feasible in five decades.

This only goes to show that NASA still is and will still be the unquestionable leader in interplanetary exploration for the next decades.

 

[CodeRedR51]

T-minus 1 hour 45 minutes to broadcast start.

 

[niky]

Any online portals showing it?

 

[Brett]

NASA TV

Curiosity Cam

NASA JPL Channel 2

 

[Blaze_409]

wow that Rover...Laser beaming spectroscopy.. overkill lol. What a masterpiece. Its like having a 2012 BMW 7 Series with Night Vision and lane departure warning..in the 1990's.

 

[Sonygamer455]

This rover ya'll are talking about, they are actually gonna release a Hot Wheels car of it sometime after it lands. I think they are doing that to promote NASA. They have done it before with the Sourjourner Mars rover.

 

[Brett]

Simulation with distance/speed/time information

 

[CodeRedR51]

http://eyes.nasa.gov

^^^ That's pretty cool to follow along with . Realtime animation.

Edit: Tree'd.

 

[ND4SPD]

Just a couple minutes away guys!

 

[Patrick]

Touchdown!

 

[Wiegert]

Sounds like the landing was a success. Great to hear they actually pulled off such an audacious manoeuvre.

 

[Zenith]

Whoo!

Edit: Best 64x64 pixel image I've ever seen.

 

[Brett]

Just waiting for pictures.

 

[Wiegert]

First shot is of the wheel on the surface. Just waiting for more to come in.