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Space Science

Beagle 3 Plans Revealed 97

Posted by timothy from the this-time-it-must-bark dept.
Richard W.M. Jones writes "While the UK's Beagle 2 may have been a well-publicised failure, the same team claims to have learned lessons and are now developing plans for Beagle 3. The new probe might be attached to a European mission due to launch in 2009 as part of Europe's Aurora project."
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Beagle 3 Plans Revealed More

Beagle 3 Plans Revealed

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  • For those of you wondering what happened to (Score:4, Informative)

    by Pingular ( 670773 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @05:44PM (#10716326)
    beagle 1, here's [sciencemuseum.org.uk] your answer.

  • One feature in Beagle 3 (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @05:46PM (#10716356)
    Will be a gun with a flashlight!

  • What really happened to Beagle 2 (Score:5, Funny)

    by tlon ( 154006 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @05:48PM (#10716385) Homepage
    And in related news today, Symantec Corporation announced that it has developed innoculation files for the W32.Beagle.3@mm virus. Symantec officials commented that there is no apparent link between Beagle.2 and the crash of the Beagle lander, but it is not taking any chances.
  • Lets hope this project doesn't look like a giant comfy chair [scifi.com] and extracts memories.

  • British engineering (Score:4, Funny)

    by MadFarmAnimalz ( 460972 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @05:49PM (#10716403) Homepage
    the same team claims to have learned lessons

    Translation: They're going to paint it flourescent green so they can tell where it crashed.

    • Translation: They're going to paint it flourescent green so they can tell where it crashed.

      It's hard to distinguish colors in the shadows of a deep hole. Next suggestion.

      • Actually, considering the situation, I believe that is a reasonable suggestion, since the process of finding an object such as Beagles 1 thru 5 involves other rudimentary techniques such as 'process of elimination'.

        If you can't find a bright green smudge on open/flat marrain, then you have a pretty good reason to conclude the damn thing is at the bottom of a deep, dark hole. All you have to do then is find the nearest DDH and take a quick peek, with no need to continue scanning open ground.

        Works for m
      • Paint in luminescent green!

        It is very easy to find a *glowing* green object at the bottom of a dark hole... or at night.

        mmmm radioactive glow...

  • Beagle #2,019,197,204,183,110 has the answer! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @05:49PM (#10716404)
    Mars's composition is mainly... Beagle material.

  • Plan for success (Score:3, Funny)

    by plover ( 150551 ) * on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @05:50PM (#10716412) Homepage Journal
    Step 1: Attach antenna.

    Step 2: Double check that antenna is attached really firmly.

    Step 3: Make sure antenna is hooked to transmitter.

    Step 4: Be sure you didn't disconnect the antenna when checking the transmitter.

  • Huh?? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by SeaDour ( 704727 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @05:56PM (#10716479) Homepage
    I thought one of the reasons cited for the failure of Beagle 2 was the very fact that it was piggybacked on a separate agency's orbiter. Now they're contradicting themselves, and saying they'll try it again?
    • What? It got there in one piece didn't it?

      I think the real problem was with Colin Pillinger himself, he was out of his depth. Lots of people were saying at the time, that the project would never have left the drawing board if it weren't for his enthusiasm and leadership. That wouldn't have been a bad outcome all things considered.

      When complex projects fail, it's almost always caused by bad project management.

      • Re:Huh?? (Score:2, Insightful)

        by M1FCJ ( 586251 )
        It is more like not enough money (to test and develop) and not enough time (to finish testing and development). Pillinger made it possible with a token amount of money, less than one tenth of the cost of a single American Rover's cost. He at least managed to get the probe all the way to Mars successfully. Many American and especially Russian probes even failed to do that. IMHO, when you look at the project as a total, it was pretty successful but not a complete one. Failure to land is not the end of the thi
      • Give the guy a break (unless you could do better--have you been to Mars?). He's just a geek and he designed most of it in his shed on a meagre budget.
    • Eh? Wasn't Beagle 2 and Mars Express both sponsored by the ESA?

      • Re:Huh?? (Score:5, Informative)

        by meringuoid ( 568297 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @07:58PM (#10717927)
        Mars Express, the mothership, was built by ESA. It's a success, it's cheap, and we're planning to build a Venus probe based around the same design - a bit like the way the US reused the Mariner spaceprobe design for many missions in the seventies.

        Beagle 2 was a longshot from the word go. It was proposed as one of the scientific packages Express would carry to Mars; nobody was expecting anyone to propose a lander, ESA had in mind spectrometers and sensors and things. So it had to be the smallest lander possible. It also needed funding. Britain has fuck-all space programme, and the Open University, while renowned for its distance-learning courses, isn't exactly loaded, so the cash had to be scraped together from corporate sponsors, whip-rounds, Blur, and what little they could get out of the government on the promise of good publicity.

        Personally I'm amazed it ever got off the ground. Had it landed successfully, it would have been even better; the next Mars probe might easily have carried dozens of the things for not much cost, and scattered them all over the planet. But it seems there's a limit to how small and cheap you can make a device to land on another planet.

        Now... speaking of European piggyback landers, I wish Huygens the very best of luck!

    • Why would piggybacking automatically mean failure? Are you suggesting that Huygens will fail too because it's piggybacking?

      • Huygens has already "almost [slashdot.org] failed" [ieee.org]. Some clever guy was analyzing the design of the radios, and found out that the data decoder was incapable of dealing with the doppler shift the probe was to encounter. They've since changed the trajectory of the mother ship to minimize the problem. The problem was caused by using a closed source radio system, and not detected because of limited testing, especially using 'real world' doppler-distorted signals.

  • Design flaws waiting to happen.... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Jtheletter ( 686279 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @05:58PM (#10716499)
    From the article:
    Advances in solar cell technology mean the craft will be able to cope with half the number of solar panels its predecessor carried: it will open up to reveal two panels rather than previous four.

    So now there is a 50% greater chance of catastrophic energy collection failure. Check.

    The craft's UHF antenna (identical to that on Beagle 2) is positioned on the top panel, so the motorised fanfold mechanism ensures it always points upwards for communication.

    So now when the "fanfold mechanism" for that panel fails we lose communications along with half the power. Check.

    Engineers stressed, however, that this was a preliminary proposal and the design would continue to "evolve".

    Let's hope so.

    • "So now there is a 50% greater chance of catastrophic energy collection failure. Check."

      Maybe, how do you know? Maybe the new panels have a higher MTBF; maybe Beagle 2 really needed all 4 panels, but Beagle III could run off a single new one; maybe with fewer parts the MTBF of the entire system's actually higher even if it can't survive a single failure. Of course, as a random SlashDot poster, I'm sure you're more aware of the issues surrounding it than experienced engineers.

      "So now when the "fanfold me

      • Of course, as a random SlashDot poster, I'm sure you're more aware of the issues surrounding it than experienced engineers.

        A good point, except that I happen to be a professional engineer whose job is developing and programming automated robotic systems, so here, yes, I do have experience.

        You're probably boned if you lose either; so what? Are you somehow under the impression that having *more* parts you're dependent on makes for a more reliable system?

        While more parts can mean more places for failure,

  • They must speak a different language over there (Score:4, Funny)

    by RealAlaskan ( 576404 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @05:58PM (#10716508) Homepage Journal
    They must speak a different language over there: it will have ``deadbeat airbags'', and though they call it a beagle, it doesn't have short legs or long ears. Well, the last one was really a dog [newscientist.com], so maybe that fits.

    It's almost as if they don't speak english [esa.int].


  • I mean, aren't the rovers on mars still roaming around doing a perfectly fine job? Seems to me maybe the next logical step would be for manned exploration. Robot vehicles can only do so much, and frankly sending another probe to Mars just seems pointless.

    I don't know if we're ready for a manned mission to Mars yet, but it seems like the next logical step. The rovers have had a lot of success, but how much more can we learn without taking the next step? I think it is time for an international manned exp

    • Re:Beagle 3...why? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Maybe because the rovers were only designed to do one thing really well, and the Beagle probe was designed to do some other thing really well?

    • Re:Beagle 3...why? (Score:1, Offtopic)

      by jmcmunn ( 307798 )

      moderation...

      redundant? It was one of the first few dozen posts...none of which came close to similar content.

      Troll? I was just trying to make a point about getting an international community together to fund the next generation of space exploration.

      Seriously, Slashdot gives out way to many mod points to people who have no idea what is going on.

      Anyway, I guess my opinions must not mesh on this topic with the almighty moderators so I will just leave it alone, and state once more that I feel space explo

    • Re:Beagle 3...why? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Ga_101 ( 755815 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @06:57PM (#10717228)
      The two NASA rovers are robotic Geologists'.

      The Beagles' are robotic Chemists.

      While the NASA robots have done a good job in the "Hummm thats interesting" way of Geology, if Beagle 2 had landed, we would know if life had existed in that area of Mars. Indeed, the head of the Beagle project has critised the two NASA rovers for lacking anything to conduct any real science.

      It is reasons like this that we need to send more robots. Beagle 2 cost a mere fraction of either of the two NASA rovers and they in turn cost a hell of a lot less than a manned mission.

      Until money is not an object (ie like in the original space race, aka "beat the commies/capitalist pig dogs"), a manned mission won't happen. This is the next best thing.
      • <I>Indeed, the head of the Beagle project has critised the two NASA rovers for lacking anything to conduct any real science.</I>

        This from a country which has never successfully landed jack or shizbot on an alien planet or ventured farther than Jupiter (on their own).
        • Of course not. We've decided to let you spend all your money laying the ground work so that we can pick it up quickly, and okay make mistakes, but less than we would had we been doing it from scratch. Hell it's only fair, the US was doing that for years. (Computers. Radar. Jet Engines. Fast than sound travel - the X1 was based mainly on a British design) We just turned the tables for a change.

  • Stick with seafaring tradition (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Camel Pilot ( 78781 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @06:05PM (#10716581) Homepage Journal
    You never name a ship after a spectacular failure

    Would you sail on the Titanic II

  • English to Metric? (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Let's hope they do a better job than JPL...

    How do you convert slugs to metric anyway?

    Should you avoid putting salt on its tail?
    • While I know you're joking, some of the folks at JPL might [nasa.gov] take [nasa.gov] issue [nasa.gov] about getting grief for screwing up missions. [nasa.gov]
    • Firstly it's known as imperial not 'English' and secondly we stopped using imperial units for engineering and science many, many years ago.

      You'll still find me using feet and inches when I'm doing a spot of carpentry in the garden shed at the weekend and I'll follow that up with a crafty pint in the local, to wash the sawdust away.

      Interestingly most timber sizes in the UK are just the imperial size expressed in millimetres, so if you ask for 90mmx90mm instead of 4-by-4 prepared, you receive blank stares,

    • According to google [google.com]:

      1 slug = 14.5939029 kilograms

  • Colin Pillinger (Score:4, Funny)

    by Timesprout ( 579035 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @06:10PM (#10716649)
    Points to mars

    Fetch Beagle2 boy, good boy Beagle3, fetch.
  • You'll notice that the Beagle 3 does NOT have the auto-triggered cloaking device equipped on the last version of the rover.

    This is estimated to save billions of dollars of lost operations budget and tylenol.
  • huh... and for a minute I thought this post was about the 'bagle' virus... no wonder the post didnt make sense.

  • Plan details involve... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @06:37PM (#10716965)
    ...sending a lander to intercept one of the mars rovers, breaking off the NASA antennas, installing a proper British antenna, and placing a Beagle 3 plaque on it.
    • ...sending a lander to intercept one of the mars rovers, breaking off the NASA antennas, installing a proper British antenna, and placing a Beagle 3 plaque on it.

      This is why NASA does not hire virus writers.

  • Earth VS Mars (Score:3, Informative)

    by Picass0 ( 147474 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @06:42PM (#10717044) Homepage Journal
    Mars Expensive Hardware Lob - The Mars Scorecard - 20:17 with Earth losing

    http://www.bio.aps.anl.gov/~dgore/fun/PSL/marssc or ecard.html

  • Things we learned: (Score:5, Funny)

    by sxltrex ( 198448 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @06:44PM (#10717079)
    Don't hit the ground so hard.

    • Don't hit the ground so hard.

      And the count shall be three and no more before pulling the holy ripcord. It shall not be four, nor five, nor six, nor include fractions, but three. Three is the count. (Apologies to Monty Python. :)

  • Mass Vs Weight (Score:3, Funny)

    by Kurayamino-X ( 557754 ) <Kurayamino@graff ... t minus caffeine> on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @07:20PM (#10717500)
    "would have a mass at entry into the Martian atmosphere of about 131kg"
    BAD science reporter! BAD! no treat for you.
    • Someone mod the parent up. Silliness has just reached a new low.
    • BAD science reporter! BAD! no treat for you.

      Actually, I think the article might be right - the total mass carried to Mars won't be the same as what enters the Martian atmosphere, thanks to there being various support equipment attached to the orbiter. Dodgy mass-to-weight calculations were probably never involved. :-)

      The original Beagle 2 apparently had a mass of 65kg [esa.int], probably including support equipment, so the new Beagle is over twice as massive.

      It seems they really got the science instrumentation [beagle2.com] ri

  • Will there be more *guaranteed* funding? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by slinted ( 374 ) on Wednesday November 03, 2004 @07:57PM (#10717919)
    MPs blame lack of cash for failure of Beagle 2 [guardian.co.uk]

    The most recent report on the failure of Beagle II, done by the House of Commons Science and Technology select committee sighted many "amateurish" funding woes and a lack of cooperation between the USA and the UK government as the underlying cause of failure. Pillenger responded by saying that they couldn't get guarantees of funding mostly because those groups didn't have the money to give. But what does that say about the success of the next project if the funding for Beagle II was dependant on groups that couldn't afford to guarantee funding but said they'd try to find the money anyway...and then failed to do so, unless they go at the next mission with a different attitude?

    NASA has backed off of its Faster-Better-Cheaper which left faster and cheaper intact, while somewhat disregarding better, in favor of Faster-Better-Fund_Projects_Appropriatly...which seems certainly to have done the trick for such projects as the Mars Exploration Rovers, which (I would agrue appropriatly) cost hundreds of millions of dollars to properly build and test for the challenges they were being asked to face.
    • above post should have read "between the ESA and UK governments"
    • Sadly Britain's industry is now run by accountants who have the power to veto projects on cost alone. Why they are allowed to do this is not known as they'd surely be engineers rather than accountants if they understood the things they were making a decision on.

      On the negative side it's hard to get funding for anything worthwhile that's going to cost more than £50 but on the plus side it does supply us with a humorous and never ending train of "Government project fails dismally" headlines, e.g. every
    • Rovers are not a member of the faster-better-cheaper group, they were extremely expensive. What belongs to this group is Mars Polar Lander which was a spectacular failure. Also Climate Orbiter, again was a failure because of the unit difference (probably an effect of rushed procedures).
    • NASA has backed off of its Faster-Better-Cheaper which left faster and cheaper intact, while somewhat disregarding better, in favor of Faster-Better-Fund_Projects_Appropriatly...which seems certainly to have done the trick for such projects as the Mars Exploration Rovers, which (I would agrue appropriatly) cost hundreds of millions of dollars to properly build and test for the challenges they were being asked to face.

      Actually MER really felt a lot of heat from budget cuts - it's amazing it's still workin
  • This [christiancarling.com] is the real Beagle the Brits should have used to get the job done right the first time!
  • May be prone to not actually even _hit_ the planet, let alone crash on it.

    Beagle2 was essentially a deadweight package dropped from an insanely high altitude. It really seems to me that the two biggest mistakes they made were A) not keeping in contact with it during descent, and B) not providing facilities on it to do minor course corrections if it turned out to be wanting to hit the atmosphere at so shallow an angle that it simply skips off the atmosphere to get lost in space.

    Now I realize that Beagle

  • Fantastic news! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ScottMaxwell ( 108831 ) on Thursday November 04, 2004 @01:54AM (#10720585) Homepage
    My only comment on Beagle 2 when the press asked me about it (as a member of the MER mission, we got that question a lot) was that I was sorry it hadn't worked out, but that the only real failure would be if the Beagle 2 team, and the British people generally, gave up and didn't do a Beagle 3. It was an inventive spacecraft design with an exciting mission, and the team behind it clearly was capable of great things.

    So I'm as happy as anyone (except maybe Dr. Pillinger :-) to see that they're going for it. From a JPL-based Martian to my friends on the Beagle 3 team (and at ESA), best of luck with Beagle 3!

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