Rough Roving: Curiosity's Wheels Show Damage 78
astroengine writes "In a recent batch of images beamed back to Earth from Mars rover Curiosity's MAHLI camera, obvious signs of wear and tear could be seen in the 'skin' of the robot's wheels. Considering Curiosity is only 281 sols (Mars days) into its mission and roved less than a kilometer after landing, surely this doesn't bode well? Fortunately, there's good news. 'The wear in the wheels is expected,' Matt Heverly, lead rover driver for the MSL mission at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., told Discovery News. 'We will continue to characterize the wheels both on Mars and in the Marsyard, but we don't expect the wear to impact our ability to get to Mt. Sharp.'"
Fun fact (Score:5, Interesting)
There's a fun fact about the wheels of Curiosity. They spell out "JPL" in Morse Code in the sand of Mars. :)
Mass and Weight are different (Score:5, Interesting)
From the article:
This sounds an idea from the same people that brought us the Mars Climate Orbiter crater.
The problem with this is that Curiosity weighs 342kg but masses 900kg. Scarecrow weighs and masses 342kg. Whatever Curiosity weighs, it hitting a rock at 1m/s is still 900 newtons of force. Scarecrow hitting a rock at 1m/s is 342 newtons. The fact it drove 12km and has serviceable wheels does not make me feel better.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Mass and Weight are different (Score:4, Interesting)
F = m * a
Look it's right there, force equals *mass* times acceleration. On earth, Scarecrow is 342kg * 1g when stationary. On mars Curiosity is 900kg * 1mars-g *when stationary*. Sure the vertical force on the tires is the same when standing still, but what about the force required to stop 342kg vs 900kg of inertia if you hit a large pointy rock at 1m/s?. In this case, with the same initial velocity, the acceleration would be the same but the force experienced by Curiosity's tires would be ~3x larger (ignoring any shock absorption).