Testing of Lunar Surface Vehicles under Simulated Lunar Gravity Conditions

The autonomous robots consisting of an immovable lander and a rover are widely deployed to explore extraterrestrial planets. Two main drawbacks limit the development of this cooperative work mode: (1) it cannot perform soft-landing missions repeatedly on the planet, owing to the damage of buffer structure during soft-landing. (2) the rover’s detection area is restricted to the vicinity of the immovable lander. To overcome these problems, we have designed an innovative six-legged mobile lander with repetitive landing capacity, called “HexaMRL”, which integrates the functions of a lander and a rover including folding, deploying, repetitive landing, and walking. This novel robot’s legs adopted hybrid mechanism with active and passive compliance. Therefore, it remains to be a great challenge to analyze the robot soft-landing capacity which is determined by the parameters such as spring stiffness coefficient, damper damping coefficient, and initial tiptoe position. In order to solve the problem, the dynamic modeling and assessment criteria were established. The soft-landing process was analyzed through three numerical simulations using three sets of representative parameters based on dynamic model and the set of best effective parameters was chosen to apply in soft-landing experiment on a 5-DOF lunar gravity testing platform (5-DOF LGTP). The experiments were further verified that the selected parameters met the requirement of soft landing on the lunar surface. The HexaMRL provides novel insight for the next generation equipment for lunar exploration, which may be an efficient solution to the extraterrestrial planet exploration.

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A Method of Earth Gravity Environment to Imitate LRV Steering on the Lunar Surface

Applied Mechanics and Materials ◽

10.4028/www.scientific.net/amm.575.457 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 575 ◽

pp. 457-463

Author(s):

Zhen Liu ◽

Zhong Chao Liang ◽

Hai Bo Gao ◽

Liang Ding ◽

Zong Quan Deng

Keyword(s):

Lunar Surface ◽

Dynamic Properties ◽

Lunar Gravity ◽

Earth Gravity ◽

The Earth ◽

Detection Tool ◽

Earth Environment ◽

Relationship Of ◽

The Relationship ◽

Parameter Relation

The lunar roving vehicle (LRV) is an important and indispensable detection tool that not only can travel far from the lunar module and transport, but also need ensure the astronauts safety when driving. Thus, the driving training for the astronauts on the earth is of great significance. However, the same vehicle has the different dynamic properties under the different gravities, and it is not able to train them with same vehicle on the earth. Therefore, a method of earth environment to imitate LRV steering on the lunar surface is required. In this study, to find out the relationship of the vehicles under different gravities, a handling dynamic model of the vehicles under different gravities is built, some parameter relation coefficients of vehicles under different gravities are carried out, and all parameters of the imitating vehicle for training and imitating on the earth are solved. Finally, the simulation results in Vortex show that, the imitating vehicle, which is changed parameters from LRV, can imitate a LRV steering under the lunar gravity on the earth.

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The Geosciences Applied to Lunar Exploration

Symposium - International Astronomical Union ◽

10.1017/s0074180900178222 ◽

1962 ◽

Vol 14 ◽

pp. 169-257 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

J. Green

Keyword(s):

Lunar Surface ◽

Probable Mechanism ◽

Point Of View ◽

Lunar Exploration ◽

Geological Model ◽

Apply Geophysics ◽

Surface Features ◽

The Impact

The term geo-sciences has been used here to include the disciplines geology, geophysics and geochemistry. However, in order to apply geophysics and geochemistry effectively one must begin with a geological model. Therefore, the science of geology should be used as the basis for lunar exploration. From an astronomical point of view, a lunar terrain heavily impacted with meteors appears the more reasonable; although from a geological standpoint, volcanism seems the more probable mechanism. A surface liberally marked with volcanic features has been advocated by such geologists as Bülow, Dana, Suess, von Wolff, Shaler, Spurr, and Kuno. In this paper, both the impact and volcanic hypotheses are considered in the application of the geo-sciences to manned lunar exploration. However, more emphasis is placed on the volcanic, or more correctly the defluidization, hypothesis to account for lunar surface features.

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A Photographic Map of the Moon

Symposium - International Astronomical Union ◽

10.1017/s0074180900178179 ◽

1962 ◽

Vol 14 ◽

pp. 113-115

Author(s):

D. W. G. Arthur ◽

E. A. Whitaker

Keyword(s):

Lunar Surface ◽

The Moon ◽

Map Projection

The cartography of the lunar surface can be split into two operations which can be carried on quite independently. The first, which is also the most laborious, is the interpretation of the lunar photographs into the symbolism of the map, with the addition of fine details from telescopic sketches. An example of this kind of work is contained in Johann Krieger'sMond Atlaswhich consists of photographic enlargements in which Krieger has sharpened up the detail to accord with his telescopic impressions. Krieger did not go on either to convert the photographic picture into the line symbolism of a map, or to place this picture on any definite map projection.

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