Mars Rover

Makes
Mission Mars
Possible
Index

Introduction
History
Capabilities
Specification
Inside
Power
Technology
Objectives
Achievements
This is mars
rover
 Mars Rover ???

A Mars rover is an automated motor

vehicle which propels itself across the
surface of the planet Mars after landing.
 Developer

Each of these rovers

was created by a group
of scientists working at
NASA

Most of the work and

development of the spacecraft take
place in the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory.
 History
Five rovers have been sent to Mars:
I. Mars 2, Prop-M rover, 1971, failed

II. Mars 3, Prop-M rover, 1971, failed

III.Sojourner rover, Mars Pathfinder,
landed successfully on July 4,
1997. Communications were lost
on September 27, 1997.
IV.Spirit (MER-A), Mars Exploration Rover,
landed successfully on January 4, 2004. Rover
was still operating as of April 2010, 6 years
after the original mission limit, but its wheels
were trapped in sand.[2] As of January 26,
2010, NASA has admitted defeat in its efforts
to free the rover and stated that it would now
function as a stationary science platform.
V. Opportunity (MER-B), Mars Exploration
Rover, landed successfully on January 25,
2004. Rover was still operating as of May
2010, surpassing the previous record for
longevity of a surface mission to Mars on
May 20.
Technical Parts
 Rover Capabilities
•Power : The rovers can generate power with their
solar panels and store it in their batteries.

•Images : The rovers can take color, stereoscopic

images of the landscape with a pair of high-
resolution cameras mounted on the mast.

•Reading : They can also take thermal readings with

a separate thermal-emission spectrometer that uses
the mast as a periscope.
 Rover Capabilities(cont.)
•Drill :The rovers have a magnifying camera,
mounted on the same arm as the drill, that
scientists can use to carefully look at the fine
structure of a rock. This drill is officially
known as the Rock Abrasion Tool (RAT).

•Analyzers : The rovers have a mass

spectrometer that is able to determine the
composition of iron-bearing minerals in rocks.
 Rover Capabilities(cont.)
•Collector : There are magnets mounted at
three different points on the rover. Iron-
bearing sand particles will stick to the magnets
so that scientists can look at them with the
cameras or analyze them with the
spectrometers.

•Communicator : The rovers can send all of this

data back to Earth using one of three different
radio antennas
Rover Specs
To pack in all of this instrumentation, motorization
and power generation, the rovers are pretty big --
perhaps the size of a small riding lawn mower. Here
are the stats :
1.5 meters (4.9 feet) high (with the mast up)
2.3 meters (7.5 feet) wide
1.6 meters (5.2 feet) long
174 kilograms (384 pounds)

Maximum speed: Perhaps 30 meters (about 100

feet) per hour, and 100 meters at most per day
 Rover Specs(cont.)
Panoramic cameras:

Pancam is a multispectral, stereoscopic, panoramic

imaging system consisting of two digital cameras
mounted on a mast 1.5 m above the Martian surface.

Cost: Approximately $820 million (for both rovers)

$645 million for design/development + $100 million for
the Delta launch vehicle and the launch + $75 million
for mission operations
Inside the Rovers

The body of a rover is an enclosed box called

the Warm Electronics Box (WEB). This box is
essential because temperatures at night can fall
to -100 degrees C (-150 F). The batteries would
stop functioning, as would many of the
electronic components, if some warmth were
not provided to get the temperature up toward 0
degrees C (32 F).
The WEB is an insulated box that contains:
Power and electronic systems
• Its power system includes two
rechargeable lithium ion batteries, that
provide energy when the sun is not
shining, especially at night.
• Over time, the batteries will degrade and
will not be able to recharge to full capacity.
 The Onboard Computer
•The rovers use a RAD6000 computer produced by BAE
systems.
•This processor is nearly identical in architecture to an
old PowerPC processor used in early Macintosh
computers. By today's standards, these processors are
slow.
•They run at 20 megahertz, about 1/100th the speed of a
typical desktop computer today.
•They have 128 kilobytes (KB) of RAM, 256 KB of flash
memory and some ROM to hold the boot code and
operating system.
•There are no disk drives.
NASA rover mission goals
• Determine whether life ever arose on Mars
• Characterize the climate of Mars
• Characterize the geology of Mars
• Prepare for human exploration
• Determine the distribution and composition of minerals,
rocks, and soils surrounding the landing sites
• Search for and characterize a variety of rocks and soils
that hold clues to past water activity
Achievements
 Reference
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_rover
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Exploration
_Rover
• http://marsrover.nasa.gov/overview/
• http://www.space.com/marsrover/
• Goggle images
Thank you