Nasa rover breaks down on Mars [Archive]

evoluzione

Jan 22, 2004, 04:13 PM

Originally posted by Juventuz
Not much for them to grin about considering that Spirit was FAR more successful than the Beagle ever was.

oh i'm sure they're bummed but i'm also sure that a li'l wry grin appeared somewhere, after all, it did ultimately fail whether it was way more successful or not.

iGAV ... haha, reminds me of a joke, can't remember who, but they talked about putting a stereo with no plug on it on the street, next to a motor, and guaranteed the car would be on bricks before the stereo went

wdlove

Jan 22, 2004, 04:39 PM

My thoughts are with JPL for continued success with Spirit. This is probably just a temporary glitch, could be due to a whole host of reasons. All we can do now is wait till 9pm PST.

Gymnut

Jan 22, 2004, 04:56 PM

Well, it's gonna be such a huge letdown for NASA if they lose Spirit after it gave space exploration the boost it needed in the wake of the Columbia accident.

Mr. Anderson

Jan 22, 2004, 09:35 PM

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/01/22/spirit.contact/index.html

The tone is programmed into the spacecraft, to be emitted when there is a serious problem onboard.

yikes! seems they're not exactly happy....hopefully there's some magic they'll be able to perform and get it up and going again.

D

Phatpat

Jan 22, 2004, 09:46 PM

There is a good Slashdot (http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/01/22/1728224&mode=thread&tid=134&tid=160) article on this. All is not lost. They can still hear it. Maybe they will do the equivalent of restarting it? Hopefully it all works out.

idkew

Jan 22, 2004, 09:48 PM

you gotta wonder what type of safeguards are built in.

i would think that if the rover goes a week without hearing from earth, it would "restart" and revert to defaults.... not sure how possible this is, but i think it only makes sense.

phat- you beat my by 2 min...

idkew

Jan 22, 2004, 09:52 PM

from nasa:

Engineers are preparing to listen for signals and possibly send commands to restore normal communication with the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit during the martian day that begins about 3 a.m. PST Friday.

whocares

Jan 22, 2004, 10:13 PM

Originally posted by Juventuz
Not much for them to grin about considering that Spirit was FAR more successful than the Beagle ever was.

Well it's a least far more succesfull than the previous effort that crash-landed on one of the poles due to some scientist working in miles and the others in kilometers. :rolleyes:

Now that's an expensive way to learn about emperial/metric systems :p

zapp

Jan 22, 2004, 10:22 PM

Originally posted by claytonbench
Is it running Windows???

That would be an easy fix.......

CTL-ALT-DEL

And it would be good for another twenty minutes.

Frohickey

Jan 22, 2004, 10:34 PM

Originally posted by zapp
That would be an easy fix.......

CTL-ALT-DEL

And it would be good for another twenty minutes.

But martians only have two fingers... :p

jayscheuerle

Jan 22, 2004, 10:46 PM

Red screen of death...

MrMacMan

Jan 22, 2004, 10:51 PM

Wow...

Sad.

What the heck guys, NASA, you gotta check EVERY possible scenario...

Hits rock in every possible place...

Come on!

:mad:

wdlove

Jan 22, 2004, 11:16 PM

Sadly on my 11pm local news they said it has ben more than 24 hours since they got any meaning data from Spirit. Just some beeps. Ruled out bad weather on Earth. Hopefully they can fix the problem soon. A theory on my part, may the soon to be arrival of opportunity is temporarily interferring with the signal!

alphaone

Jan 23, 2004, 12:14 AM

Posted on SpaceFlightNow.com
But earlier today, a signal was sent from Earth to Mars and Spirit responded with a simple tone.

"We did send a command to the spacecraft on a specific channel and we got a response back basically saying 'yeah, I am here' and we got exactly what we expected from it. So that gave us the indication, because it is on that specific channel that we got the response, is that the spacecraft is in safe-mode. Something kind of went wrong and it put itself into a safe-mode," Elachi said.
Sounds like they can fix it...I think.
"The way we set the spacecraft is that if there is something abnormal, it goes into a certain safe-mode. The indication when we linked and it responded positively is that it is most likely in a certain safe-mode."
LOL :rolleyes:

Controllers are now preparing for the next step in sorting out the problem and bringing Spirit back to useful life.
Sounds good to me :)

Flynnstone

Jan 23, 2004, 12:37 AM

Originally posted by claytonbench
Is it running Windows???

Ya, Windows ME ( Mars Edition) :D

Sol

Jan 23, 2004, 12:48 AM

This is a dissapointment. The rover seemed to be making great progress and now, for no apparent reason it is gone. I for one hope that NASA can rescue this mission so that I can get more great desktop backgrounds for my Mac ;)

Seriously, even if this rover is lost for good there is one more landing on another part of the planet sometime on Monday morning. Fingers crossed that all goes well with that.

By the way, I am not sure what Operating System the rovers use but the CPU is a variation of the PPC. Not that it is running OS X or anything like that; apparently the memory used is only 128 MB.

alphaone

Jan 23, 2004, 01:17 AM

Originally posted by Sol
This is a dissapointment. The rover seemed to be making great progress and now, for no apparent reason it is gone. I for one hope that NASA can rescue this mission so that I can get more great desktop backgrounds for my Mac ;)

Seriously, even if this rover is lost for good there is one more landing on another part of the planet sometime on Monday morning. Fingers crossed that all goes well with that.

It's not gone, it's just probably temporarily incapacitated (I hope this is the case). If you read my last post you would see.

I hope that Opportunity gets it's opportunity to do better. Second time's a charm ;)

apparently the memory used is only 128 MB.
Edit: Nevermind. you're right.
The rovers are equipped with three types of memory: 128 megabytes of random access memory, or RAM, which holds real-time data that is wiped out when power is lost; 256 megabytes of flash RAM, which holds data with or without power; and programmable memory, which is used to store critical flight software.

Edit: Update:
Global Surveyor made its pass over and did not detect any signal from the rover. This is not exactly a bad thing though as if the rover really is in safe mode as they think it is then it wouldn't attempt such a communication anyway. They are getting ready for a low data rate communication secession on the same channel that they received the "heart beat" on this morning. This will occur tonight when Earth rises.

Cross your fingers!

Doctor Q

Jan 23, 2004, 02:09 AM

A news story said they hope it is a software problem, in which case they may be able to correct it by downloading new software to the rover. Wouldn't that be uploading? Especially when it's "up there" on Mars!

Mr. Anderson

Jan 23, 2004, 10:22 AM

Well its communicating again....

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/01/23/spirit.contact/index.html

Now if they can just get things back and running full speed again.

Tomorrow the other rover comes in for a landing....

D

G4scott

Jan 23, 2004, 10:38 AM

you know, we're going to come across some broken rover or something on Mars several years from now, and be like "WTF is this??? who built it??? Why is it here??? oh, wait... nevermind..."

I could just see a NASA programmer sitting in front of his computer, checking lines of code, and then suddenly freezing, seeing that the glitch is just one character out of place...

Mars... Eater of space ships...

Mr. Anderson

Jan 23, 2004, 10:42 AM

Imagine how much you'd get on ebay for one of these rovers in a few years....if you could actually get them :p

Even some of the Apollo stuff on the moon would be priceless - and a little easier to get to :D

D

jayscheuerle

Jan 23, 2004, 10:48 AM

Originally posted by Mr. Anderson
Tomorrow the other rover comes in for a landing....

I knew it! The partial information conveyed from Australia inadvertently triggered a conflict in the program. The Spirit rover has lost its mind, a la HAL in 2001. This is 2004, A Mars Odyssey. Spirit is all speed ahead to the landing spot of Opportunity, where it will engage the other rover in a Martian Battle-bot competition!

BE THERE as the rovers do spectral analysis of each other (Sweet!!) and drill 5mm deep holes into each other in a fight to the death (while searching for life). Bring your own landing bags because this one will be OUT OF THIS WORLD!!!

patrick0brien

Jan 23, 2004, 11:54 AM

-jayscheuerle

Battlebots, Mars edition!

jayscheuerle

Jan 23, 2004, 12:31 PM

I know everything hasn't been quite right with me...but I can assure you now...very confidently...that it's going to be all right again. I feel much better now. I really do.

Doctor Q

Jan 23, 2004, 02:06 PM

It's lucky for Apple that Spirit seems spirited again. Today's QuickTime News to e-mail subscribers has a headline story "Getting in the spirit of Mars". Apple certainly wouldn't want to associate itself with a broken-down rover on its most embarrassing day. So that's one more reason to hope that Spirit will be happily prancing all over the surface of Mars again.

wdlove

Jan 23, 2004, 03:30 PM

On the "David Letterman Show" last evening his guest was Dr. Jim Garven, NASA scientist. Dr. Garven works on the Mars project. He said that they are receiving bleeps from Spirit. "There are a lot of very talented scientists at ther moment working on this. The task is to determing what mode it is in and how to wake it up. We are also focusing on the Opportunity, that is due to land on Mars early Sunday morning EST.

Doctor Q

Jan 23, 2004, 05:11 PM

Let me be the first to point out that if Spirit wasn't sending us its usual data and photographs for 2 days, we don't actually know where it was for those 2 days. Could it have been taking a little side trip it doesn't want us to know about? When will Oliver Stone get us some answers?

Tyler.Schmaltz

Jan 23, 2004, 06:17 PM

If the rover problems is hardware related they should have used apple computers

Frohickey

Jan 23, 2004, 08:48 PM

RAD6000 Space Computer (http://www.iews.na.baesystems.com/business/pdfs/02_d22_001.pdf)

RAD6000 is 32 bit
33MHz
8 KB cache
3.3v
running VxWorks OS
same as the one used in the Mars Pathfinder

When was Spirit launched? Couldn't they have used the RAD750 (PowerPC based)?

Mr. Anderson

Jan 23, 2004, 11:25 PM

Originally posted by Frohickey
RAD6000 Space Computer (http://www.iews.na.baesystems.com/business/pdfs/02_d22_001.pdf)

RAD6000 is 32 bit
33MHz
8 KB cache
3.3v
running VxWorks OS
same as the one used in the Mars Pathfinder

When was Spirit launched? Couldn't they have used the RAD750 (PowerPC based)?

Scary to think that the processor is so friggin slow - and all because it has to be shielded from radiation.

And this processor is pre PowerPC....:eek:

D

MrMacMan

Jan 23, 2004, 11:29 PM

Originally posted by Tyler.Schmaltz
If the rover problems is hardware related they should have used apple computers

*sigh*

Yeah that would have worked... but not really.

idkew

Jan 24, 2004, 12:37 AM

but, you must realize, the newest technology is not necessarily the most robust technology. i doubt nasa wanted to save a few hundred/thousand dollars by using an old piece of hardware, especially an important one such as the cpu.

Doctor Q

Jan 24, 2004, 01:31 AM

We Americans on the west coast are luckier than those of you on the east coast. After all, we only have to wait until Saturday for Opportunity to land, while you have to wait until Sunday! (And we get to sleep 3 hours later than you every single workday!) ;)

Let's hope for a smooth (despite being bouncy) landing for Opportunity. As of two days ago, the landing site (called Meridiani Planum) weather report (http://www.msss.com/mars_images/moc/mer_weather/weather/17.23.Jan.04.MER.html) was:No dust storms or water ice clouds. Local dust storm activity was noted on several occasions 2100 km NW of the site. These storms lasted less than 48 huours and showed no substantial southward movement and are not expected to effect(*) weather conditions for the Opportunity landing.(*) Note: They mean "affect"!

idkew

Jan 24, 2004, 02:02 AM

Quote:

The commonest meanings of Affect (a verb never a noun) are:
To produce a change in, To influence, to have an effect on.

Quote:

Effectis both a noun and a verb. As a verb it means: 'To accomplish,'to achieve,' To bring about,'To result in';

Quote:

Effect as a noun, 'That which is produced by an agent or cause,' a conseqence of, An impression left on the mind

these two words suck.

Snowy_River

Jan 24, 2004, 02:43 AM

So, in fact, they either meant 'affect the weather' or 'effect a change in the weather'. Two different ways of correcting their english...

To me this whole situation highlights how much more versatile having real human beings up there would be. I've heard that, if we wanted to we could actually have someone on Mars inside a decade. Of course, in order to do that Bush would actually have to foot some of the bill during his presidency. But the knowledge that we really are that close is kind of exciting to me. Now if only they'd press on with it... Make it happen...

jayscheuerle

Jan 24, 2004, 12:15 PM

Originally posted by Snowy_River
To me this whole situation highlights how much more versatile having real human beings up there would be.

Possibly, but this may be a critical hardware failure. It's not like astronauts that have a critical hardware failure can run to CompMARS and buy a replacement. A catastrophic failure on Spirit means it quits working. For humans, it means death.

There's only so much you can do to help a robotic probe or a landing party from so far away. Failures like this should underline just how difficult and unpredictably problematic space exploration can be. Take this as a cautionary note, not a rallying cry to send people to Mars.

It's all fun and games until somebody loses and dies.

Java

Jan 24, 2004, 12:39 PM

"We spent ninety jillion dollars,
trying to get a look at Mars,
I hear universal laughter ringing out among the stars."

-Jimmy Buffett

wdlove

Jan 24, 2004, 02:18 PM

This is just a very sad situation, said best by NASA secientists, mission 'critical.' An example where humans are a needed quanity, they could possibly fix the hardware problem. Without humans space exploration would not be as far.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/01/24/mars_rover_critical_scientists_say/

Snowy_River

Jan 24, 2004, 03:38 PM

Originally posted by jayscheuerle
Possibly, but this may be a critical hardware failure. It's not like astronauts that have a critical hardware failure can run to CompMARS and buy a replacement. A catastrophic failure on Spirit means it quits working. For humans, it means death.

There's only so much you can do to help a robotic probe or a landing party from so far away. Failures like this should underline just how difficult and unpredictably problematic space exploration can be. Take this as a cautionary note, not a rallying cry to send people to Mars.

It's all fun and games until somebody loses and dies.

A couple of points. First, explorers have always risked their lives. How many of the early explorers that travelled across the Atlantic Ocean in search of the new world die enroute? It's only in modern times that we seem to think that if there's any chance that someone could die doing something that we shouldn't do it.

Next, part of the problem with the rovers is that they have to be technologically complex enough to function by themselves without someone there to help take care of them. It is simply true that the technology needed to keep someone alive on Mars isn't that complex. It is, essentially, 1960s or 1970s technology. To make a rover function and perform various experiments, it takes more like 1990s technology. Sure, advanced 'toys' could be taken up with a manned flight, but then if something went wrong with them, there would be a practical way to try to figure out what.

The simple truth is that we already have the technology to send a manned space flight to Mars and back. We could do it within the next 5 to 10 years. But it couldn't be done the way that NASA seems to like to do things, packing as much bleeding edge technology in as possible. (Note that right now, for space, 1990s technology is bleeding edge.) Of course, there a small matter of being willing to invest the money that it would take either way.

In any event, I hope that they can figure out what's going wrong with Spirit, eventually. I've heard that the problems with Spirit have now been put on the back burner until they get Opportunity down.

(Oh, just as a final note, I took this as a 'rallying cry to send people to Mars', rather than as a 'cautionary note', simply because I've heard so many people talking about how perfect the robotic space program is, and that there's no need to send people to Mars because robots can do it all, and so on. I am a human space program advocate. However, that said, I do understand that this must also be taken as a cautionary note.)

Snowy_River

Jan 25, 2004, 12:17 AM

Here's some good news...

Hours before NASA's Opportunity rover will reach Mars, engineers have found a way to communicate reliably with its twin, Spirit, and to get Spirit's computer out of a cycle of rebooting many times a day.

Doctor Q

Jan 25, 2004, 01:10 AM

Two questions:

Are there separate teams on the ground for each rover? I can't believe they would waste Spirit's abilities rather than use it to the maximum possible, just because they were sharing staff time at JPL between it and Opportunity.

The Spirit ground staff adjusted their daily life to keep on the same schedule as Spirit's day. Since Opportunity is on the other side of Mars, will the Opportunity staff have the opposite hours?

alphaone

Jan 25, 2004, 01:54 AM

They're having problems with the Rover's Flash memory:
From Spaceflightnow.com
"So we have a vehicle that is stable now in power and thermal," Theisinger said. "We have a working hypothesis that we have confirmed. The fault protection to the best of our estimation has worked as designed. It took us a lot to figure out what was going on, but we think everything has worked in the fault protection as we expected it to do."

But Spirit is not yet out of the woods. Flight controllers must develop an efficient way to operate Spirit in cripple mode, without flash memory, until they can determine exactly what happened to cause the problem in the first place. If the flash memory cannot be recovered - and it will take quite a while to figure that out - the team must develop new procedures to operate the entire mission with the RAM memory.
:( :) ;)

Snowy_River

Jan 25, 2004, 12:00 PM

Originally posted by alphaone
They're having problems with the Rover's Flash memory:

:( :) ;)

I shudder to think that maybe there was a non-radiation hardened RAM chip that got sent up...

Doctor Q

Jan 25, 2004, 03:21 PM

It's interesting that Opportunity landed almost exactly at the center of the Mars map, 0 degrees latitude and 0 degrees longitude.

Since the Mars equator (0 degrees latitude) is defined as the circle perpendicular to the axis of rotation, halfway between the poles, it is a real, scientific property of the planet. The Mars rovers needed to stay in the central latitudes in order to have the most sunlight to power themselves. It just so happened that the desired landing site for Opportunity, the Meridiani Planus, is very near the equator. It looks like Opportunity is a little south of the equator, but I haven't seen the exact coordinates.

Longitude on Mars, as on Earth, is a measure around the planet, starting from an arbitrary point (the prime meridian) selected simply by agreement. It just so happens that the Mars prime meridian, picked long ago by astronomers, is where Opportunity was headed. The name Meridiani Planus comes from "meridian" and "plain".

I wonder if Opportunity is east or west of 0 degrees longitude, and whether it is much south of the equator. Does anybody know the landing coordinates?

Mr. Anderson

Jan 25, 2004, 03:30 PM

I really like the fact that the location looks quite different from Spirit's landing zone.

I hope they get more pictures up soon. :D

Doctor Q - how do they determine lat and lon? There is no GPS equivalent for Mars yet. Do mission control look at the pics, determine the position, then tell the rover where it is? I didn't think the magnetic field on Mars is all that strong either - is there a discernible magnetic North?

D

Doctor Q

Jan 25, 2004, 04:12 PM

Your questions are good, and I am simply guessing.

The keys to defining the map are (1) the axis of rotation, which determines the orientation for mapping (i.e., which way is north) and (2) the surface features that allow us recognize a particular place on the surface, through which we draw the prime meridian. The rest is just measurement, dividing the surface into degrees.

The keys to measuring to determine the current location, I would assume, are based on looking at the relative positions of the stars and planets. From which stars are above the horizon in each direction, you should be able to compute your location on the planet.

I wonder if having two rovers on opposite sides of the planet lets scientists make any measurements, using triangulation, that they couldn't do as accurately before?

Snowy_River

Jan 25, 2004, 06:58 PM

Originally posted by Mr. Anderson
I really like the fact that the location looks quite different from Spirit's landing zone.

I hope they get more pictures up soon. :D

Doctor Q - how do they determine lat and lon? There is no GPS equivalent for Mars yet. Do mission control look at the pics, determine the position, then tell the rover where it is? I didn't think the magnetic field on Mars is all that strong either - is there a discernible magnetic North?

D

As Dr. Q noted, the lat and lon on Mars were defined a long time ago. Also, lat and lon were defined on Earth long before GPS existed.

The rover doesn't need to know where it is, lat and lon wise. It only really matters to us. The rover will only operate within a relatively small radius of its landing site, so lat and lon are not an effective means of measuring location.

As to Mars' magnetic field, as I understand it, it is no where near as strong or reliable as Earth's. You could use a compass to get you within about 20-30 degrees of North, and from there you'd want to use the stars to get a true bearing.

MrMacMan

Jan 26, 2004, 12:19 AM

Originally posted by idkew
but, you must realize, the newest technology is not necessarily the most robust technology. i doubt nasa wanted to save a few hundred/thousand dollars by using an old piece of hardware, especially an important one such as the cpu.

I didn't know a good drive was hard to come by...

Flash memory?

Bah, why, why?

How about you get some ECC memory... and a tested flash memory... bah.

Lat and Long ... intresting.

Snowy_River

Jan 26, 2004, 01:20 AM

Originally posted by MrMacman
I didn't know a good drive was hard to come by...

Flash memory?

Bah, why, why?

How about you get some ECC memory... and a tested flash memory... bah.

Lat and Long ... intresting.

Hard drives are far more susceptible to radiation damage than physical RAM, flash or otherwise. So, the reason that the rovers use flash RAM instead of drives is for durability issues...

Frohickey

Jan 26, 2004, 04:09 PM

Originally posted by jayscheuerle
There's only so much you can do to help a robotic probe or a landing party from so far away. Failures like this should underline just how difficult and unpredictably problematic space exploration can be. Take this as a cautionary note, not a rallying cry to send people to Mars.

It's all fun and games until somebody loses and dies.

Just because there is the possibility of systems failure and death does not mean we should not try.

If everyone subscribed to that way of thinking, we'd still be living inside cold dark caves, hoping that animals don't come in to eat us.

Mr. Anderson

Jan 26, 2004, 04:13 PM

Originally posted by Snowy_River
Hard drives are far more susceptible to radiation damage than physical RAM, flash or otherwise. So, the reason that the rovers use flash RAM instead of drives is for durability issues...

not just durability - but when you pull Gs on liftoff and landing/re-entry, a harddrive won't really work well under those circumstances. They use flash memory drives in combat aircraft as well for the same reason.

D

jayscheuerle

Jan 26, 2004, 04:19 PM

Originally posted by Frohickey
Just because there is the possibility of systems failure and death does not mean we should not try.

If everyone subscribed to that way of thinking, we'd still be living inside cold dark caves, hoping that animals don't come in to eat us.

No. Of course not. But technologically, we are a long, long way from being able to send people to Mars. Contrary to some people's beliefs, this isn't merely going to the Moon, but farther. There's a bevy of problems that we haven't even begun to tackle that don't even have to do with propulsion. Going to Mars is a swell idea, but don't count on it happening in the next 25 years. It boggles my mind how simple of an endeavor most people (including President Bush) make this out to be. The problems with it have very little to do with desire and budget. It's simply far beyond our ability right now. Let's take the steps if we want to, but put all this silly "send a man to Mars" talk aside until the most basic of problems (like life-support) are worked out.

Frohickey

Jan 26, 2004, 04:20 PM

Mr. Anderson

Jan 26, 2004, 05:32 PM

Originally posted by Frohickey
Huh?

GPS did not invent latitude and longitude!

Here is a history lesson for navigation (http://www.boatsafe.com/kids/navigation.htm)

As far as I can tell, latitude is how far away from the equator, and longitude is long far away from one particular point.

Uh, I know that - my point is that determining lat and lon is made more difficult with out GPS, especially for a robot. I know about the history of navigation - but one thing that's made even more difficult on Mars is the very weak magnetic field. The one good thing is that the clock on the rovers is quite accurate. Regardless, you still need to have some sort of reference points - I was just wondering what they use - could it be stars?

D

idkew

Jan 26, 2004, 05:53 PM

Originally posted by Mr. Anderson
could it be stars?

D

i know that it uses stars and planets to point its antenna towards earth, so it wouldn't be a leap for it to figure out its location with the stars.

but- why does it need to know where it is on mars? stars would not be accurate enough for the small movements it makes, neither would gps, if mars had it.

i just think it needs to know left from right and forward from back. we know generally where it is, we can tell it to go "over there", "100 yards straight forward..."

as long as it knows where the point of origin is located, it will know where it currently is located. no lat/lon needed.

Snowy_River

Jan 26, 2004, 06:11 PM

Originally posted by jayscheuerle
No. Of course not. But technologically, we are a long, long way from being able to send people to Mars.

Would you care to explain your credentials for making such a proclamation?

I've listened to aerospace experts talk on this subject, and they have all concurred that we have the technology today to go to Mars. Spending the money to get there is another matter. But, if the money were available, the general estimates that I've heard are that if we were to start now, we could have a flight heading for Mars in about 7 to 8 years, 10 at the outside...

jayscheuerle

Jan 27, 2004, 12:13 AM

Originally posted by Snowy_River
Would you care to explain your credentials for making such a proclamation?

I've listened to aerospace experts talk on this subject, and they have all concurred that we have the technology today to go to Mars. Spending the money to get there is another matter. But, if the money were available, the general estimates that I've heard are that if we were to start now, we could have a flight heading for Mars in about 7 to 8 years, 10 at the outside...

One word: biosphere.

We can get people there. We just can't keep them alive for that long.

That's ridiculous to say we have the technology. Where is it? What is it doing? We've tested nothing remotely like this type of endeavor. This is HUGELY complicated. Heck, 30 years is probably being generous. For every idealistic, sci-fi-fan aerospace expert you hear spouting off on the latest Discovery Channel special, there another more seasoned, realistic expert whose sound-bites aren't the stuff ratings are made of. It's folly and politico talk here, but don't take my word for it. Watch, wait, and see it all dissolve right before your eyes.

I think it would be way-cool to go to Mars, but it's not like this is planned out and has blueprints locked away in a closet. The scary thing is, it could be 15 years and half a trillion dollars before we decide to abandon this idea. Like the "Star Wars" program, whose technology was always right around the corner. 20 years and billions of dollars later- nothing.

But this is the stuff dreams are made of, so dream on...

Snowy_River

Jan 27, 2004, 03:07 AM

Originally posted by jayscheuerle
One word: biosphere.

What does that have to do with a trip to Mars? I highly doubt that the first trip will be to establish a colony. And even if they did, the approach taken in the Biosphere project was significantly flawed. Did you know that one of the biggest problems that they had was crazy ants? They clogged up the electrical outlets. Do you really think that crazy ants will be a problem on Mars?

In any event, primary methods of food production on Mars would be based not on standard cultivation (which is what Biosphere did), but rather on hydroponics, at least until they can properly convert Martian soil to grow Earth crops.

...That's ridiculous to say we have the technology. Where is it? What is it doing? We've tested nothing remotely like this type of endeavor. This is HUGELY complicated. Heck, 30 years is probably being generous. For every idealistic, sci-fi-fan aerospace expert you hear spouting off on the latest Discovery Channel special, there another more seasoned, realistic expert whose sound-bites aren't the stuff ratings are made of...

Uh, for the record, I never said that I heard these experts on the Discovery channel. The fact is that I've heard these as part of the graduate colloquium series at U of A. These were talks held at the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory as a cross over between the physics and astronomy departments. Please try to tell me that this was about 'ratings'.

... It's folly and politico talk here, but don't take my word for it. Watch, wait, and see it all dissolve right before your eyes.

Now, I'm not saying that won't happen. But, if it does it won't be because we don't have the technology to do it. It will simply be a matter of money and politics that will keep us from doing it...

...Like the "Star Wars" program, whose technology was always right around the corner. 20 years and billions of dollars later- nothing...

Yes, but the experts were questioning whether or not SDI was even possible, one of whom work at the U of A physics dept.

Snowy_River

Jan 27, 2004, 03:12 AM

Originally posted by jayscheuerle
One word: biosphere.

Oh, one other thing, this is a reference to Biosphere 2, right?

Here's a little quiz. Do you know where Biosphere 1 is?

patrick0brien

Jan 27, 2004, 08:53 AM

Originally posted by jayscheuerle
That's ridiculous to say we have the technology. Where is it? What is it doing?

-jayscheuerle

Humans really do have the technology now to go. In fact, we are better prepared to go to Mars now, than NASA was in going to the Moon when they succeeded in landing on it.

The challenge, is that the technology is scattered all over the place. Bob Zubrin and his Mars Direct plan solves the transportation issue, and all of it's client issues (and the project plan is all fleshed out BTW - no money need be spent by NASA to develop this). The operations on Devon Island in Canada and in the Dry Valleys of Antarctica have proven the human life support and subsistence technology and methods - and training to boot!

We can do it, we just need the motivation. This Moon base and trip to Mars is the best idea to come out of Bush's mouth, perhaps ever IMHO.

jayscheuerle

Jan 27, 2004, 09:06 AM

Originally posted by Snowy_River
Oh, one other thing, this is a reference to Biosphere 2, right?

Here's a little quiz. Do you know where Biosphere 1 is?

It's a reference to Earth.

My reference to a biosphere had nothing to do with establishing a colony on Mars. It had to do with producing enough food for a trip that's going to take 18 months round trip, minimum, providing we have the best of all alignments. Remember, the recent trips to Mars took advantage of the fact that we were the closest we've been to it in 60,000 years. Don't talk about all theses experimental engines that they cover in the back of Wired. The only thing that we know we can use to move large mass is conventional rocketry, so this trip's going to take a while.

Let's say we don't produce food along the way. We pack it. How many people will send out there? With all the effort that would go into this, and considering that we'd most likely be taking off from orbit because the ship would be HUGE (we're not talking X-Wing fighter here), we'd probably send about 6 (just a guess). There'd need to be a great group dynamic. 18 months of food (better make it 24 in case something goes wrong) for 6 people is a LOT. I'm sure we'd be making a mess along the way, jettisoning our turdsteroids into space, but we'd still be needing something the size of a semi-truck just for food.

It would be a boring as heck trip too. Exercise and checkers. Science could be done, but really... that's what the Space Station is supposed to be for, right? Speaking of which, a Mars craft would probably end up looking a bit like the Space Station, with solar panels everywhere, modules splayed every which way, leaks... Hey, let's just put some boosters on there and send it towards Mars!

There is great romance in the idea of jettisoning off to Mars, and I'm not saying it can't be done. It's just not the "pack our bags and go" type of scenario that's being tossed out. I'm not even saying it's not worth doing, but by pushing the vision of it happening anytime soon, this administration is merely going to frustrate a short-attention-span nation and end up having the entire program cancelled. We have propulsion inefficiencies to deal with. We have life support to deal with. We have psychological issues that are going to be difficult to predict (how would YOU feel when your home planet is no brighter than the brightest star?). Call them baby steps, but they are HUGE baby steps. Methodically attack them and we'll get there someday. We're just nowhere near ready yet. - j

Snowy_River

Jan 27, 2004, 11:58 AM

Originally posted by jayscheuerle
...a trip that's going to take 18 months round trip, minimum...

Well, again, for the record, I'm not a reader of Wired, I don't base what I'm talking about on things I've learned on TV or reading magazines. Most of what I'm talking about comes from people that I've directly interacted with both here at U of A and guests who have come to lecture here.

Based on what I know, to best equip the astronaughts to deal with landing on Mars, the trip should be taken under power, not at drift. Yes, this will mean that the fuel supply needed will be extensive, but the trip will be more on the order of six months round trip, or shorter, depending on the level of thrust used.

...I'm not even saying it's not worth doing, but by pushing the vision of it happening anytime soon, this administration is merely going to frustrate a short-attention-span nation and end up having the entire program cancelled...

Yes, but even if you're right and we need new technologies to get there, how is leaving the space program to languish in LEO going to develop those programs? This is what has been happening for the past two decades. NASA's manned space program has been, essentially, without a purpose. If NASA isn't working toward a goal, then, as you say, our 'short-attention-span nation' will think that it's just wasting money (which is what most of the public has felt for the past, uh, what is it, oh, yeah, two decades). NASA once had, in relative dollars, four times the budget that it has now. It's been significantly cut back in the past two decades.

...Don't talk about all theses experimental engines that they cover in the back of Wired. ...

... (we're not talking X-Wing fighter here)...

Okay, now, please stop using phrases like these. They are insulting and putting down my knowledge. I've only ever asked where your information comes from. So far as I can tell, your information seems primarily like FUD. If you're not willing to have a civil discussion of this topic, then I'd rather not discuss it with you.

Mr. Anderson

Jan 27, 2004, 12:15 PM

Nuclear powered craft are well within the realm of possibility. And the fuel supply is significantly smaller than conventional power sources. But there are issues with using nuclear in a manned craft.

And even if you were under power the whole way there, once you reach the half way point, you have to turn around and *reduce* velocity. But if you could create enough thrust, even a continual .5 G, that would solve the problem of long term effects of weightlessness.

But all of this is scifi right now. Just because we can build it, doesn't mean we should. There are many more things that need to be done before a Apollo-esque mission to Mars.

D

jayscheuerle

Jan 27, 2004, 12:26 PM

Originally posted by Snowy_River
If you're not willing to have a civil discussion of this topic, then I'd rather not discuss it with you.

I apologize for coming across as insulting Snowy. I mean no offense. :)

A simple Google search of phrases like "Mars trip difficulties" will point you to many articles (mostly from the States and Russia, NASA included) that have to deal with the difficulties astronauts will face in going to Mars.

To ask the average rocket-scientist about the feasibility of going to mars is like asking Emiril about the tastyness of food. Of course, they want to believe in our ability to go to the Red Planet. Why do you think they pursued those fields in the first place? Take their "information" with the same grain of salt which you would anything coming from The Mars Society.

Here's a few buried tidbits:

Fuel Issues (http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/SP-4026/noord59.html)

Psychological Issues (http://209.157.64.200/focus/f-news/1062578/posts)

Interesting scenario. (http://newsfromrussia.com/science/2004/01/20/51957.html)

Take what you will from any of that. Information is only and good and biased as its source.

I don't want to be snide. You believe this is going to happen soon. I don't. You're a hopeless romantic. I'm a negative ninny. But in the end, we'll both be happy if this happens anywhere within our lifetimes.

- j

jayscheuerle

Jan 27, 2004, 12:28 PM

Originally posted by Mr. Anderson
Nuclear powered craft are well within the realm of possibility. And the fuel supply is significantly smaller than conventional power sources. But there are issues with using nuclear in a manned craft.

One interesting article I stumbled across said that with conventional rocketry, a round-trip flight to Mars would require 98-99% of the mass of the craft to be devoted to fuel.

Snowy_River

Jan 27, 2004, 01:05 PM

Originally posted by jayscheuerle
I apologize for coming across as insulting Snowy. I mean no offense. :)

Appology accepted, thanks.

A simple Google search of phrases like "Mars trip difficulties" will point you to many articles (mostly from the States and Russia, NASA included) that have to deal with the difficulties astronauts will face in going to Mars.

Oh, I certainly agree that there are difficulty issues. There have been plenty of those with any manned (or unmanned) trip into space. But they aren't insurmountable.

To ask the average rocket-scientist about the feasibility of going to mars is like asking Emiril about the tastyness of food. Of course, they want to believe in our ability to go to the Red Planet. Why do you think they pursued those fields in the first place? Take their "information" with the same grain of salt which you would anything coming from The Mars Society.

Except that one of the speakers was a specialist in the field. He was talking specifically about the state of technology as it relates to the manned space program and exploration of the solar system. I'd tend to take his opinion with a bit of a smaller grain of salt, at least as it relates to the question of whether or not we're technologically capable.

I don't want to be snide. You believe this is going to happen soon. I don't. You're a hopeless romantic. I'm a negative ninny. But in the end, we'll both be happy if this happens anywhere within our lifetimes.

- j

Alas, I really don't. I don't think that the public has the interest spend the money to do it. I guess my best hope is that space does become privatized. The private sector has a far better record of pushing things to happen faster than government, at least in some areas.

My understanding is that, here in the US anyway, NASA is a government supported monopoly. That is to say that it would be illegal for me to form my own space agency and launch rockets into space on US soil.

And, also, weren't the explorers of old private adventurers most of the time? Granted they had government sponsorship, but they weren't expeditions created by the government.

Yeah, we'll both be happy to see it in our lifetime...