Run For The Hills!, The flight to Winter Quarters... Options

[Jeff7]

Concerning dust, I did a quick and dirty combination of L257 and L456 images, using GIMP, from the Exploratorium.
Anyone have calibrated images? Using these, it doesn't look near as bad as it did back when it was just arriving at the Hills.

Ah, here we go. Calibrated images, except they're from much earlier in the mission. I just wonder how Spirit now compares to Sol357 in that picture.

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[helvick]

Beautifull work again! Solar panels doesn't look very dusty. How do they know how dusty the panels are ? Comparing the theoritical output relative to the actual ? Watching accumulation on the sundial ? Anybody knows

Spirit is operating at about 50%% of ideal efficiency at the moment, if the panels were perfectly clear she'd be generating around 650whr/sol.

[sattrackpro]

I just wonder how Spirit now compares to Sol357 in that picture.

Well - it is not near as good now as when Spirit first perched itself on the side of West Spur for the winter.

Just compare the the images below from Aug 2004 (left images) and those now (right images.)

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[climber]

My feeling is that pictures doesn't tell everything. I clearly remember the comments and pictures on Mer Web site as well as Steve Squyres comments after the first unexpected cleaning event. Now, seeing the last postings, I can see apparently clean panel from Jvandriel & MHoward view, then comparisons with "may be" different sun angles. Quite challenging to get a "clean" accurate status, eh ? To me, helvick's quote saying that we operate at 50% of the ideal efficiency could be a good base to get a "calibrate" pictures.

[jvandriel]

Tesheiner,

I don't mind.

I have made the same one but did not publish it.

You can see the tilt of the rover very well.


jvandriel