Zhurong Lander/Rover, Surface Operations at Utopia Planitia Options

[Huguet]

Full resolution panorama provided to me by someone who can get the CNSA site to load for them

Just amazed how the "Center China" path symbol is visible on this image.

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[Bill Harris]

And notice the wee sundial/gnomon on the deck!

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[Huguet]

And notice the wee sundial/gnomon on the deck!

Very Nice, we don't have a persistent magnetic filed, so we get a return to the time of the caravels... Wee sundial and i believe stars navigation at night.

Mars will quickly need a good GPS constelation...

[Bill Harris]

And the Sundial extends the tradition from the early MER Marss rovers. I wonder if there is also an inscription on the gnomon face?

--Bill

[Huguet]

And the Sundial extends the tradition from the early MER Marss rovers. I wonder if there is also an inscription on the gnomon face?

I may be wrong,.. but isn't it a second Center China symbol ? Mabe we found a new Easter Egg... hidden on the shadows this time...

If it were an easter egg, they didn't put a lot of effort into making it apparent.

Added a quick guess on what it should looks like from a front view.. the mast cam view is from a perfect side view, proportions corrected... its's just so fun to follow Zhurong... ...

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[Hungry4info]

It only (rather vaguely) looks like a 中 because of the low sun angle. The object casting the shadow appears to be cylindrical. If it were an easter egg, they didn't put a lot of effort into making it apparent.

[Bill Harris]

I have no.idea. The sundial looks like a sundial, but I can't explain that shadow. Pareidolia?

--Bill

[Huguet]

Pareidolia?

Exactly!. First Shadow is from the base of the sundial and it's coloured marks, the second one i just can't understand it... a very nice pareidolia, geometrically perfect...

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[Hungry4info]

The sundial is T-shaped, with the camera being almost co-planar with the two sections. We can see the camera-facing face of the top cylinder (pointed out in red).

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[Bill Harris]

The sundial is T-shaped, with the camera being almost co-planar with the two sections.

That was my initial conclusion, though I couldn't understand why the gnomon was T-shaped.
We can wait to see how the cast shadow behaves at higher Sun elevations, or we could build a mockup and experiment with it ourselves.

I recall playing games with the dust pools that formed and migrated around on the decks of Oppy and Spirit. I was intrigued by a ring of dust that formed on Oppy's Low Gain antenna and persisted for years. I never figured out why it formed there, and never found any pattern to it's behavior.

--Bill

[Phil Stooke]

A very interesting and welcome paper here:

https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-836162/v1

It summarizes the first 60 sols on Mars for Zhurong.

Papers on Chang'e 5 are also starting to appear now.

Phil

[Phil Stooke]

That paper includes a table of activities by sol. The table starts with landing on sol 1, but previously it seemed that the landing sol was called sol 0. I can't remember now where the sol 0 landing date came from, but I will have to revise the sol count if this becomes the new standard.

Phil

[Hungry4info]

https://twitter.com/SegerYu/status/1447033285859708931

After the solar transit period is over, the Zhurong rover will continue to travel south. First, head to the suspected sedimentary sand pile about 2 km from the current position of the rover, and conduct inspections of its composition and regional geography. According to the previously obtained life expectancy and working conditions of the Mars rover, the ground application system also hopes that Zhurong can continue to go to the suspected mud volcano area about 20 km south to conduct scientific exploration.

[Explorer1]

Opportunity-style ambition, I like it! But how will they manage such a pace if the orbiter is leaving its data relay position?

[Phil Stooke]

They should still have one relay opportunity per day with their orbiter, plus I understand they have an agreement with ESA for some additional relays if needed.

Phil