Actually there are more costs due to the MMRTG.
1. MSL is contributing money for the development of it
2. There are launch vehicle mods
3. there are launch approval costs
4. there are launch processing costs

True; close oppositions of Mars only happen every 17 years, so the next such opportunity (ta-dah, dah!) won't be until 2020.

Wasn't Delta II possible in 2005 and/or 2007 with a Venus and/or Earth gravity assist?

The vehicles weren't design for that. Per Peter T., it was 2003 or the NASM

I know MER wasn't designed for that; the assumption was that the spacecraft would be modified for inner solar system cruise. My understanding is that there was trajectory analysis done that identified an Earth and/or Venus gravity assist for either the '03 or '05 launch opportunities.

Whether it was feasible is another issue, but assuming it was, then Delta II could have handled it.

Rob,
How is MSL going to keep the sand out of its wheels? I noticed in the pictures from Emily that there wasn't much of a guard on the sides of the wheels to keep out sand and rocks.

Rob,

There is a thread here at UMSF discussing possible names for MSL. I know
that you have no control over the naming of MSL (isn't that a shame?), and
that someone over in NASA HQ will decide. Here are my questions -

1. Can you let us at UMSF know who that bureaucrat is and how we
can contact him/her?

2. Do you have any favorite name, or names, for MSL?

3. Is there a "pet" name for MSL at JPL?

4. Have you heard other names suggested by JPL engineers?


I know that these are not technical questions, but I still think that they are important.
Names go a long way in helping the public identify with a mission.
Imagine if, instead of Stardust, the comet mission was named Flypaper-1.

Also, I am tired of the "let the school kids name the mission" trend.
I would rather have the project team name the project.
If that isn't allowed, how about opening up a naming program on the Internet,
open to Everyone, including adults and school kids. If you get a million suggestions,
then count your blessings in that amount of public interest. If that happens, pick
a thousand out randomly, have someone read all of those, and pick 10 finalists.
Then let the American Idol crowd vote for their favorite.

Another Phil

Mike Griffin and I am not joking

I can't speak for Rob or anybody at JPL, but I have never, ever heard any name for the vehicle other than MSL. JPL has never been big on "pretty names" for spacecraft: witness Mariner 9, Viking 2, etc. It's only been fairly recently that names started being used (Galileo and Magellan were the first I recall, obviously when you only have one spacecraft per mission type you can't use a number) and even then, those programs were often referred to as Jupiter Orbiter/Probe and Venus Radar Mapper, respectively. I will always think of Mars Climate Orbiter and Mars Polar Lander as the Mars Surveyor 1998 Orbiter and Lander; the names (pretty lame in that case) usually come very late in the process. There are plenty of people who still call Spirit and Opportunity MER-A and MER-B (or MER-2 and MER-1

Sometimes the assembly techs have pet names for spacecraft, but they're not always printable :-)

Include me in this group

I can't understand why the MER test rover couldn't be modified and used in a future Mars mission. I'm sure that the test rover hasn't gone through the rigorous space qualification processes of the other two rovers but its basic structure should be the same. I would think that it would cost maybe a tenth the cost of a new rover. It could be made better than the original rovers (as you stated) by adding better solar arrays, software and etc.

http://www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/solars...mer-050606.html

Because it has be used over and over in the Mars yard. All the parts would need to be clean and requalified.It has no brains. There is no lander or cruise stage, so it doesn't really save any money

Well that's interesting. What makes you think it's just him?

Because the Admin has the final say.

As for bureaucrats, involved: Alan Stern, Doug Mcquistion (sp?) Mars program executive,

I've been told that the original in-house names for MER-A and B were Itchy and Scratchy. IMHO, those names would have been better than the lame ones actually used.

Oh - I heard other names got used once or twice given the months of 50,60,70+ hour weeks involved.

Those got mentioned here. Divorce was one, can't remember the others.

Hi Hendric,

I do not know the answer. My first take on the matter is that it looks like the wheel design is tolerant to rocks and sand entering the wheel cavity as MER was intended (but ultimately, it turned out not not to be). You will recall that MER had a bit of a challenge with potato-sized rocks getting stuck between the inner wall of the wheel and the axel. The spacing on MSL's design is much larger (should we worry about eggplant sized rocks?). But I will ask the mobility team's lead engineers Jaime and Chris. They may yet want to close out the gaps as was done with the fill material and kapton used on MER. There is still time.

thanks!

-Rob

You are right Mike. For reasons that probably lurk deep in the neuronal structure of us Dilbert-like engineers we find ourselves quickly getting comfortable with TLAs (three letter acronyms). MSL runs off our lips as loquaciously as VCR, EDL, PC and iPhone.

I have to agree that it is odd, but we really did not have special names for the two rovers under construction in ATLO (assembly, test & launch ops) during late 2002 and 2003 other than MER-1 & MER-2. We are a dull lot aren't we?

We did have unique names for some of our hardware that we used in jest. One particular "flight" rover's electronics module (REM) was put through its test paces inside inside a thermal chamber (hot & cold) where we had inadverantly let in ambient (not dry) air after it had been cold. The result was a soaking wet set of very expensive electronics. Forever after we called it the incredible "Aqua REM". This same REM took a turn on (I think) MER-1 / Opportunity and found iteslf getting zapped on an AC outlet by accident. We decided that neither rain nor sleet nor electircal shock would hinder that REM. It worked fine but we still decided it would be best it remained on mother earth. It still lives in the testbed.

When I first started working JPL (as a student electronics draftsman), I worked on what was still called "JOP" or Jupiter Orbiter Probe. It was renamed Gallieo soon just after I arrived around 1980 (it was scheduled to be launched in '83 or '84 by then I think). It took us a while to get used to "Gallieo". Some folks really did not like it, but we got used to it.

Unlike competed missions (like Phoenix which get named by their PIs) these big missions tend to get their final mission names relatively close to launch. Even Spitzer was SIRTF (Spaceborn InfraRed Telecscope Facility) prior to launch. I do not know the reason but I think it has to do with "reality". Even up to the weeks before launch there is some (low) probability that these machines will not be launched. Once the are really really going to launch, then a final name is selected.

-Rob

The Soviets did y'all one better, not naming their spacecraft until after launch; that is, if they were successful; if they failed they got some dud placeholder name like "Kosmos".

I like this one Rob, you're still NOT used to it . It was called GALILEO and not Gallieo

Not really. They all had names, just not public ones

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that lame as they may be, and despite being wary of them initially myself, I've kinda grown comfortable with the names "Spirit" and "Opportunity", just as most seem to have grown comfortable with other names for other NASA spacecraft--like "Hubble", "Sojourner", "Magellan" and "Voyager" (the last, BTW, if memory serves, started out in life being called "Mariner Jupiter/Saturn" before being renamed; I wonder how many diehards at NASA or JPL still call them that?

In some senses "Spirit" and "Opportunity" even, bizarrely, reflect the rovers' respective fates (with "Opportunity" have more than its fair share of luck--eg its hole-in--one in Eagle Crater--and Spirit of pluck).

But that said others have not gone down so well. Does anybody--except maybe NASA's PR office--habitually refer to the Mars Pathfinder lander as the "Carl Sagan Memorial Station"? Or the Viking 1 lander as the "Thomas A. Mutch Memorial Station"?

For that matter who would refer to certain (other) pieces of MER hardware as the "Columbia Memorial Station" or the "Challenger Memorial Station"?

I guess in the end it all comes down to what we feel most comfortable with, have grown used to, or find trips most easily off the tongue.

======
Stephen

I'm little impatient...
When is "Rob Manning Q'n'A" coming up?

Plan is for me to pull all the questions together - hand them to Rob, and Rob will do written answers.

BUT

I'm not giving Rob the questions till after Phoenix is away I'm not going to get the blame if Phoenix has EDL issues.

My advice - forget it was ever thought of, and then it'll be a nice suprise when Rob starts answering the questions

Doug

I may be misremembering, but I have this vagrant memory that, at one point, they were referred to by the mission name Mariner Outer Planets Explorer. I also have a vagrant memory that they were renamed quickly after that, since no one wanted to fly a MOPE...

-the other Doug

All that MARDI talk over on the Phoenix thread got me to a thinkin':

Can the MARDI also be used to image the ground beneath MSL like Phoenix? Would this be helpful in any way to detect slippage? Or what other "stop you're in another Purgatory Dune" mechanisms are there?

Some may feel this belongs in the Mars Sample Return thread, but my main question is about MSL. The July 9 Aviation Week has an article about Alan Stern wanting to move up a sample return mission to 2018/20, with the following quote:

"One approach may be to outfit the '09 MSL...with a sample cache that could be filled as the rover moves across the surface and retrieved by a later sample return mission."

Is this really possible, given how close MSL is to launch? It was my impression that the MSL design is pretty close to being frozen, and adding a sample cache seems to involve a nontrivial change to the rover design. I'll admit it could be done on an emergency basis, but given the budget problems MSL has already incurred, the schedule is currently very tight. I don't see how it could be done without restructuring the MSL program and delaying launch to 2011.

I applaud Dr. Stern wanting to shake things up a bit and challenge the Mars program, but this doesn't seem realistic.

Agreed, Monitor. However, that sounds like a potentially valuable standard feature to add to any and all future rovers. It would be great to carry along significant samples for possible later return or more detailed examination, whether by MSR or eventual manned missions...saves a lot of footwork for the latter!

Of course, the science team would have to be pretty selective...I can just see Spirit & Oppy hauling around about 500 kg of rocks each after traveling only 1000 meters or so...

Close to launch? CDR just happened and the sample handling portion was delayed until Oct

Shades of The Long, Long Trailer...

But we would have a good name for the rover - Lucy!

"...science team would have to be pretty selective..."

Doesn't take much.. imagine pencil-erasor sized grabs of soil or other "fines" and centimeter long pencil-thick minicores of rock. You can do incredibly lots with that.. each would more than everythign brought back from stardust.

Instead of "close to launch" I probably should have said "so far along in the development cycle". What I was getting at is that MSL is not very receptive to adding major new features at this point. The volume of the rover has been split amongst the various systems and experiments, and adding a sample cache system now would mean moving a lot of things around, especially considering the cache location would be constrained by where the sample delivery system arm could reach.

I actually like the idea of adding sample caches to future rovers like ExoMars and the astrobiology rover, but I think it's too late for MSL unless a major funding increase is imminent.

The great thing about this forum is that the interaction inspires creative juices to flow. My biggest talent is contradicting myself, and I just thought of something about a sample cache system for MSL. Not knowing a great deal of the rover's technical design, I'm still wondering if you could put a sample carousel on the side of the vehicle, oriented vertically (like a ferris wheel), with sealing chambers and a rotation of the carousel after each sample was deposited. Such a design wouldn't require moving other rover systems around, provided that a slight increase in the width of the rover were allowable and the sample delivery arm could reach that location.

I dunno, does this sound logical?

As of now, it is going to be a horizontal carousel and placed in the front

odoug: "I may be misremembering, but I have this vagrant memory that, at one point, they were referred to by the mission name Mariner Outer Planets Explorer. I also have a vagrant memory that they were renamed quickly after that, since no one wanted to fly a MOPE..."


I think you mean TOPS - Thermoelectric outer planet spacecraft.

Phil

Yeah..I like it, I like it! Design such a system for all future rovers, and future human expeditions could conceivably acquire excellent mineralogical profiles for entire regions while minimizing in situ routine sample runs, enabling them to concentrate on interesting things they'd find in real time instead of baseline stuff.

I love it when a plan comes together!

There was a very very good general review of the TOPS mission proposal in one of the space-aeronautics journals when it was under concept development --- before the no-funding decision and budgetary de-scoping of the mission concept to Mariner Jupiter-Saturn.

I *THINK* it was Astronautics and Aeronautics, but it may have been in Space-Aeronautics. Good engineering libraries should have bound copies. It would be about 1972? 1973?.. not much later than that.

I do recall reading the Astronautics and Aeronautics article. Before the descoping, the spacecraft were to be designed for longer minimum mission lifetimes. One spacecraft was targeted to same planets that Voyager 2 eventually encountered. The other was targeted Jupiter -> Saturn -> Pluto.