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Mars Rover Spirit Recovers From Steering Glitch

Posted by michael on from the a-okay dept.

jangobongo writes "Spirit's steering glitch apparently cleared up on its own and engineers are still trying to understand what caused it. Meanwhile, the rover Opportunity found a cracked rock that may provide evidence of a second water event in the red planet's past."

25 comments

  1. The wrong side of the planet. by eibhear · · Score: 4, Funny

    "...are still trying to understand what caused it"

    I suspect that Spirit stopped at a light on the wrong side of the planet and it went green while the locals were replacing those wheels with blocks.

    Mind you, NASA's never going to admit that...

    Éibhear

  2. Overstaying their welcome by RsD212 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Does anybody know off the top of their head how long past due these robots are? I remember them saying both machines would fail quickly, but they're still up and chuggin.

    Im thinking NASA just gave those early death numbers to make themselves an easy goal to surpass. They havent exactly had a good track record lately.

    1. Re:Overstaying their welcome by Tablizer · · Score: 4, Informative

      My understanding is that many contractor payments depend on the "warrentee" periods. If the rovers failed before that time and a particular contractor was related to the part of failure, then they don't get paid as much. I don't know the specific legalese of it all, though. It would make an interesting article if somebody could find the scoop.

      Further, many of the parts were only tested under the 90-day assumption. For example, they may test thermal cycling on a circuit board 90 times to simulate 90 Martian days.

      But one should also point out that the rovers are showing aches and pains. Spirit has a bum front wheel that requires excess power to run. Sometimes they turn it off and run the rover backward to avoid wearing it further. Opportunity seems to be having cable glitches due to worn cables from all the rocks it has drilled and imaged up close, and both rovers seem to have dust doors on instruments that seem to sometimes stick. Thus, it has not been exactly roses as far as the equipment is concerned.

      Almost every other week I read about some new glitch that stumps engineers for a few days, sometimes halting science work. So far they have found workarounds, but the luck cannot last forever.

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
    2. Re:Overstaying their welcome by DAldredge · · Score: 1

      Not if it is like the weather sat that got dropped because the bolts where not attached. What happend is the contractor had to give back the 'profit' for that job and then the contractor was paid, at no 'profit' to fix the thing they broke in the first place.

      IOW, the taxpayers got screwed.

    3. Re:Overstaying their welcome by sjames · · Score: 1

      had to give back the 'profit' for that job and then the contractor was paid, at no 'profit' to fix the thing they broke in the first place.

      Actually, it makes a certain amount of financial sense with anything that expensive. Without that deal, the contractor would have to take out insurance on the job (and all other government jobs). The premium would be passed through. It's the same reason the Federal Government explicitly instructs vendors NOT to insure shipping (FedEx, UPS, freight, etc).

      This all makes perfect senes. Insurance companies are very careful to price insurance so that they will make an overall profit after paying out claims (no surprises there). People buy it to spread risk because they can't afford to be the unlucky one to lose. The federal government is large enough that the risk is already spread enough.

  3. Padding the numbers by mdp1173 · · Score: 5, Interesting
    I don't think it was a case of overly padding their estimates, but some condervative assumptions turned out to be way off.

    Originally, they thought dusk accumulation on the solar panels would be a much larger problem. They estimated that the panels would be sufficiently covered to not produce enough juice about 100 days in. It turns out, the panels just aren't getting all that dirty and the terrain is hilly enough that you can park the rover on a North-facing slope to increase power.

    As for the other components, they spend so much time making them small and light that they invariabley are forced to use high quality components that go way past their L10 (the time at which 10% of a lot of parts will fail)

    Overall, it's probably more good luck and proper planning than a tin-foil hat consipriacy to make NASA look good

    1. Re:Padding the numbers by Henry+V+.009 · · Score: 1

      Imagining CYA at NASA isn't exactly tin-foil league stuff.

    2. Re:Padding the numbers by Positive+Charge · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I doubt it. The most likely scenario is that the engineering requirements extremely conservative in order to make the mission successful and save NASA from a black eye. The fact that they come out looking rosey is a side effect of their CYA program.

    3. Re:Padding the numbers by deglr6328 · · Score: 2, Informative

      What's even more amazing, I think, is that all the science and remote sensing instruments are still working fine!! The stuck heater glitch in Opportunity forced engineers to put it into "deep sleep" during winter months to prevent completely draining the batteries overnight but this has the unwanted consequence of also turning off all heaters in the warm electronics box. And the box, which also contains optics for the Mini-Thermal Emission Spectrometer was long ago expected to fall to >-60C overnight, shrinking an aluminum housing holding a crystal optic of potassium bromide (transparent to all IR light) enough to crack and destroy it...never happened though! Also, the microgrinding tool used to make boreholes in rock has worn much less than expected and the moessbauer spectrometers and microscopic cameras are still working perfectly after some concerns that one of thier plastic ribbon data cables might have been cracked while flexing during movement due to the extreme cold of martian winter. Amazing.

      --
      - "Hear that?! The percolations are imminent! Cease your ingress!"
  4. Crack Rock? by qnonsense · · Score: 1, Funny

    We spend $800M on robots to find crack on mars? Man, I'm sure I gould find a whole lot more than one lousy rock for that much, and I don't even smoke! Stupid NASA.

    --
    There comes a time in every man's life when he must say, "No mother! I do not want any more Jell-O!"
  5. I love these plucky little guys by hey! · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If anything, I think we should consider ramping up the rate and diversity of robotic planetary missions, rather than attempting a complex, dangerous manned mission with insufficient funding.

    For one thing, we've already done a manned planetary mission -- to the Moon. There's more opportunities for useful new technological spinoffs in the robotic arena.

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
    1. Re:I love these plucky little guys by Tablizer · · Score: 2, Funny

      consider ramping up the rate and diversity of robotic planetary missions, rather than attempting a complex, dangerous manned mission with insufficient funding.

      How dare you outsource MY job to robots! Next you will be sending up starving Ethiopians because they are going to die soon anyhow and work for micro-peanuts.

      - Pissed Astronaut

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
    2. Re:I love these plucky little guys by seven+of+five · · Score: 1
      we should consider ramping up the rate and diversity of robotic planetary missions, rather than attempting a complex, dangerous manned mission with insufficient funding.
      .. yeah, and no plan to win the peace.
  6. I'm surprised by elmegil · · Score: 2

    Nobody yet has suggested that it's martians performing experiments on the rover.

    --
    7 November 2006: The day Americans realized corruption and incompetence weren't addressing 11 September 2001
  7. white mice by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I think we passed this test admirably. The white mice just wanted us to send a robot to mars.

    Mission Accomplished!

    1. Re:white mice by ScrewMaster · · Score: 1

      Oh wow! A Hitchhiker's Guide reference! Cool

      --
      The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
  8. "Water Event" by Euphonious+Coward · · Score: 0
    Obviously all this water was from the Flood. What, you thought it was just on Earth? This is God we're talking about: every planet in the universe had to have been flooded at the same time.

    Of course that explains too why the rovers haven't found anything alive -- they all drowned. None of them could get to Earth to get a ride on the boat, er, ark. (Never mind getting them home afterward.)

    That also explains the Fermi Paradox, likewise: probably aquatic radio-using species (who would not, presumably, have drowned) just don't happen very often. Anyway, those more than 6008 light years away haven't been around long enough for their signal to reach us.

  9. Mars Bitches! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Tyrone Bigsly would love Crack rock! Send me to Mars bitch!

  10. smoke the rabbit by Tablizer · · Score: 1

    Is it just me, or does this art-work seem like Chicago Mob on Mars? Contrast with this.

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
  11. You know... by cr0sh · · Score: 1
    I always hated those damn "turn in reverse" remote-control cars too - they always seemed to get stuck...

    Oh, come on, laugh!!!

    --
    Reason is the Path to God - Anon
  12. Shoot!! by Sensible+Clod · · Score: 1

    And here I had this ginormously expen^H^H^H^H^Hbrilliant plan I was going to sel^H^H^Hsuggest to them to get it unstuck...
    Anyone need some spaceworthy 3-in-1?

    --

    The difference between spam and poop is that you don't have to dig through septic tanks looking for real food. -- Me
  13. Robotic Arthritis? by Nick+Driver · · Score: 1

    From the article: "We don't have a root cause for this event yet but as they age we'll see more aches and pains," said Jim Erickson, rover project manager at JPL. "We'll just have to deal with the problems as they go."

    Maybe it's just getting the robot equivalent of arthritis in its old age?

  14. Something's amiss by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    hm,

    I think something is wrong with that image!