The desire to colonize the moon has prompted an examination of ways to mine lunar regolith to create a solid foundation for NASA's 2020 Lunar Base and/or recover O2, water, or He-3. Accordingly, NASA created a Centennial Challenge directed at various North American groups to design excavators to mine regolith. Several mechanical and operational challenges exist because of the unique physical properties of regolith — high internal friction angle, high compressibility, and a very-fine particle size distribution leading to dust entrainment in excavator components. UBC-Thunderbird Robotics Team TREAD — a University of British Columbia student club — has been working for two years on a viable approach to this problem. This paper presents an effective design based on a scraper excavator from Miskin Scraper Works. Details about the NASA Centennial Challenge will also be given.
Design and Tele-Operation of a Lunar Excavator for the NASA Centennial Challenge
12th Biennial International Conference on Engineering, Construction, and Operations in Challenging Environments; and Fourth NASA/ARO/ASCE Workshop on Granular Materials in Lunar and Martian Exploration ; 2010 ; Honolulu, Hawaii, United States
Earth and Space 2010 ; 1031-1038
2010-03-11
Aufsatz (Konferenz)
Elektronische Ressource
Englisch
Design and Tele-Operation of a Lunar Excavator for the NASA Centennial Challenge
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