Curse those little devils for lasting so long!

Oh, wait...

different rover

Yeah, but this one can actually fight whatever robotic bully tries to destroy it while on Mars.

How hard is it, really, to send an RC car to Mars?

There's a little voice in the back of my head that suggests that five years from now, we'll be wishing we had the original designs for the Spirit rover instead of the bloated thing that's supposed to be an improvement.

It's the shipping that costs so much.

What part of a_Transfer = 1.887 x 10⁸ km do they not understand?

In other news, creating one-off devices that have to work in harsh conditions without failure is difficult to budget for.

NASA can't seem to learn from other recent failures -- they continue to have different teams engineer different parts of the same spacecraft, and then wonder why the components don't work well together. The designer of the power system are different from the team making the instruments -- is it any wonder they now need bigger batteries, which will affect speed, range, and structure, which will impact some other team...

Too much empire building, too little coordination -- much as I love astronomical research (I actually watch missions and such), NASA is a typical government agency, sucking up more money without fixing the reasons it can't stay on budget.

Uzzah: Curse those little devils for lasting so long!

Oh, wait...

Someone didn't read the article. FAIL

eqtworld: They sure do have a hard-on for Mars

I think they are scared of sending landers to venus or mercury because it's hard

Do you blame them for rational caution in the face of irrational criticism? Much as I criticize NASA's bureaucratic failures, I also have great sympathy for people trying to accomplish great things -- only to be attacked by the ignorati when something very hard fails.

I'm amazed that humanity accomplishes anything in a the current culture of destructiveness. People who can barely balance a checkbook feel perfectly comfortable attacking scientists and engineers for any failure, even in the most difficult endeavours.

It isn't "easy" sending complex devices across millions of miles to alien worlds -- and I can understand why NASA is gun-shy about trying targets more difficult than Mars and the outer planets.

ChaoticCoyote: It isn't "easy" sending complex devices across millions of miles to alien worlds -- and I can understand why NASA is gun-shy about trying targets more difficult than Mars and the outer planets.

It IS however, relatively easy to send the same design back to Mars, and NASA's refusal to do that has cost them as well as several other programs.

NASA is often about justifying certain jobs of approval rather than actually doing the on the ground science.

blahblahblah mars rover blahblah threatens other space missions blah blah

I'm just going to assume this article is about global warming on mars.

ActionJoe: Uzzah: Curse those little devils for lasting so long!

Oh, wait...

Someone didn't read the article. FAIL

I suspect the 'Oh, wait...' at the end just may have been a winking acknowledgment that they did actually know better? But I'm cripplingly stupid and usually don't pick up on subtle hints, so you're probably right? OR NOT

ChaoticCoyote: NASA can't seem to learn from other recent failures -- they continue to have different teams engineer different parts of the same spacecraft, and then wonder why the components don't work well together. The designer of the power system are different from the team making the instruments -- is it any wonder they now need bigger batteries, which will affect speed, range, and structure, which will impact some other team...

Too much empire building, too little coordination -- much as I love astronomical research (I actually watch missions and such), NASA is a typical government agency, sucking up more money without fixing the reasons it can't stay on budget.

Not really. Pretty much the entire thing was engineered and built within JPL. The problem here has arisen from the last minute tweaking that pushed the project back and forced the two year launch delay. Among other changes, some components were redesigned using new, heavier materials causing an increase in weight. The new MSL just got out to the testing environment very recently. It's not a lack of communication that caused these issues; it's just the simple fact that not everything can truly be accounted for before testing.

As to why the initial tweaks were made, I don't know. I've heard rumors, something about supply problems and changing to steel ball bearings. Anyone know?

dualplains: As to why the initial tweaks were made, I don't know. I've heard rumors, something about supply problems and changing to steel ball bearings. Anyone know?



He told them to.

The answer is quite simple. In a down economy, one would think that the braniacs could figure out where to cut the scads of waste that surely exists in a government agency. Crank on the suppliers and manufacturing to reduce the costs. Bet they pay more for a screwdriver than I do... but why? I'm not talking about the specialized, non-ferrous, laser-treated, forcefield-equipped stuff. I mean Joe Maintenance fixing the urinals. How much are his plungers? Hell, how much does it cost just to do the freakin' paperwork to GET a plunger?

eqtworld: I think they are scared of sending landers to venus or mercury because it's hard

I think it has something to do with the ZERO chance of colonizing either planet... Mars, while a fairly remote possibility, definitely has a better chance of being colonized than Mercury or Venus.

eqtworld: They sure do have a hard-on for Mars

I think they are scared of sending landers to venus or mercury because it's hard

Mars is hard enough and is the most logical target with the most potential to yield information relevant to understanding Earth by comparison. Mercury is presumed to be little different than the moon but much harder to get to and function at so close to the sun.

Venus is actually easier to get to than Mars but is such a hostile environment there's not much time to work once you get there. Ten Soviet landers functioned for an hour or two before getting cooked/crushed. The final mission measured surface pressure of 1,300 psi and temperature of 865 degrees Fahrenheit. fark that.

As there's still no remotely-identified practical method of protecting astronauts from GCR, human interplanetary travel is best kept in the Unicorn Farts folder. It's the tra-la-la, "then a miracle happens" part of every description of the Mars Orion mission.

And no, they haven't invented Star Trek deflectors, pumpkin. GCR isn't something you can wish away.

DarthBrooks: As there's still no remotely-identified practical method of protecting astronauts from GCR, human interplanetary travel is best kept in the Unicorn Farts folder. It's the tra-la-la, "then a miracle happens" part of every description of the Mars Orion mission.
And no, they haven't invented Star Trek deflectors, pumpkin. GCR isn't something you can wish away.

After all, only the hunter survives.

Wait, that's GTR.

DarthBrooks: As there's still no remotely-identified practical method of protecting astronauts from GCR, human interplanetary travel is best kept in the Unicorn Farts folder. It's the tra-la-la, "then a miracle happens" part of every description of the Mars Orion mission.

And no, they haven't invented Star Trek deflectors, pumpkin. GCR isn't something you can wish away.

Galactic cosmic rays are shown to be reduced during solar max as the sun ejects enough mass to effectively extend its magnetic field. It's possible to build shielding against the increased solar radiation while presumably the margins get better for hypothetical GCR shielding. Granted you could wait a while for an optimal planetary alignment that happens to coincide with solar max.

eqtworld: That rover is going to cost:

$72,000

per ounce

Why was my first thought, "How does that compare to Cocaine?"

Why does it need bigger batteries? I thought the MSL Rover was nuclear. PU-238.

Nem Wan: Galactic cosmic rays are shown to be reduced during solar max as the sun ejects enough mass to effectively extend its magnetic field. It's possible to build shielding against the increased solar radiation while presumably the margins get better for hypothetical GCR shielding. Granted you could wait a while for an optimal planetary alignment that happens to coincide with solar max.

NASA says the next solar max is 2011-12. That puts the following solar max at about 2023.

Hohmann windows on Mars from Earth are generally odd-numbered years. So 2023 is a window. But then the crew is stuck there until 2034? Doesn't sound practical - - plus there's a Hohmann window problem getting back to Earth -- I think the window is something like 21 months after arrival. Which means it's a return to Earth on a waning solar prominence. Doesn't sound very radiologically safe.

I don't foresee a round-trip manned Mars voyage in the next 30 years. I hope I'm wrong but there's an awful lot of really bad stuff to overcome to get there and back. A lot of people pretend it's just a really long Moon mission but that's not scaling the radiation problem very well.

Well, at least it wasn't honda....

playin' workout tapes by Fonda

Harry_Seldon: Why does it need bigger batteries? I thought the MSL Rover was nuclear. PU-238.

Because the RTG (Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator) only puts out a steady supply of current that may not satisfy the power requirements of certain instruments. So they use downtime to charge batteries which are set in a configuration that CAN provide the necessary voltage or current and use that when available. It's the reason they're still going to only really drive during the day and not at night...that's the time the batteries for the drive system are recharged.

Harry_Seldon: Why does it need bigger batteries? I thought the MSL Rover was nuclear. PU-238.

No no no, This sucker's electrical. But it needs a nuclear reaction to generate the 1.21 gigawatts of electricity that powers the flux capacitor.

KarmicDisaster: Harry_Seldon: Why does it need bigger batteries? I thought the MSL Rover was nuclear. PU-238.

No no no, This sucker's electrical. But it needs a nuclear reaction to generate the 1.21 gigawatts of electricity that powers the flux capacitor.

That's heavy, Doc.

Harry_Seldon: KarmicDisaster: Harry_Seldon: Why does it need bigger batteries? I thought the MSL Rover was nuclear. PU-238.

No no no, This sucker's electrical. But it needs a nuclear reaction to generate the 1.21 gigawatts of electricity that powers the flux capacitor.

That's heavy, Doc.

Win. Radioactive amounts of win guys.

ChaoticCoyote: NASA can't seem to learn from other recent failures -- they continue to have different teams engineer different parts of the same spacecraft, and then wonder why the components don't work well together. The designer of the power system are different from the team making the instruments -- is it any wonder they now need bigger batteries, which will affect speed, range, and structure, which will impact some other team...

Too much empire building, too little coordination -- much as I love astronomical research (I actually watch missions and such), NASA is a typical government agency, sucking up more money without fixing the reasons it can't stay on budget.

That's how engineering works these days, especially when you're building something as complicated as a robotic research laboratory that operates flawlessly on another goddamned planet. Different teams of engineers have different tasks because no single reasonably-sized team of engineers is capable of designing the entire thing. It's just too complicated, with too many fields and specialties involved.

Moreover, it's not as if there's no communication between the teams. There are project managers whose job it is to make sure everything is able to work together, and who ensure that the each of the teams' parameters are made known to the teams that need to know them.

NASA engineers things the same way as everyone else, it's just that NASA tends to make things that are far more complicated and with a far lower acceptable failure rate.

Harry_Seldon: KarmicDisaster: Harry_Seldon: Why does it need bigger batteries? I thought the MSL Rover was nuclear. PU-238.

No no no, This sucker's electrical. But it needs a nuclear reaction to generate the 1.21 gigawatts of electricity that powers the flux capacitor.

That's heavy, Doc.

Funny thing is, I immediately started reading KarmicDisaster's post in Doc Brown's voice. Friggin' hilarious, you people

As long as it's threatening other space missions with actual futuristic space age weapons, like photon torpedoes or the like, I'd say we're still getting our money's worth.

eqtworld: The Russians landed a probe on Venus.

The USA has never done so

They did, and they get credit, but they had eleven or 12 failed missions to Venus before they did so. Three of those they didn't even tell the public about. If NASA sent 11 failed rockets up to reach anything you'd be biatching about that.

The Russians had a problem with lens cap removal, since five of the missions failed to remove the lens cap of the panoramic camera. The regular cameras worked just fine, however.

The biggest reason Venus exploration is difficult to justify is because the return on investment is so low. The longest period any of the 10 successful Russian landers transmitted data was 127 minutes. Most lasted a little over or under an hour. With returns like that, it would be hard to get a budget.

***On a slightly technical note, the US DID land a probe on the surface of Venus, and it returned data from the surface for, once again, just about an hour. However, it was an atmospheric probe from the Pioneer Venus mission and it wasn't designed as a lander. It was supposed to send data about the atmosphere, and it didn't have cameras on board. It was just dumb luck that it survived the landing impact and continued working.

New rule. Any NASA programs that goes 10%+ over original budget get automatically canceled.

No exceptions

belowner:

***On a slightly technical note, the US DID land a probe on the surface of Venus, and it returned data from the surface for, once again, just about an hour. However, it was an atmospheric probe from the Pioneer Venus mission and it wasn't designed as a lander. It was supposed to send data about the atmosphere, and it didn't have cameras on board. It was just dumb luck that it survived the landing impact and continued working.

We also sent the Magellan probe which orbited Venus for 4 years mapping the planet with RADAR and gravimetry.

mrlewish:

New rule. Any NASA / Areospace / weapons system / software development / generic engineering programs that goes 10%+ over original budget get automatically canceled.

No exceptions

Good luck with that.

Do you know how I know you've never done project management on anything more complicated than making a LEGO model?

continuing to dump more money into space when we have problems right here. Global warming, banks collapsing, mortgages foreclosing, unemployment rising, famines increasing, people starving, wars starting, and wildlife going extinct.

The Mars rover devours the budget and threatens other space missions. This is what you can expect when you have Chrysler unions make a rover\

FTFS

portscanner: continuing to dump more money into space when we have problems right here. Global warming, banks collapsing, mortgages foreclosing, unemployment rising, famines increasing, people starving, wars starting, and wildlife going extinct.

We are looking for a new place to move, this neighborhood is all F'd up

eqtworld: The Russians landed a probe on Venus.

There really isn't all that much to see there. NASA is roving robots all over Mars because they want to know
a) was there ever life on mars, and
b) could Martian soil be useful to a colony?

Venus has no such information. Venus is too inhospitable, and if it ever had life the climate has destroyed the evidence. There will be no life on Venus, and no colonies on Venus, so why visit?

This is why the probe to Europa getting bumped is sad - Europa is a similarly promising world, like Mars.

portscanner:

continuing to dump more money into space when we have problems right here. Global warming, banks collapsing, mortgages foreclosing, unemployment rising, famines increasing, people starving, wars starting, and wildlife going extinct.

By gum, you're absolutely right! That 0.001% of the budget those pigs at NASA are soaking up could solve all those problems!

While we're at it, we can cut medical research, biotech, fusion research, and even NSF funding of open-source software development.

I really hope you're just working a tired troll line here.

Pxtl: There will be no life on Venus, and no colonies on Venus, so why visit?

Because we can.
Some scientists believe that Venus could be terraformed for less trouble than it would take to modify Mars or a jovian moon into a hospitable climate. Also, at its upper altitudes, Venus has the most earthlike atmosphere of the inner planets.

Personally I think we should try to visit and colonize all the planets we can, even difficult ones.
...but Mars is the easist world to live on besides earth, for the time being.

On that note: When probes get this big and budgets for them this large, the next natural step is to slam it into the surface of mars or skip it off the atmosphere into the frozen depths of space due to some retarded oversight.
I wager we'll never get a minutes worth of science out of the thing.

way south: Also, at its upper altitudes, Venus has the most earthlike atmosphere of the inner planets.

Until you consider the 300-km/h wind and the sulfuric acid clouds.

eqtworld: ChaoticCoyote: It isn't "easy" sending complex devices across millions of miles to alien worlds

Strawmen are easy though.

This will be the 4th mars lander in just a few years. Two rovers are currently sending data, not to mention the orbiters which are still working.

The Russians landed a probe on Venus.

The USA has never done so

The Russians did that so someone in the future would say exactly what you just said. It took 7 tries to get a lander to the surface and transmit back to Earth for 20 minutes.

Instead of landing heavily armored barometers to last for an hour or less, the Americans mapped 98% the surface of the planet from orbit and made the first gravity well maps of Venus with one probe that lasted 4 years. That probe was later used to confirm the feasibility of aerobraking, a technique that has been used by American Mars probes to conserve fuel when circularizing orbits.

Russia has a long history of failures at Mars.

portscanner: continuing to dump more money into space when we have problems right here. Global warming, banks collapsing, mortgages foreclosing, unemployment rising, famines increasing, people starving, wars starting, and wildlife going extinct.

That's nice and all, except that the money that we spend on space exploration is a drop in the bucket compared to the problems we have here. Also, if we waited for everyone on the earth to get their shiat together before we explored space, then we would never ever ever get off the ground.

Thanks to the space race we are sitting here using the net and handheld computers. The goodies we have- No Google earth maps with Space Race. Phone and Video beamed around the world. You can whine about the money but the fact is Billions of people are alive and better off today with technology forged from wars and space. Even your medical care is better because of battlefield practice to save life.