{"id":300,"date":"2012-08-18T15:18:14","date_gmt":"2012-08-18T22:18:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/?p=300"},"modified":"2017-05-06T12:27:18","modified_gmt":"2017-05-06T19:27:18","slug":"the-wheels-of-the-mars-rovers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/the-wheels-of-the-mars-rovers\/","title":{"rendered":"The wheels of the mars rovers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A tour of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.jpl.nasa.gov\/\">JPL<\/a>&nbsp;in 2005 left me charmed by the Mars Exploration rover wheel (the Spirit and Opportunity rover design). The 26 cm diameter wheel is milled from a solid block of aluminum. The black surface is anodized for added surface protection. Why black, I don&#8217;t recall. The spiral flexures (spokes) add a little suspension.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"v\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/D20030206_wheel.jpg\" alt=\"\"><\/a><br \/>\n(<a href=\"http:\/\/marsrover.nasa.gov\/technology\/is_autonomous_mobility-01.html\">image source<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p>The new wheel on Curiosity is twice as big at 50 cm. The tread is one piece of aluminum attached to a hub with 6 individually-fastened titanium flexures. The flexures extend axially from the hub, curve back towards the rim maintaining a radial profile, and finally bend almost tangentially to attach to the rim similar to the spirals from before.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/PIA13384_crop_1.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/PIA13384_crop_1-1024x893.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\"><\/a><br \/>\n(<a href=\"http:\/\/mars.jpl.nasa.gov\/msl\/\">image source<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/PIA13384_crop_2.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/PIA13384_crop_2-1024x664.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\"><\/a><br \/>\n(<a href=\"http:\/\/mars.jpl.nasa.gov\/msl\/\">image source<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p>The holes in the wheels leave impressions in the soil that allow the scientists to measure distance. They also <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/File:Curiosity_wheel_pattern_morse_code.png\">spell J-P-L in Morse code<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Both wheel designs are inspiring, and have me thinking of applications for human use. Shock-absorbing bicycle wheel or hub? <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fastcodesign.com\/1665045\/soft-ride-bike-has-steel-tires-and-you-can-ride-it-now\">Probably not<\/a>, but what about uses other than wheels?<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/marsprogram.jpl.nasa.gov\/msl\/gallery\/spacecraft\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/Mars_rovers_wheels_isometric.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\"><\/a><br \/>\n(<a href=\"http:\/\/marsprogram.jpl.nasa.gov\/msl\/gallery\/spacecraft\/\">Image source<\/a>) Left to right: Exploration (Spirit\/Opportunity), Sojourner, and Curiosity wheels.<\/p>\n<p>More info on the Exploration wheels on NASA&#8217;s website <a href=\"http:\/\/marsrover.nasa.gov\/spotlight\/wheels01.html\">here<\/a> and on Curiosity&#8217;s wheels <a href=\"http:\/\/spacedoutclass.com\/2012\/08\/06\/at-the-jet-propulsion-laboratory\/\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A tour of JPL&nbsp;in 2005 left me charmed by the Mars Exploration rover wheel (the Spirit and Opportunity rover design). The 26 cm diameter wheel is milled from a solid block of aluminum. The black surface is anodized for added &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/the-wheels-of-the-mars-rovers\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[68],"tags":[71,70,69,72],"class_list":["post-300","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-science-and-technology","tag-aluminum","tag-fascination","tag-inspiration","tag-metal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=300"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":820,"href":"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300\/revisions\/820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garrettbelmont.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}