Publication Date: 07-JAN-19

Program ref.: Technology Developme
Tender Type: C
Tender Status: INTENDED
Price Range: 200-500 KEURO
Budget Ref.: E/0901-01 – Technology Developme
Proc. Prop.: NO
Special Prov.: BE+DK+FR+DE+IT+NL+ES+SE+CH+GB+IE+AT+NO+FI+PT+GR+LU+CZ+RO+PL+EE+HU
Establishment: ESTEC
Directorate: Directorate of Tech, Eng. & Quality
Department: Mechanical Engineering Department
Division: Mechatronics and Optics Division
Responsible: Visentin, Gianfranco
Products: Satellites & Probes / Mechanisms / Mechanisms / Other
Techology Domains: Automation, Telepresence & Robotics / Automation & Robotics Systems / Mobility Systems
Industrial Policy Measure: N/A – Not apply

Lunar missions recently investigated by ESA require rovers to explore extended stretches of the lunar surface. These are likely to be structured in long fairly-linear traverses on relatively easy; terrain, interlaced with star-shaped meandering in scientific-interesting patches, which require more complex rover motion. This applies to – unmanned missions like the Lunar Volatile Prospector – manned missions: the human lunar exploration foresees a mobile habitat that travels between subsequent landing sites to provide habitation and local transportation to the crew for up to 40 days. The understanding that a rover system for these new missions require two fundamentally different modes of operation has already led to the formulation of concepts based on a large, long autonomy mother rover and a smaller high-mobility daughter rover. The daughter rover is carried for the long traverses by the mother rover and deployed on the patches, where it explore autonomously. This concept may be very effective where the motion capabilities of the two rovers need to be profoundly different (e.g. the daughter rover may go into craters/crevasses). However when terrains do not have such extreme differences and the use of resources is highly critical, the mother-daughter concept exhibits a major problem in the fact thatthere is a very high duplication of functions (e.g. dual locomotion systems, dual navigation systems and power systems). An alternative concept that is the subject of this proposal associates the two modes into two different configurations of the same system. this is achieved by dividing the rover system into a small intelligent and powerful traction rover that has an associated active trailer that is loaded with high power generation and storage system, scientific laboratory/habitation module and any other subsystem thatis only needed for long ranging. The activity encompasses the following tasks: 1)define requirements for the rover 2)define architecture of rover, associate functions to elements and subsystems, define interfaces 3)design a scaled size breadboard 4)manufacture integrate and test a scaled size breadboard 5)validate the system in an analog test

W razie pytań prosimy o kontakt z Polską Agencją Kosmiczną pod adresem SEKTOR.KOSMICZNY@POLSA.GOV.PL lub bezpośrednio z Europejską Agencją Kosmiczną pod adresem IDHELP@ESA.INT .