NASA is testing a digger to explore the moon



    The Mars theme is now more than ever popular (not only on Habré, of course). This is explained simply - several consecutive successful and super-successful (in the case of Spirit & Opportunity) missions to Mars can attract the attention of even a very spoiled person. But in the light of all these “Martian chronicles,” we are paying less and less attention to the Earth’s closest neighbor - the Moon. But there is also a lot of interesting things, plus everything can be water (i.e. water ice), which facilitates the task of creating a lunar colony. For a more thorough exploration of the moon, NASA has prepared a new spacecraft - the RASSOR robotic digger.

    This robot is more like a miniature excavator than a research device. By the way, this device can be used not only on the Moon, but also on Mars, so here everything is fine. The weight of RASSOR is about 45 kilograms, which allows it to work equally well both on Earth (where tests are currently being conducted) and on the Moon / Mars, where gravity is reduced compared to Earth.



    For reliable operation and movement, the device is equipped with two digging drums, plus tracks. The carrying capacity of the robot is 18 kilograms, which is very good with such a size and dead weight. The developers claim that RASSOR will be able to move about four times faster than Curiosity.

    The project involves the launch of a robot to the moon with a mobile laboratory, which weighs about a ton. The laboratory is mobile, which facilitates the task of delivering the resulting material. RASSOR will each time bring "accumulated" to the base, where all this will undergo a variety of analyzes (of course, all this will be carried out automatically).



    Unfortunately, it is not yet known when the robot will hit the moon or Mars. But NASA is already working hard on the second generation of the digger robot.

    Via theverge

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