MMX Locomotion Subsystem: mechanics for extraterrestrial low gravity drive

Abstract

The advent of exploring low-gravity environments gives the opportunity to land rovers on celestial bodies without any landing platform and perform manipulative tasks under mostly unknown conditions. In addition to common loads, for example vibration, operation and thermal loads, the rover will face also impact loads during touchdown. This circumstance requires additional mechanisms to protect exposed parts, like the legs and wheels of a rover. Previous research attaches the wheels to the rover body or the landing platform through cup-cone interfaces at the wheel hub, which leads to unfavorable force distribution at the wheel rim in certain load cases, especially if the wheel represents the first point of contact during touchdown. This paper gives a detailed description in the mechanical design and testing of the locomotion subsystem (LSS) of the Martian Moons eXploration (MMX) rover. As the rover will fall to the moon Phobos unprotected and without any landing platform, the exposed locomotion subsystem has a high probability of being the initial contact point at touchdown. Besides the drivetrains and thermal hardware, a novel hold down and release mechanism (HDRM) will be introduced as an integral part of the locomotion subsystem. The HDRM is realized using three support structures at the wheel rim and one fixation in the wheel axis. In this way, the exposed locomotion subsystem will be stabilized in described load cases, since each support structure forms a closed kinematic loop with the wheel and the central fixation in stowed configuration. This approach leads to vibration and impact resistant behavior