Space
presented themselves while testing
22 MARCH 2020 \\ AEROSPACETESTINGINTERNATIONAL.COM
“When different challenges
in the field it was enthralling”
operations the glove enabled all of the science and
exploration tasks tested to be successfully performed.
The drone handing qualities afforded by the ASG were
also found to be significantly more precise than the
handling that would be possible with a conventional
commercial drone controller interface.”
The initial test phase has also cleared the way to plan
the next phase of testing. This will include assessing the
ASG’s performance using a pressurized spacesuit in a
laboratory setting and integrating it into a higher fidelity
analog spacesuit. The team is also looking at testing how
the ASG performs in the field when controlling robotic
assets such as robotic arms, ground vehicles, drills and
cranes. It is also planning to test the ASG’s performance
in the field again as part of end-to-end science and
exploration scenarios, to assess how to transition in and
out of ASG operations during field activities.
FUTURE RESEARCH
As the prospect of interplanetary exploration activity
during the next decade becomes more likely, activity at
HMP is increasing. Over the next year engineers at
Haughton will help to field test a new spacesuit concept,
run simulated pressurized rover traverse studies, human
vehicular robotic arm operations studies, conduct more
astronaut smart glove studies in detailed end-to-end
exploration scenarios and field test a new robotic
mobility system.
“Planned studies are in support of both near-term
needs for NASA’s Artemis Program to the Moon, and
longer-term needs for human Mars exploration,” says
Lee. “The HMP is also planning to acquire a new rover to
support a number of small pressurized rover operation
studies for human Moon and Mars exploration and look
at the use of electric ATVs as unpressurized rovers.
“Upgrades, but not necessarily an expansion, of the
existing infrastructure are also anticipated,” he adds. \\
MARS HELICOPTER SCOUT
Anticipated to be the first aircraft to fly on another planet,
the Mars Helicopter Scout (MHS) will be deployed from
the Mars 2020 rover next year and is expected to fly
five times during 30 days on Mars. Development of the
MHS started in 2014 and it has undergone a series of
tests in the Space Simulator, a 25ft (7.62m)-wide vacuum
chamber at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in
Pasadena, California.
David Agle from JPL says that each test was designed
to address a specific part of the laboratory’s verification
and validation matrix, but also to “fill voids in our
knowledge and experience of how to prove that a
helicopter works in a Martian environment.”
The Space Simulator was configured to recreate a
Martian atmosphere by sucking all of the ambient air out
and allowing enough gas back in to simulate the density
of atmosphere the Helicopter would experience on Mars.
“In addition to that we needed, to our best abilities,
recreate the effect of gravity on Mars. This was
accomplished with a custom-built gravity offload device
that would pull the helicopter upwards with a string
against an automated pulley, with the perfect amount of
force to balance out the remaining gravitational forces,”
says Agle.
Each test, venue, and campaign formed a key part
of “baby-stepping”, where the team designs custom
tests to prove out a certain part of the helicopter design
only after extensive analysis and reviews. The test
plan therefore progressed from flight testing a third
scale lift demonstrator to a full scale proof-of-concept
inside the vacuum created inside the Space Simulator.
Vibration testing, thermal tests and deployment tests
then followed.
“Each baby-step was a tremendous leap forwards
towards building our confidence and understanding of
how helicopters operate in 1% of Earth’s atmosphere
and one third of its gravity,” says Agle.
4 // The research
station and airstrip at
the Haughton Crater on
Devon Island
-17˚C
Average annual
temperature on Devon
Island
-60˚C
average temperature
on Mars
The flight model of
NASA’s Mars Helicopter
in a clean room at
NASA’s Jet Propulsion
Laboratory in Pasadena,
California during testing
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