Introduction to Lunar Excavator Senior Design Project

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Introduction to Lunar Excavator Senior Design
Project

• Mission Objective Design a excavator to dig
  lunar dirt at rate, power consumption, mass
  specified by NASA
• Follow a Systems Engineering Approach
• No hints from your instructor you will need to
  design your own system
• But you will have resources to prepare you for
  lunar machinery design

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Resources

• Handbook and Webpage containing Chapters on
• Chapter 1 Introduction what been happening,
  whats going to happen moon missions
• Chapters 2-4 Systems Engineering How to
• Chapter 5 Lunar environment
• Chapter 6 Component design and selection
• Chapter 7 Thermal control
• Chapter 8 CAE tools

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Moon vs. Earth
Heiken, Vaniman, French (1991)
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Past Lunar Missions - http//www.lpi.usra.edu/luna
r/missions
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Past Landing Spots
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Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV or Moon Buggy)

• The LRV has legacy (proven to be reliable in
  operation). When making one-of-a-kind systems
  for use in a space, legacy can have strongly
  influence new designs

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Earth Construction Machinery

• Lunar Base Applications for Construction
  Machinery similar to Needs on Earth
• Construction, excavation, unloading/loading,
  transporting loads, site preparation, roads,
  berms, trenches, digging and drilling
• Will lunar equipment look like this????

Backhoe loader
Excavator for Earth
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Earth Excavators and Lunar Excavators are not the
Same
Earth Excavator Lunar Excavator
Power Source Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) ??? (and not an ICE)
Actuators Hydraulic Cylinders ??? (and not hydraulic)
Propulsion Tracked or wheeled Tracked, wheeled or something else?
Sensing Human Operator Sensors many options
Controller Human Operator Autonomous vs. teleoperated

• Trade Studies are a powerful tool to compare
  and rank choices
• And dont think it has to look like an earth
  excavator!

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Recent and Future Mission
Mission Year Summary
Lunar Prospector/ Clemintine 1994, 1998 Small spacecraft orbiters that sensed significant amount of Hydrogen in dark polar craters
Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) 2008 Orbiter to map and characterize future landing sites for In-situ resource utilization (ISRU)
Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) 2008 Launched with LRO to search for water-ice in dark polar craters, later deploying a spacecraft to impact a dark crater with second following and sensing impact cloud for water-ice
Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) 2020 Man returns to the moon on the CEV and lunar lander
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Lunar Base Architectures
Oxygen Plant
Habitat and airlocks
Radio Antenna
Regolith Excavation Area
Radiators
Fuel cells
Solar Arrays
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Dark Craters and Mountains of Perpetual Light at
the Poles
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Polar Base Architecture
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Technology Readiness Level

• NASA measures the maturity of a technology on a
  scale from 1 to 10.
• TRL 1 level projects are considered basic
  research (most student excavator projects will
  start here and stay low TRL level).
• TRL 9 means the technology is mission ready (for
  an excavator, that implies it is ready to send to
  the moon).

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ITAR

• ITAR is the International Traffic in Arms
  Regulations (ITAR). It is a law and punishable
  with fines and imprisonment if violated. It
  purpose is to control the export and import of
  defense-related articles and services, which
  often includes work on NASA projects. Designs,
  test data, software codes, etc. should not be
  shared with non-US citizens. Or, if you have
  access to such data you are not allowed to share
  it with non-US citizens.