Effect of tractive given by grousers mounted on wheels for lunar rovers on loose soil

Abstract

Rovers are one of the most important mission devices for planetary exploration. The Lnar rovers are required to move on rough terrains such as in craters and rear cliffs where it is scientifically very important to explore. Recently, wheel typed rovers are popular for planetary exploration missions. However, there is a problem that the wheel typed rovers have possibility of stack. Because the ground where the rover have to traverse is loose soil called Regolith. When the rover traverse the ground like this, the one have possible doing stack. Therefore the surface of the wheel of the rovers has grouser like fin's form. The running performance of the rover can improve by grouser of the wheel. However, it is not clear on what kind of the form of grouser is appropriate. Therefore, this paper investigates about grouser's form. We carry out experiment that focus on the length and the ratio between radius of the wheel and grouser's length concrete. In experiment, we use the single wheel test equipment. This equipment can measure slip ratio various slope for traversing. We consider the running performance from results using single wheel test.