Category Archives: Rover

Building, Developing, Exploring, Home Page, Navigation, Rover

Rovers Using IFR Navigation on the Moon?

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Pilots navigate aircraft in two separate ways, abbreviated IFR and VFR. IFR is a term pilots use for “Instrument flight rules”, as opposed to “visual flight rules.” Visual is when a pilot flies by using his eyes to reference terrain, and uses his instruments as a secondary reference. They are necessary – for example, a pilot cannot tell with any precision his height above the ground without looking at the altimeter.

But with Instrument Flight Rules the pilot only uses his instruments. Ocean vessels are also captained when necessary in weather conditions by IFR methods.

In the book, it’s proposed that given the existing databases of lunar terrain, accurate down to a half meter for most of the Moon, IFR navigation of rovers on the lunar surface is plausible.  Continue reading Rovers Using IFR Navigation on the Moon? →

Apollo, Developing, Exploring, gamer, Home Page, Maker, Manufacturing, Politics, Rover

Is a manned return to the Moon practical?

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Although anything can be done, and several nations would like to match the American accomplishment of landing men on the Moon, the greater question is “Why?”

The American accomplishment of the Apollo missions simply cannot be matched. Repeating something done in 1969 with a flight in 2019, fifty years later is not matching Apollo.   It is repeating it, with all the advantages of advanced technology.   Fifty years worth.  It is like doing a cattle drive of the 1870s, in 2015. Continue reading Is a manned return to the Moon practical? →

Developing, Engines, Home Page, Rover, Solar Power

Light and shadow on the Moon

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This is a brief look at  the issues of Lunar light and shadow.

First, consider that the limit of either light or shadow is the horizon, which is much closer on the Moon than on Earth.  On flat terrain such as a Mare, consider the horizon as less than two kilometers distance.  A 500 meter peak may cast a shadow over forty kilometers distant – far “over the horizon.”

Effectively this is why the lunar North and South pole could not be imaged until LRO did it with radar.  Consider the solar terminator moving the line of sunlight and dark across the lunar surface.  The Moon has a slight axial tilt relative to the Sun, so the point we call the “North Pole” is not 90 degrees tangent to the Sun.

Because of the lack of an atmosphere, the transition from light to dark is sudden, abrupt and total.  Continue reading Light and shadow on the Moon →

Building, Home Page, Rover, Solar Power

Lunar WhiteOut – Moon-Blind

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White out on Earth refers to conditions where the sky, due to low clouds, fog or snow, does not clearly transition to the ground.  Typically in a white out there are no shadows, and there is a lot of white, so there is nothing seen but white.  Whether you look down, up or forward, only white with no contrast.  It is similar to a way over exposed photograph.

When the sun hits the Lunar surface close to high noon, there is little shadowing and the surface becomes very uniform, as occurs with  “whiteout” as occurs on earth.  NASA suggests that when the Sun’s angle is within 20 degrees of vertical, manned excursions on the surface would not be wise.

20 degrees of vertical would be a range of 70-110 degrees from the plane of the surface.  However, the sunlit side of a crater could easily be within this range when the sun was in a number of positions.  The same would be true for the sides of hills, at least in certain areas. Continue reading Lunar WhiteOut – Moon-Blind →