Lunokhod
One of the main problems that the participants of the first lunar missions will face is the search and extraction of fresh water. NASA studies of recent years, in particular the Lunar Prospector, LCROSS and SOFIA missions, have confirmed the presence of a large amount of ice at the satellite's poles. However, before getting water from it, it must be extracted from the lunar soil – regolith.
The next NASA lunar mission under the Artemis program, which will deliver an autonomous lunar rover VIPER to the surface of our satellite, is designed to help solve this problem.
Lunokhod
It is the size of a golf cart and will be delivered in 2023 to the south pole of the Moon, where it will have to work for at least 100 days in search of four "areas of stable ice". We are talking about the places of its shallow occurrence – from 50 to 100 cm under the regolith layer. As soon as the instruments determine the appropriate concentration of ice, VIPER will activate a meter-long drill to extract the regolith. Being in the area of the south pole, the lunar rover will have to work in difficult conditions, when the Sun will rise no more than 10 degrees above the horizon, which creates very long shadows. At the same time, they will be adjacent to very bright sunlight, which can cause failures in the visual navigation system. The VIPER suspension will be able to provide him with a movement speed of up to 20 cm / sec. The power source is solar panels with a capacity of 450 watts. Each of the four wheels is controlled independently of the direction of movement of the rover. If the rover gets stuck in the regolith, it will be able to turn the wheels sideways. In addition, the suspension allows him to lift each wheel like a leg. VIPER will move completely autonomously, for which NASA specialists are developing a digital lunar roadmap for the rover.
