Google Lunar X PRIZE Complete Teams RSS Feed

Picorover in the news

acsete — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 05:24:25 -0700

March 16, 2010, the Picorover group held a press conference at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya.

"This week, PicoRover Group has grown with a few members between students, teachers and involved people. For this reason we have done a press conference in order to show our two models, the Lunar one and the Earth one.", writes Joshua in the Team FREDNET forum.

This generated a lot of coverage in the Spanish media.

Videos

Espai Terra (TV3.CAT):

See video in higher resolution. There is also another video for the article about X PRIZE.

Un robot podria fotografiar la superfície de la lluna, www.btvnoticies.cat:

Google convoca un premi per enviar un robot a la Lluna (starts with a few seconds of advertisement):

Now you know how to correctly pronounce Picorover ;-)

Articles

Un grupo de universitarios españoles enviará a la Luna un robot con forma de pelota, El Mundo. There was also a short column in the paper (PDF).

Estudiantes españoles enviarán un robot a la Luna, Elpais.com

Estudiants de la UPC tracten d’enviar un robot esfèric a la Lluna, UPC. Sala de premsa anuncement

Investigadores de la UPC diseñan un robot capaz de circular por la superficie de la Luna, Europa Press

El robot catalán que puede ir a la Luna, ABC.es

Estudiantes de la UPC de Castelldefels diseñan un pequeño robot esférico para enviarlo a la Luna, ElCastell.org

Investigadores de la UPC diseñan un robot capaz de circular por la superficie de la Luna, 20minutos.es – it was also in the paper (PDF).

Una bola catalana a la Lluna, Avui

PDF: La UPC diseña un robot capaz de circular por la Luna y captar imágenes, La Razón

Estudiants de la UPC tracten d’enviar un robot esfèric a la Lluna, Global Talent

Estudiants de la UPC volen enviar un robot a la lluna, Lamalla.cat

Un robot de estudiantes españoles va camino de la Luna, CasaCocheCurro.com

Investigadores de la UPC diseñan un robot capaz de circular por la superficie de la Luna, hoyTecnologia

Uns estudiants de la UPC proven sobre la sorra de la platja de Castelldefels un robot que volen enviar a la lluna, Dèria

Estudiantes de la UPC quieren enviar un robot a la Luna, Eldebat.cat

Investigadores de la UPC diseñan un robot capaz de circular por la superficie de la Luna, Gente en Barcelona

Un robot 'made in Catalunya' pugna para viajar a la Luna, Catalunya Press

Estudiantes de la UPC diseñan un robot para enviarlo a la Luna, El Periódico

Investigadores de la UPC diseñan un robot capaz de circular por la superficie de la Luna: Que.es, Yahoo España, ForoProvincias.Com, Terra.es, ADN.es, Diario Barcelona, Noticias.com, Ojopelao.com, Actualidad Noticias.

ARCA video journal entry 9

Bogdan — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 15:58:36 -0700

ARCA video journal entry 8

Bogdan — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 14:32:20 -0700

New Sponsor: TresCom Technology

Open Moon — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 16:21:41 -0700

We are very happy to welcome our new sponsor TresCom Technology!

TresCom provides us with technical facilities and ressource logistics.

Why we appreciate this avenue:

We will have access to the knowledge of a team experienced in communication and traffic engineering.

We think this is an important step towards technical realization of hardware modules.

...and thank´s for your true interest in collaboration!

Drop a comment

ARCA video journal entry 7

Bogdan — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 12:39:25 -0700

Expanded payload opportunities now available

Astrobotic — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 21:59:02 -0700

Astrobotic Technology today announced that it has vastly increased the amount of payload that it can deliver to the Moon for researchers and marketers, as part of its maiden expedition in 2012 to win the Google Lunar X Prize. The company will be able to carry 240 pounds (109 kg) to the lunar surface for space agency technologists, academic researchers and marketers.

The company previously had offered only 12 pounds of payload to third parties.

The payload delivery service is available for $700,000 per pound, plus a $250,000 fee per payload to cover the engineering costs of integrating it into either the expedition’s lander or its solar-powered robot.

A technical description of the service is available on the Astrobotic Web site, along with the “Request for Information” asking potential users to characterize how they would use this capability.

The RFI is available at:
http://astrobotictechnology.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/astrobotic-pa...

The Payload Specification document is available at
http://astrobotictechnology.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/astrobotic-pa...

ARCA video journal entry 6

Bogdan — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 12:40:19 -0700

Composite battery pack pulled from mold

Astrobotic — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 16:47:13 -0800

The rover will operate with a 273 W-hr battery pack to provide peak power as well as power when the rover's solar array is oriented away from the Sun. The pack is comprised of A123 lithium ion cells, which will be attached to one of the interior I-beams anchoring the radiator to the chassis.

After designing and machining molds, the team laid up carbon composite materials over the molds this week to test production of the battery pack holder. In the photos, the cells are about the diameter of a U.S. quarter.

Lander Thermal Design and Analysis

Andrew Barton — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 02:57:48 -0800

The White Label Space engineering team has started the design and analysis of the thermal subsystem for our our Google Lunar X PRIZE (GLXP) lander. Since the lander will operate as a telecommunications relay for the rover, both the lander and the rover must be capable of withstanding the high temperature environment of the lunar day.

Starting from the design outlined in our Mission Concept Summary document, our specialists Martin Lemmens and Michiel Vullings are defining the external surface optical properties needed to maintain the lander's internal equipment within the required operating limits. To analyse the thermal performance of candidate designs, the team is constructing radiative equilibirum models such as as the one shown in the picure below.

This early model includes only the hexagonal body of the lander and a deployable solar array. The lander is offset above a simulated lunar surface.

Following the same approach that was used in NASA's (Lunar) Surveyor missions, the solar array is actuated about one axis. By controlling the roll angle of the lander at the time of touchdown, the rotation axis will point either north or south, and thus it is possible to point the solar array directly at the sun for the complete lunar day.

***

Hybrid rover prototype 2 completed

SELENE — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 21:18:04 -0800

The hybrid rover prototype 2 is completed and ready for outdoor tests and launches. We gave the rover the name RLR - short form for Rocket Launching Robot. See the rover also at Let's Make Robots!