Mobility Evaluation of an Anchored Lunar Exploration Rover

One of the recent issues for lunar exploration is finding a spot which has abundant amount of Moon ice and characterizing it. This is essential for future lunar outpost site selection. Orbital remote sensing is one way for prospecting Moon ice, this could provide variable information of global location. However, there is a limit of remote sensing as it cannot perform subsurface investigation and we cannot know which is actually over there before we touch it or feel it. Thus, developing a rover which could explore inside the crater is required for the Moon ice prospecting inside the Permanent Shadow Region (PSR). This paper presents the new approach to travel steep slopes through lunar anchoring supported rover tested on lunar similar environment. These are preliminary work in designing and testing a locomotion system offering high agility and tractions for the Extreme Rough Terrain Exploration Rover (ERTER). Results of the first locomotion tests will be presented during the Earth & Space 2012 conference.