Dust Mitigation for the VIPER Mobility System
NASA’s Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER) is built to prospect, provide ground truth measurements, and build regional maps of the volatiles at the lunar South Pole that were previously detected by Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS), and Chandrayaan-1. The rover’s mobility system, responsible for navigating the moon’s partially defined terrain, is the part of VIPER that is most exposed to the lunar surface environment. To ensure it can survive the thermal extremes and lunar regolith, the VIPER project utilized resources across NASA centers to create and evaluate a multi-functional environmental protection strategy. The project’s approach combined thermal insulation with dust protection in a flexible barrier across dynamic actuated joints to serve as the first defense between the hardware and the environment. Additionally, the VIPER project integrated a selection of seals (labyrinth, Nomex felt, and spring-energized PTFE) with individual mechanisms to further mitigate dust infiltration and abrasion risk to the bearings, motors, and sensors. In stages, the project performed extensive testing through a matrix of simulated environmental parameters to evaluate performance margins from the component level to the integrated mobility system. This paper addresses the project’s lessons learned, with an emphasis on systems integration and how this work can affect future long-duration lunar surface systems, such as crewed unpressurized rovers and in-situ resource utilization robotics.