Success stories in high-reliability engineering don’t get much better than NASA’s Curiosity rover, which began exploring Mars in August. After a 10-month, 350-million mile journey, the rover landed on the Red Planet without a glitch.
Weighing in at just under a ton, Curiosity is 9.5 feet long, 8.9 feet wide and 7.2 feet tall. It’s equipped with six 20-inch-diameter wheels in a rocker-bogie suspension. Each wheel is independently actuated and geared, and each front and rear wheel can be independently steered.
The rover also has a robotic arm with a cross-shaped turret holding five devices that can spin through a 350-degree turning range. Nearly 7 feet long, the arm has three joints so it can extend forward and retract again while driving.
All totaled, Curiosity is equipped with 47 rotary and linear actuators. Each actuator has a sensor, called a cold encoder, to provide performance feedback to the rover’s control system. The sensor accurately measures the actuator’s position, velocity and other variables despite extreme temperature changes, which on Mars range from -128 to +85 C.
The encoders were assembled in Valencia, CA, by the High Reliability Solutions Div. of Flextronics International. “Flextronics is extremely proud to have played a part in this historical exploratory mission to Mars,” says Paul Humphries, president of the High Reliability Solutions Div. “We share NASA’s excitement for the complex rover program and are thrilled to have contributed to this important scientific exploration.”
Flextronics’ Valencia facility specializes in highly reliable and durable microelectronics for aerospace, defense and medical applications. Another Flextronics subsidiary, Multek Flexible Circuits, provided the thermal control materials that enabled Curiosity to travel safely to Mars.
Surviving an epic journey through space and a harrowing descent through the Martian atmosphere is no accident. It takes rigorous design, stringent quality control, and in some cases, the right manufacturing partner. For a growing number of OEMs in the automotive, medical, aerospace and defense industries, the right partner has been Flextronics.