Visit the Spirit's Heat Shield?

Why did the Spirit Mars Rover controllers decide not to visit the site
of the crashed heat shield? Would it not have possibly dug a small hole
suitable for geological inspection? Would any useful information be
gathered for future heat shield designs by examining the wreck?

In article ,
Kerry S wrote:
Why did the Spirit Mars Rover controllers decide not to visit the site
of the crashed heat shield?

It's the scientists, not the controllers, who set the rovers' agenda.
The rovers are not going to last forever, and they move slowly and
haltingly, so every day is precious, and engineering studies take second
place to science unless a really compelling case can be made. Design of
heatshields for Mars atmospheric entry is thought to be fairly well
understood, so it's hard to make much of a case for a close-up look
at a used one.

Would it not have possibly dug a small hole
suitable for geological inspection?

Probably not much of one, and the craters have done a better job of that.

Would any useful information be
gathered for future heat shield designs by examining the wreck?

Maybe a little. Unless surprises were found -- always possible -- probably
not very much.
--
MOST launched 30 June; science observations running | Henry Spencer
since Oct; first surprises seen; papers pending. |

Kerry S wrote in message ...
Why did the Spirit Mars Rover controllers decide not to visit the site
of the crashed heat shield? Would it not have possibly dug a small hole
suitable for geological inspection? Would any useful information be
gathered for future heat shield designs by examining the wreck?

Heat shield is too far away from the rover landing site.

In article , mvillanu
wrote:

Kerry S wrote in message
...
Why did the Spirit Mars Rover controllers decide not to visit the site
of the crashed heat shield? Would it not have possibly dug a small hole
suitable for geological inspection? Would any useful information be
gathered for future heat shield designs by examining the wreck?

Heat shield is too far away from the rover landing site.

Not true - the heat shield is now only 100m away or so, after the rover
has driven 100's of m's to get to bonneville.

"Kerry S" wrote in message
...
In article , mvillanu
wrote:

Kerry S wrote in message
...
[snip]
Heat shield is too far away from the rover landing site.

Not true - the heat shield is now only 100m away or so, after the rover
has driven 100's of m's to get to bonneville.

Consider this ... the original 90-day lifespan/mission duration of the
rovers is ~6 weeks. Consider that the rovers when in a travelling mode
appear to move at about 25m/day more or less. You are looking at taking
at least 4 days to get there and probably 4 days minimum to inspect the
heat-shield and a crater. If you assume another 100m of travel just to
get back onto the direction of prime movement you lose yet another 4 days.

So now we've diverted for 10-14 days to examine a crater (a scratch
really) and a heat shield that probably does not contain any expected
science payoff, nor does it likely contain much in the way of engineering
surprises.

Is that really the best expenditure of resources? If there was some
compelling reason, such as abnormal temperature readings on reentry, or
unexplained variances of G loadings on reentry, or even some wild lateral
accelerations that seem out of the ordinary I might understand a divert.
However it seems that you're interested in going at the expense of science
payoff because 'the heat shield is there'.