UBC robot to compete in NASA excavation challenge

Miskin SR-1 MoonScraper designed to dig lunar soil

By Graeme Wood, Vancouver Sun – October 12, 2009

A group of University of B.C. students has designed and built a robotic moon excavator prototype that will be put to the test at a NASA-sponsored international robotics competition this weekend in California.

The students will have a chance to win $500,000 should their robot be able to move the most simulated moon dirt in a 30-minute time trial. About 20 teams of engineering students will compete in the NASA Regolith Excavation Challenge at Ames Research Air Force Base in Mountain View, Calif., on Oct. 17.

Regolith is the scientific term for moon dirt. It’s a fine, heavy and cohesive sand that covers the moon’s surface several metres deep. Because of its properties, moon dirt is difficult to dig making moon-excavation technology essential to future space exploration projects.

“The whole point is to showcase mechanical solutions to digging on the moon,” said Taylor Cooper, 25, an engineering physics student who was instrumental in the robot’s mechanical design.
Also on the team is Amy Cheng, 32, a computer science student with a background in mining, who created the scraper design, which reduces the force needed to excavate the fine, heavy dirt.

Andre Wild, 22, an engineering physics student, developed the robot’s software and electronics, while Josh Weinstein, 28, who has a degree in cognitive systems and is well-versed in artificial intelligence, dealt with the robot’s mechanics and electrical system and will also be its driver. Ian Phillips, 28, another engineering student and the team leader, managed the robot’s construction.

John Meech, 62, a professor of mining engineering, has overseen the three-year, $60,000 project, which is part of Thunderbirds Robotics, an extra-curricular university club he founded.

Meech said the students have learned valuable and immeasurable experience working as a team and thinking outside the box in coming up with innovative engineering solutions for what he describes as a very difficult challenge.

“The process far exceeds the endpoint,” he said, during test trials in the basement of a UBC science building Saturday morning.

The mobile robot, named Miskin SR-1 MoonScraper, is about one metre long with white panels and triangular rubber tracks on either side. It runs by remote control and is designed to move back and forth to scrape the regolith into two catch basins. During the competition, once the simulated moon dirt is collected, the robot will automatically move up a two-track ramp and dump it into a bin. It will collect 30 kilograms of dirt at a time and repeat the cycle 10 times, Meech hopes.

“It’s an outstanding design,” he said.

The Thunderbird roboticists are the only Canadian team in the competition, but only Weinstein and Phillips, who are American citizens, will officially participate in the competition along with two other Americans on the team (but who are not UBC students). That’s because NASA specified only Americans can participate at the competition.