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imafraidofmuricans t1_ivyh1k6 wrote

Reply to comment by Palmput in Saying goodbye to NASA's InSight lander before it's buried in Martian dust by Impossible_Cookie596

No they can't.

The instruments aren't delicate for the fun of it. Sensitivity means fragility. Even sensitive instruments on earth are fragile.

Going to grab an RTG at home depo, for that matter? It seems you dont quite understand that Mars is not earth. The atmosphere is thin as hell and there is more dust than even in your bedroom. Off they shelf parts would get shredded by dust alone. I remind you that curiosity weights 1 ton and is the size of a car. The issue is not payload weight, it's how absurdly hostile Mars is. It's not beach sand.

"Planetary science mass insanity". I'm going to be blunt: you are an idiot. Not because you know less than the people doing this work. But because you fail to realize you know nothing, and choose to call it "mass insanity".

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Palmput t1_ivz5157 wrote

You’ve got to chill the hell out. Besides, we’re talking about Mars. They’ve already sent commercial parts. The problem is that they couldn’t afford to use more durable structural pieces. Yes, like Curiosity as you said. The wheels were shredded because they were extremely thin. If they had the mass budget for solid steel wheels, more powerful motors, and a larger power source to compensate, that’s that problem dealt with. Engineers are more clever than you seem to think.

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