NASA's lunar Roomba set to suck up Moon dirt for study NASA is sending a "vacuum cleaner" to the Moon as a payload on next week's Blue Ghost 1 mission to land on the lunar surface. The words "vacuum cleaner" are those of the US space agency. The Lunar PlanetVac (LPV) device is a NASA payload on Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost 1 lunar lander. It is part of NASA's efforts to find new …
That reminds me that I really don't like the inaccurate term 'vacuum cleaner' when they are just suction cleaners so I just refer to them informally as hoovers.
Bonus points are availble to the contributer who can reveal the numpty who first decided to call them 'vacuum cleaners'. (I have no idea who it was)
I have a vague idea that they developed as a portable version of the systems found in some upmarket houses, where a pump hidden away in the cellars/servant's quarters maintained a low pressure reservoir connected to each room that required cleaning by inbuilt pipework. Just plug in the bendy bit and let atmospheric pressure (and the servants, of course) do the rest.
I think in late Victorian times there was a lot of work being done using pressure and/or vacuum for industrial/public systems.
Vacuum, no, but lower pressure. Perhaps Mr Hoover came up with the name? Or Henry?
I suppose, technically, if you remove some air from a constrained area you are creating a partial vacuum which is then immediately replaced by air forced in by the ambient atmospheric pressure, even if that partial vacuum is barely below ambient :-)
After all, you don't breath in by sucking air in. You move muscles causing the volume of your lungs to increase, reducing the internal air pressure such that the external ambient pressure forces air to blow into your lungs.
"After all, you don't breath in by sucking air in. You move muscles causing the volume of your lungs to increase, reducing the internal air pressure such that the external ambient pressure forces air to blow into your lungs."
Isn't this "sucking"? (If we ignore any other meanings.)
Perplexity.AI says: "Hubert Cecil Booth may have coined the term "vacuum cleaner". Booth was a British engineer who invented one of the first powered vacuum cleaners in 1901, creating a large horse-drawn machine that used suction to clean carpets and floors."
Space rated electric motor + pump+bearings --> solenoid operated valve(s) + compressed gas canister.
Space rated parts are seriously expensive.
The thing to remember about "vacuum" cleaners is that they create a vacuum relative to earth sea level. That relative difference is enough to strip dirt out of carpets etc to drop it in the bag.
The difference on the moon is need to add some atmosphere first to get the dirt in motion.
Really clever bit of lateral thinking.
I wish them good luck with the mission.
It's a technology demonstrator - if it works out, it can also be sent to Mars to analyse regolith there.
It can do some analysis in-situ, rather than just collecting samples for later transport and analysis.
If that all works out, it could collect, analyse, dispose, move on. That way it could build a map of regolith composition leading to more targeted exploration.
Also... why not?
The wet/dry vacuum cleaner will be searching for water and helium. Funny how that stuff (and especially precious hydrogen) that they're so desperate to find on the moon is available in insane quantities in the gas giants and their moons but we can't get to any of it. Talk about having been dealt lemons.
When I read about a vacuum cleaner on the Moon I could not help remembering the first Wallace and Gromit 'documentary':
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01pzqj3/wallace-gromit-a-grand-day-out
And no, I am not going to apologise for this, it is an excellent movie, fun for all the family.
All together now, everyone, say "Cheeeeese".
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"works by using pressurized gas to stir up the lunar regolith"
"There's no digging, no mechanical arm to wear out requiring servicing or replacement – it functions like a vacuum cleaner."
Meaning, there's a source of pressurized gas, either a tank/bottle, or some sort of chemical process which generates a gas.
While the mechanical parts might not need replacement, the source of gas / propellant would surely run out.
They've simply moved the limiting factor to a different part, unless, it can somehow use energy supplied by photovoltaics to heat up the regolith and generate an unlimited supply of gas / propellant.
If it can do this, then, that's worth bragging about, and they missed the lede!
Finally, assuming only a small amount of material is gathered (a "one shot"), meaning they don't care about the limited supply of gas / propellant, what are the chances of the mechanical arm wearing out that quickly?
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