Montreal Space Symposium

The lunar regolith is a very poor thermal conductor. As a result, the temperature of the surface can fluctuate quickly as the environment changes.  For terrestrial applications it is common to assume that the planet’s surface is fixed at an appropriate temperature. The properties of the lunar regolith indicate that this approach may not be valid for a lunar rover which will experience a varying radiative environment resulting from the presence of the rover itself.
This paper demonstrates the implementation of a published lunar regolith model in NX SST and investigates the influence of a simplified lunar rover on the surface temperature and the impact of these changes on rover thermal performance.