Plug & Play Modular Robotic Mining System

Our proposal to utilize Line Replace Units (LRUs) is a significant step toward enabling industrial-scale lunar operations. This innovative approach will enhance the system's self-maintenance capabilities and ensure its longevity, even as it excavates thousands of tons of material over years of operations. The scale of this task is exemplified in our estimate for a lunar propellant pilot plant, which will require the deployment of 37 robots for excavation, collection, and hauling functions. The maintenance of these robots is a critical aspect, necessitating a system that can effortlessly remove and replace worn-out subsystems and components through dedicated maintenance robots. Our innovation for maintenance enhancement modularity is a meticulously crafted comprehensive design approach that ensures the unit can be readily serviced robotically and with a high degree of autonomy. This approach addresses the critical factors of diagnostics, accessibility, interfaces, required tooling, and support systems. This innovation will also extend to OffWorld’s terrestrial mining robots, further enhancing their serviceability and autonomy. OffWorld will review our lunar Prospector robot design and evaluate its terrestrial mining robots to identify the subsystems and components relevant to Prospector that have demonstrated the highest risk of failure. Terrestrial experience will be complemented by researching relevant system performance in the lunar environment from planetary rovers. A Reliability, Availability, and Maintainability analysis will be completed using the data from OffWorld’s terrestrial mining system performance and available lunar rover performance. The resulting critical subsystems and components will be downselected to determine where the most benefits can be obtained. A development plan to obtain the necessary capabilities will be created. This plan will identify the expected performance capabilities, costs, schedule, and associated risks.