Dust on Mars is a material, not only a sky. It coats solar panels, it is the red pigment, and the rocks in it punch metal. Curiosity's aluminum wheels grew holes and tears in 2013 while crossing sharp ground on the way to Mount Sharp. [1]
On 20 March 2017 the odometer stood at 16.0 km, and the first grouser breaks had just been seen on the left middle wheel. Earth tests the team cited said a wheel with three broken grousers was about 60 percent of the way through its useful driving life. That is a test rule, not a measurement of Gale soil. [1]
A later count, still dated
A 2022 mobility paper, looking back at 2 August 2021, counted 4 broken grousers: three on the left middle wheel and one on the right middle wheel. [2] The rover was still driving in 2026. This page does not carry a hole count from that later year. It also does not invent watt-hours per kilometer. Soil strength at a new site is still something a designer has to measure.
Dust storms on Mars is the sky. Solar resource is why a storm can starve a solar array. The nuclear rovers did not die that way. Their wheels still did.
See also
What links here
References
- NASA JPL. Breaks observed in rover wheel treads. 21 March 2017. https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/breaks-observed-in-rover-wheel-treads/
- Rankin et al. Assessing Mars Curiosity rover wheel damage. NTRS 20230005728. Count as of 2 August 2021. https://ntrs.nasa.gov/citations/20230005728