The abrasion bit and the target boulder/large cobble clearly slipped during the operation, and we only have 13 minutes worth of frames for this animation, so I’m sure the abrasion ended prematurely. Later frames, however, show that some powder/tailings were generated during the operation, so it should be interesting to see what the partial abrasion patch looks like.
UPDATE: Now using the animation (with timestamps) provided by Paul Hammond in this thread.
Here’s a version with timestamps :)
Thanks, Paul! I’ve updated the post, using the animation you’ve provided.
Catching up after 2 days off Mars (trip to our highlands) :)
The abrasion was partly successful:
Interesting texture. Are those grey splotches at the top and left of the patch part of the greyish coating or crust that we saw before we abraded, or are they (very) large unweathered grains in the rock’s interior?
They’ve got quite a few similar targets nearby if they don’t want to put the instruments down on this patch for a closer look…
or are they (very) large unweathered grains in the rock’s interior?
Very hard for me to tell if they’re surface material or chunky grains from this image, I’d wager that the onboard instruments would be able to differentiate, if they decide to deploy them (fingers crossed)
I’ll be honest I did not think that small float rock had enough mass to be abraded in any fashion when I saw it move. I just expected a few surface scratches :) Gives me confidence they’ll attempt future abrasions on other interesting small float rocks they encounter along the notional path.
It would be nice to see further investigations in this ‘cobble field’, to see if there are different rock types present before they drive away :)
A wider view of the robotic arm placement :)
