Design Optimization of the Beagle II Mars Lander Airbags Through Explicit Finite Element Analysis – An Update

The Beagle II Mars Lander is a portion of the European Space Agency (ESA) Mars Express program. Irvin Aerospace Limited, on contract to Martin Baker Aerospace Ltd., will provide the parachutes and airbags for the probe’s landing system. The purpose of the Beagle II Lander is to deliver scientific equipment, which will perform atmospheric and soil experiments focused on identifying signs of life on the Red Planet. To reduce development costs, the parachute system will be identical to the Huygens probe parachute, which is currently enroute to the Saturn moon Titan. This parachute has been the subject of previous papers. The parachute system, lander mass, and landing atmospheric conditions therefore define the conditions for the airbag first impact. This paper presents the results of concept development analysis for the Beagle II mission. Airbag design requirements, including the somewhat challenging impact velocity of 30.0 m/sec are presented. Several design iterations explored using the Explicit Finite Element Analysis (FEA) code LS-DYNA are presented.