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Air inflated rubber tires will explode in the matian atmosphere.
Are you sure? Does anyone know if the shuttle landing gear compartments are pressurized? Anyway, there's no need for pneumatic tires. Solid rubber, or wire mesh would be better.
Well, clearly a stock-standard $4500 vehicle 'downloaded' from Amazon would be out of its element. Significant modifications would have to be made. Actually, I was thinking more along the lines suggested by another poster; that 'paths' may be cleared around a base and Segways could be used to quickly move from station to station. As for speed, I seem to recall that the current models may have a top speed of up to 20mph (yikes! get off the sidewalk! ).
I wouldn't give up on Segways for all-terrain use, either. This is the same company that is now testing a stair-climbing wheelchair that appears to employ a similar type of gyro-stabilization. During the Apollo program, wasn't there a fair amount of concern about astronauts falling over and being unable to get back up, or worse, damaging their suits or backpacks? It occurs to me that a self-stabilizing transport could be an advantage to explorers in environment suits, particularly when they are not fully acclimated to lunar or martian gravity.
Newbie here -- I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere and a search didn't turn up any references, but regarding the issue of personal transportation around the base, has anyone considered a Segway-like vehicle? Assuming the basic design could be modified to suit the environment, it seems to me to have some distinct advantages. Obviously, they are a lot smaller, lighter, and simpler than larger vehicles. They should also be much easier to mount and operate by astronauts wearing environment suits. Their automatic stabilization would be tremendously helpful to an explorer wearing a top-heavy suit, carrying cumbersome equipment and/or sample containers.
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