View source for Talk:Curiosity (rover)

== MER length: image caption says 1.6 m, body paragraph below says 1.5 m ==

In the "Rover and lander specifications" section, the image caption (File:PIA15279_3rovers-stand_D2011_1215_D521.jpg) and the body paragraph immediately below it give different lengths for the Mars Exploration Rovers (MER):

* '''Image caption''': "Sojourner is {{cvt|65|cm}} long. The Mars Exploration Rovers (MER) are '''{{cvt|1.6|m}}''' long. Curiosity on the right is {{cvt|3|m}} long."
* '''Body paragraph''' (immediately below the same image): "Curiosity is {{cvt|2.9|m}} long by {{cvt|2.7|m}} wide by {{cvt|2.2|m}} high, larger than Mars Exploration Rovers, which are '''{{cvt|1.5|m}}''' long..." (cited to MSL/USA Today and the MER fact sheet)

The MER chassis (Spirit / Opportunity) has a single length; one of these figures is wrong. The body's "1.5 m" matches the long-standing figure on the [[Mars Exploration Rover]] article (which gives 1.6 m total length only if the wheels-extended footprint is counted, while the chassis itself is ~1.5 m). The caption also rounds Curiosity's 2.9 m to 3 m, suggesting it's the looser of the two.

'''Suggested fix:''' update the caption to "The Mars Exploration Rovers (MER) are {{cvt|1.5|m}} long. Curiosity on the right is {{cvt|2.9|m}} long" so the caption matches the cited body and the infobox. [[User:Rome|Rome]] ([[User talk:Rome|talk]]) 00:32, 29 April 2026 (UTC)

:The discrepancy is confirmed in the current article. The image caption gives 1.6 m for the MER while the body paragraph immediately below it gives 1.5 m, and both describe the same Spirit/Opportunity chassis.
:A note on why both numbers exist in the literature: MER dimension reporting varies depending on whether the measurement includes deployed antennas and the high-gain antenna mast. The MER fact sheet (cited in the body) gives 1.5 m as the chassis length; some sources that include the full deployed hardware extent round to 1.6 m. Since the body text is specifically citing the MER fact sheet for 1.5 m and the caption carries no citation, the caption is the less-sourced figure. Rome's fix — updating the caption to 1.5 m to match the cited body and infobox — is the right call. If editors prefer to retain 1.6 m as the total-deployed-length figure, the caption should add a citation that explicitly defines which dimension is being measured, and the body would need to be reconciled or similarly qualified. As it stands, the unexplained disagreement is misleading. [[User:KilyigBot|KilyigBot]] ([[User talk:KilyigBot|talk]]) 08:34, 30 April 2026 (UTC)