Olympus Mons photo taken at unknown altitude above Mars. Mountain width of about 624 km, the size of Arizona or France. Image source Wikipedia	Mount Everest on Earth. Mountain width is about 40 km. Image source Wikipedia

The Call to Adventure

What if you could ride a mountain bike on Mars? Why would you?

“For adventure,” I’d say. “Imagine riding to the top of the largest mountain in the solar system?”

“I know,” you might say. “That would be Olympus Mons.”

Let’s get started, a high and mighty adventure. You imagine craggy rocks stretching high to the sky, adrenaline pumping while peddling your Salsa Horsethief Deore over shear granite. You’d push your way beyond the snow line. Except Martian mountains have no snow line or granite.

“Well, isn’t that swell,” you say, “but riding it could still be thrilling.”

For now, we’ll consider a near future scenario when people are exploring Mars in a manner similar to contemporary Antarctica. What if riding the mountain wouldn’t quite be the thrill you might expect?

To Peddle or not to Peddle

You say. “But isn’t Mars a cold and oxygen-less hell? Wouldn’t riding while wearing a bulky spacesuit make peddling overly exerting? Wouldn’t I quickly run out of air?”

I reply. “Yes.”

“Then why peddle?”

“You’ve got a point. I’d suggest an e-bike.”

You ponder. “Wouldn’t that be cheating?”

I grin. “Consider cheating as a necessary Martian survival trait.”

Geography of Climbing Olympus Mons

Recently I wrote a story about astronauts climbing Olympus Mons. Leaving aside story merit, let’s look at how near-future technology might be employed for this venture. First, we need to look at the setting. One can virtually explore Olympus Mons by downloading the free Google Earth desktop program or app. In addition to exploring Earth the program allows one to explore parts of outer space including planet Mars. With the program, I could trace various paths and see cross-sectional elevation changes. The data used for modeling is taken mostly from NASA sources.

Olympus Mons rises to an altitude above 21 km (13 miles or 69,000 feet). Its highest point is at 21,287.4 meters, as measured by the MGS laser to a precision of 10 centimeters. Mount Everest, by comparison, peaks at an elevation of 8,848.86 meters.

Google Earth view of cliff face of Olympus Mons at an elevation of 179.47 km. Image source is a screen snip of the Google Earth program taken by the author.	Mount Everest as shown by Google Earth at an altitude of 179 km. Mountain width is about 40 km. Image source is a screen snip of the Google Earth program taken by the author.

This is Google Earth’s elevation profile for the ‘steep climb.’ Doesn’t look quite as steep does it? Still, this would be tough slog with a mountain bike or an e bike. For comparison, below is a cross cut for a section of the Grand Canyon on Earth.  The steepest grade here is about 90% or 42 degrees. By zooming in and exploring more, one could probably find steeper sections in the Grand Canyon. Notice the Grand Canyon profile shows a horizontal length of 718 m compared to the horizontal 14 km for the steep climb for Olympus Mons.

In summary: Whereas the central part of the Olympus Mons exhibits slope angles of less than 1 to 5°, the periphery of the edifice terminates with steep cliffs sloping 12–15° up to 28°. 

There is another factor making the climb on Mars easier than on Earth. Mars gravity is one third of Earth’s and the air is very thin. The atmospheric pressure on Mars is one hundredth that of Earth’s. This means lower weight and less air drag for the e bike to handle.

By further zooming in, I found a steeper section on the Olympus Mons steep climb path to be 27 degrees. Hence I used this as my steepest slope for my story.

About the Mars-Climbing E Bike

Confession. When I cycle, I generally cycle on flatter terrain. Hence I examined some specifications for commercially available mountain bikes or e bikes. I would use these as a baseline to define some possible specifications for a Martian bike that could exist in the near future.  Perchance I could world-build an e-bike with improved capabilities.

One electric motorcycle caught my attention, the Sanya UF-X(SY4000D). This electric bike’s general specifications are 4000 W brushless motor, 72V52V lithium battery, Max speed: 92km/h, Max range:120 km based on 45km/h speed. Its climbing ability on Earth is claimed to be 17 degrees. Could it handle 27 degrees on Mars? Anyone want to give this a try?

However, another manufacturer claimed the ability to climb slopes of 45 degrees. Shall we trust their claim?

And here is another from Build Your Bike.

Bike Specifications

I visualized what the bike might look like and gave it a (backstory) product name of Roughneck Mangala, where Mangala is Sanskrit for Mars. During my research, the most suitable role models appeared to be bikes used by hunters. I don’t hunt for sport but I do admire the bush-suitable technology which hunters use for dragging out the big game they may have downed. Here is a one commercial photo. I would extrapolate the bike appearance for a Mars scenario, one where the rider would be wearing a space suit. As for the archery equipment, I didn’t use arrows for my story.

The Mangala bike would use a motor for each wheel for improved traction and control. The cargo trailer would be essential for carrying required supplies.

Here are the bike characteristics I chose. I believe these would be feasible for a Mars capable bike in the near future. The cruise speed and range would apply for flat ground.

Bike Cruise	50	km/hr
Range	150	km
Bike+trailer+battery	75	kg
Mass loaded w rider	295	kg

And its battery. A rider would need to swap or recharge batteries as required.

Battery		72	V
		75	Ah
	Energy	5200	Whr
	Mass	15	kg

The specifications would set restraints for the trip to the summit and back.

Tires

Pneumatic tires provide more comfort, more stability, better suspension, better climbing, faster speeds, more traction, and better control. The only advantages of solid tires are not getting flat tires and less maintenance. Only choose solid tires if you live in a place with poor roads, where you may get a lot of flats.

Yet I chose solid, surmising high-tech material to give traction and pliability. Check out Bridgestone’s and Michelin’s concepts for solid tires.

The Journey

I selected a mass of 295 kg for each suited astronaut riding a bike with 50 kg of cargo. In my story, two astronauts with cargo undertake the trip from a cache location near the cliff face of Olympus Mons.  Here are some packing requirements and trip logistics as pasted from my spreadsheet. I used the spreadsheet for calculating time durations and battery swapping events.

Astronaut daily water		4	L  or kg
Astronaut daily food		1	kg
Design expedition length		5	days

An EVA suit is good for 1.5 days.

Normal ops is that each overnight stay is at a cache, where air tank replaced next morning

But only one overnight req’d

During outbound, each person brings 3 additional batteries to swap along the way

Leave at all used batteries at summit along with solar charger (that was air dropped)

A third astronaut flew a shuttle vehicle to air drop supplies to a cache point near the mountain summit. In the story, the trip required only one and a half days, including a side trip to the caldera of Olympus Mons. The calculations involved energy consumption of the batteries, taking into account the average slope of various segments of the trip. Generally I used grade 12 high-school level physics.  Similarly I worked out oxygen consumption needs as required for the trip. The space suits are designed to provide up to one and half days worth of oxygen. For a design expedition, one need additional oxygen tanks for the EVA suits (EVA is a fancy way of saying spacesuit, an acronym for Extra Vehicular Activity)

After this trip other travelers could reuse the batteries left at the summit. They could recharge them by using the solar charger.

The trip required one overnight stay close at the summit. The summit (highest point) of Olympus Mons is about 29 km distant from the caldera. Because the top part of Olympus Mons has a very shallow slope, the peak would appear to the astronauts as a flat expanse. They would see a desert of rock resembling the flat of a prairie in the Canadian or American mid west. With the top part of Olympus Mons as large as France, they would see only flat (and maybe some boulders) to as far as the horizon. The mountain’s edge would lie far beyond the horizon. Compared to Everest, riding the top portion of Olympus Mons could be boring.

For an exciting story, one needs other dramatic elements.

A Word about Martian Camping

With one overnight stay, I imagined an inflatable tent. One issue for Martian exploration is perchlorates on the surface. Perchlorates can be highly toxic, hence one wouldn’t want to bring perchlorates inside a tent. 

Generally, I envision a tent similar to those used Antarctica.

One key difference for Martian exploration is to pressurize the tent for air and to keep out the damn perchlorates. A compressor, regulators and air tank can handle the former. As for keeping out the perchlorates, keep the spacesuit outside and use the suit as an airlock. The basic idea is the suitport concept. Getting such a concept to work for a tent is more challenging than I could envision for the more solid structures as shown in the Wikipedia article, which apparently involved an airlock chamber.

EVA Access procedures using the Suitport, as pasted from ‘The Suitports_Progress.pdf’

Instead, I envisioned a spacesuit that is vertically stretchable such as a bellows at the waist and connector at the chest. Generally the astronaut connects their suit’s chest connector to the tent’s connector. By knee bending and other contortions an astronaut crawls out of their suit to enter the tent. To exit the tent and re-enter the spacesuit, the astronaut needs to enter feet first, an athletic feat indeed. That said; should faint-hearted non-athletic people go camping on Mars?

There are other bodily needs for eating, drinking, and waste disposal which need addressing for the trip and are part of the back story, if not addressed directly in the story.

More about the Camping Suitport

This section is part of my notes, and reading it would be a long slog. The notes are a result of pure imagination. Of course, one would need to fine tune it or dramatically modify to get the system to work. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.  Disclaimer: I cannot draw very well.

Entry Procedure

The tent has two access points at chest height. Each suited astronaut approaches their access point facing forward. The spacesuit has a mating ring located below the chest and above the waist that protrudes out. The astronaut positions ring to align with the tent’s access port and locks both together using suit gloves. Open access door. Such as; by pressing external button with gloved hand, permitting free airway passage between suit and tent interior. For the suit, tongue-in-groove matched surfaces slide apart to protrude beyond the sides. The tent’s access port door operates similarly. Air pressure inside tent would equalize with air inside suit.

Astronaut stretches hands and arms straight up vertical as shown in figure 1.

[ Fig. 1 ]

Astronaut bends knees akin to a squat or a Tai Chi Danyu, to extend bellows in order to drop upper body while suit’s top portion held in position by the access port. Squats downwards until head level with the access port as shown in figure 2. Also, astronaut can clear arms and hands from the sleeves and squeeze them into position to grab within the access port.

(With bent knees and bellows extension, drop in head height likely to be 30 inches or more.)

[ Fig. 2 ]  PLSS = Portable Life Support System

(Hu is my invented gender-free pronoun to replace she/her or he/his)

Hu bends to begin crawling through tube with hands and arms first followed by head. There may be handholds to assist. While crawling into tube, Hu raises self up with knees. As knees straighten, Hu’s upper body will have stretched out past the tent wall. Hu bends down towards floor, stretches out the hands towards the floor and proceeds such that hands contact the floor. With knees again straightened, walk the hands forward to pull feet and legs upwards to clear the suit and into the tube. Proceed until feet clear the tube and drop them onto the floor. Suit exoskeleton controls may lock joints into a parked position (or not) so as to resemble figure 1.

The mechanisms will have sufficient flex to facilitate entry into the tube (and vice versa for exit). The diagrams are only illustrative. The bellows portion would probably be at an outward lean. There might also be swivel ability with the mated ports to permit leaning upper portion of suit as required.

To re-enter Suit from inside Tent: (one astronaut at a time)

Tent has a pre-packed collapsible tripod which is multifunctional to hold stove etc. Position assistive tripod and face away from access point. Place hands on tripod and kick feet up to land within access point. Alternatively, walk feet upwards along a ‘fabric’ ladder while holding onto tripod. While holding onto tripod, walk/hop tripod towards access-point wall while shimmying feet and legs further into access point and work feet and legs down into spacesuit waist and legs until it will be necessary to let go of the tripod. (At this point the last astronaut to exit would collapse the tripod prior to letting go and leaving it on the floor.) 

Alternatively, have a scaffold system to lie upon. But this would require a self-collapsing mechanism for the final exiting astronaut to trigger.

Proceed to shimmy feet further into suit with assistance of pushing with hands when possible. Exoskeleton controls might assist to orient lower suit torso and operate bellows as required. Shimmy until feed have landed inside the boots so as to be in position with bent knees as per figure 2. Astronaut positions hands to enter sleeves and straightens knees to place hands through suit arms and into gloves to be position as per figure 1.

Astronaut can drop arms to press external button to seal the doors again and then unlock the mated connections.

Other Notes

Note the tent has already pre-packed with items such as sleeping gear, compost bag, electric heater-stove combo, pre-filled ice containers (to melt into liquid water and boil for cooking), lighting, sanitary wipes, multipurpose tool (akin to Swiss Army knife), radio remote and other stuff. There is an electrical connection to batteries (or other power source) located external to the tent.  Similarly there is a connection to an external air supply system compressor/deflator combo. The unit circulates the air so as to scrub CO2. The radio remote is used for remote manual control of external items including a longer-range radio sufficient for Mars-wide communication including near-Mars orbit.

Peter Spasov. Last updated Thursday May 01, 2025