Viking Lander Surface Sampler

NASA's Viking mission landed two spacecraft on Mars in 1976, Viking landers 1 and 2. This video describes in detail the design and operation of each landers' Surface Sampler Acquisition Assembly, an electro-mechanical subsystem for scooping up samples of mars soil and delivering them to lander science instruments for analysis. The sampler enabled one of Viking's primary mission goals - to learn about the chemistry and possible biology of Mars.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viking_...

The video demonstrates the sampler hardware using a high-fidelity 3D digital model of the Viking lander that is a work-in-progress hobby of mine. Some renderings of the model components, still under construction:
https://goo.gl/photos/bcdFG1M2YMwQqyfq9
The model itself (created with SketchUp) is freely available:
http://tinyurl.com/viking3dmodel

Most of the animations were created using a beta version of Fredo6's SketchUp extension "Animator". Two sequences (winding of the flat conductor cable, and backhoe trenching) were created using Anton Synystia's "MSPhysics" extension.

My thanks to the following organizations who have allowed me to research their Viking artifacts:
The Viking Mars Missions Education and Preservation Project https://vikingpreservationproject.org
The Museum of Flight http://www.museumofflight.org
California Science Center https://californiasciencecenter.org
Virginia Air and Space Center http://www.vasc.org
NASA Langley Research Center https://www.nasa.gov/langley
Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum https://airandspace.si.edu

The Viking research photographs and measurements I've captured (plus some historic information I've collected) are available in the following albums:
Flight Capsule 3 in Seattle Museum of Flight (756 photos): https://goo.gl/photos/hedHCChRTyAbsN7W9
Dimensioned diagrams of the FC3 lander: https://goo.gl/photos/bp6qyitviWuS55VCA

Proof Test Capsule Lander at Smithsonian NASM (466 photos): https://goo.gl/photos/DPPq6cci1dNQJRVP9
PTC Lander at Smithsonian NASM in 2016 (888 photos): https://goo.gl/photos/nwr4Mt2CAaHYJraw9

Lander at Virginia Air and Space Center (622 photos): https://goo.gl/photos/kk3cojepePDNo3yg6
Dimensioned diagrams of the VASC’s lander: https://goo.gl/photos/fPBQcWmbmo8gbwzt8

Lander at California Science Center (456 photos): https://goo.gl/photos/zEF5GqU7D8WZWSVGA
Dimensioned diagrams of the CSC's lander: https://goo.gl/photos/7HoHmLFPzzL3eYee8

Misc diagrams, unusual photos (over 350 images): https://goo.gl/photos/FDcpciijf1HSjj2G7
Body assembly blueprints: https://goo.gl/photos/sczxRikkwJ2DB83j8

Collector Head Shroud Unit at NASA LaRC (99 photos): https://goo.gl/photos/pPY6yjAum8BBYxjR7
Biology instrument at Cleveland Museum of Natural History (36 photos): https://goo.gl/photos/JyKWiSegW9rVDAcL8
XRFS Instrument (42 images): https://goo.gl/photos/CGCyfMukJZde3MxQ8