The Mars 3 lander, a so called Passability Estimating Vehicle for Mars was designed and manufactured in Mobile Vehicle Engineering Institute by a team of approximately 150 engineers, led by Alexander Kemurdzhian. Vehicle was a small 'Mars rover' on board, which was planned to move across the surface on skis while connected to the lander with a 15-meter umbilical cable. Two small metal rods were used for autonomous obstacle avoidance, as radio signals from Earth would take too long to drive the rovers using remote control. The rover carried a dynamic penetrometer and a gamma ray densitometer.