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A comment on Basics of Space Flight: Orbital Mechanics. Parent comment

Re:Basics of Space Flight: Orbital Mechanics by Animats on Wednesday October 07, 2015 @03:19PM (#10348338)
Kerbal's two-body mechanics thing is the worst limitation. Getting into orbit around Mun looks weird, as you suddenly snap from one gravitational system to another.

Slightly non-spherical gravitational fields don't matter too much unless you're doing a lot of orbits.

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Re:Basics of Space Flight: Orbital Mechanics by exDM69 on Wednesday October 07, 2015 @03:54PM (#10348566)
> Slightly non-spherical gravitational fields don't matter too much unless you're doing a lot of orbits.

Actually the effects of non spherical gravity is one or two orders of magnitude greater than the influence of all the other bodies in the solar system combined for low earth orbit satellite operations. It has a huge effect, causing a rotation of the orbital plane several degrees per day (up to 10 or so).

The effect isn't as great for lunar or interplanetary trajectories, though.

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