Asteroid Grand Tour |
Asteroid Grand Tour |
Apr 7 2007, 01:31 AM
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Merciless Robot Group: Admin Posts: 8784 Joined: 8-December 05 From: Los Angeles Member No.: 602 |
This article from JPL describes recent efforts to derive a main belt multi-asteroid mission trajectory...any of you orbitsmiths out there have some early thoughts/observations?
-------------------- A few will take this knowledge and use this power of a dream realized as a force for change, an impetus for further discovery to make less ancient dreams real.
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Apr 7 2007, 03:10 AM
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#2
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Member Group: Members Posts: 903 Joined: 30-January 05 Member No.: 162 |
I don't know if this is original with me, but I have always liked this concept. (note, this may not fulfill all the mission objectives, or be the fastest)
Launch your probe to pass 60 degress ahead of Jupiter at the time it crosses Jupiter's orbit. You time launch to pass 1 or 2 asteroids in the main belt on your way to encountering a leading Jupiter Trojan. Keep moving out past Jupiter, maybe you get lucky and go by Hidalgo or Chiron (maybe not . . .). Your orbit about the sun is timed to fall back towards the sun so that you cross Jupiter's orbit when the trailing Trojan's are going by and you get to encounter one of them. After that, you fall back through the asteroid belt, and you get to encounter 1 or 2 more asteroids. If your period about the sun is an integer # of years, the probe comes close to earth again, maybe gets a little gravitational nudge to go back out to the asteroid belt again, maybe out of the ecliptic a little bit this go round. (this time, Jupiter Trojans probably elsewhere, so you don't get to see them again, but you do get to go out through the asteroid belt and back again, might pick up to 4 more 'roids) So if the timing isn't too tricky, you get to see up to 8 mainbelts and a couple of Trojans. If you really want to see Chiron, well, you might be jamming up some of the other encounters. Otherwise, if you aren't too picky about which main belts you see (afterall, you get to see up to 8 if luck holds) timing of your launch is pretty much every 13 months or so, might be easier to fly with a little flexibility, rather than trying for a 1 in how many millions shot at 4 specific ones. |
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