Re: [TML] Watching A Planet
shadow@xxxxxx 29 Sep 2015 18:55 UTC
On 25 Sep 2015 at 19:40, Kurt Feltenberger wrote:
> On 9/25/2015 12:43 AM, Thomas Jones-Low wrote:
> > If you have a planet with a moon I would select the L4 or L5 points.
> > The leading or trailing position avoids the EM issues. If your stealth
> > fails partly your ship may be mistaken for another rock in the stable
> > point. For worlds without a moon the planetary L4/5 point may work for
> > the same reason but may be further away than you like.
>
> I thought the Trojan points were quite a bit further away than 1.5m km?
> That was my original thought, to have them there, as there may be some
> captured rocks that could be used as masking, but then I seemed to
> recall they were quite a bit further out.
L1, L2 & L3 are "metastable". That is, anything placed at them will
only stay there as long as nothing disturbs them. If they move at all
off the point, they'll drift farther away.
L4 & L5 are "stable" anything that drifts off the point will tend to
drift back as long as it doesn't drift too far.
So L1, L2 & L3 are like hilltops. You can place something there but
if it gets nudged much it'll roll away.
L4 & L5 are more like depressions. Thing will tend to roll back to
them unless pushed far enough to go over the "rim".
So you won't find rocks and dust at L1, L2 & L3. You will at L5.
--
Leonard Erickson (aka shadow)
shadow at shadowgard dot com