Skip to main content
added 843 characters in body
Source Link
MBraedley
  • 16.4k
  • 21
  • 102
  • 150
  • You should always be looking to enter a planetary system such that you're travelling counter-clockwise when viewing the north pole of the parent body, since this is the "correct" direction and nothing orbits in the "wrong" direction.

  • When encountering a moon that is tidally locked, it effectively doesn't matter which direction you enter from, but since you might not know if a moon is tidally locked, and since nothing rotates slower than the tidally locked rotation speed, your best bet is to also enter in the "correct" direction. There is a small cost associated with landing or taking off in the retrograde direction, the worst being for Laythe, where the difference is only about 120m/s.

  • When launching from a planet or moon, launch towards the direction that the background stars rise. In the general case, this is usually the same direction that a parent star or planet rises from, and in KSP, is always the case.

  • You should always be looking to enter a planetary system such that you're travelling counter-clockwise when viewing the north pole of the parent body, since this is the "correct" direction and nothing orbits in the "wrong" direction.

  • When encountering a moon that is tidally locked, it effectively doesn't matter which direction you enter from, but since you might not know if a moon is tidally locked, and since nothing rotates slower than the tidally locked rotation speed, your best bet is to also enter in the "correct" direction.

  • When launching from a planet, launch towards the direction that the background stars rise. In the general case, this is usually the same direction that a parent star or planet rises from, and in KSP, is always the case.

  • You should always be looking to enter a planetary system such that you're travelling counter-clockwise when viewing the north pole of the parent body, since this is the "correct" direction and nothing orbits in the "wrong" direction.

  • When encountering a moon that is tidally locked, it effectively doesn't matter which direction you enter from, but since you might not know if a moon is tidally locked, and since nothing rotates slower than the tidally locked rotation speed, your best bet is to also enter in the "correct" direction. There is a small cost associated with landing or taking off in the retrograde direction, the worst being for Laythe, where the difference is only about 120m/s.

  • When launching from a planet or moon, launch towards the direction that the background stars rise. In the general case, this is usually the same direction that a parent star or planet rises from, and in KSP, is always the case.

added 843 characters in body
Source Link
MBraedley
  • 16.4k
  • 21
  • 102
  • 150
  • You should always be looking to enter a planetary system such that you're travelling counter-clockwise when viewing the north pole of the parent body, since this is the "correct" direction and nothing orbits in the "wrong" direction.

  • When encountering a moon that is tidally locked, it effectively doesn't matter which direction you enter from, but since you might not know if a moon is tidally locked, and since nothing rotates slower than the tidally locked rotation speed, your best bet is to also enter in the "correct" direction.

  • When launching from a planet, launch towards the direction that the background stars rise. In the general case, this is usually the same direction that a parent star or planet rises from, and in KSP, is always the case.

From this system, we can extract a number of angular momentum vectors: each body has one located at their centre of mass and extending along the axis of rotation towards the north pole (the rotational angular momentum vector), as well as a second one located at the barycentre of the system and pointed along the normal of the orbital plane (the orbital angular momentum vector, which also defines the ecliptic plane of a planet). Note that the first set of vectors is how north is defined for a body.[See note below] It is independent of the direction a planet or moon orbits the parent body, but I'll come back to this in a minute.

What does this mean for your question? Well a planet or moon only rotates "in the wrong direction" if the angle formed by the rotational angular momentum vector and the orbital angular momentum vector are more than 90°. This angle is defined as the axial tilt. No body in KSP meets this definition. (One possible exception would be Bop. I haven't personally checked it, and the wiki is a bit unclear.) In reality one planettwo planets in the solar system meets this definition (albeit only just): Uranus, though only just, with an axial tilt of almost 98°, and Venus, with an axial tilt in excess of 177°.[See note below]

As for tidally locked moons, yes there are plenty of them in KSP. Duna is even co-locked to its moon Ike. They are, however, still rotating in the "correct" direction. Even if these moons rotated slightly slower, they would still be rotating in the "correct" direction, since from an inertial frame of reference, they are still rotating in the same direction that they're orbiting. Yes, from a rotating frame of reference, they may appear to be rotating in the wrong direction, but we're not allowed to use a rotating frame of reference. It doesn't matter which direction a parent body rises from, although this is somewhat of a moot point for KSP since it doesn't happen.


Note:
The IAU doesn't actually use the mathematical definition described above for determining which pole is the North Pole, despite the convenience the mathematical definition affords when doing calculations. They instead prefer to designate the pole that forms the smallest angle with the invariable plane normal as the North Pole. From a physics and engineering standpoint, this is stupid, and may actually cause the definition of north on Uranus to eventually swap due to axial procession.

  • You should always be looking to enter a planetary system such that you're travelling counter-clockwise when viewing the north pole of the parent body, since this is the "correct" direction and nothing orbits in the "wrong" direction.

  • When encountering a moon that is tidally locked, it effectively doesn't matter which direction you enter from, but since you might not know if a moon is tidally locked, and since nothing rotates slower than the tidally locked rotation speed, your best bet is to also enter in the "correct" direction.

From this system, we can extract a number of angular momentum vectors: each body has one located at their centre of mass and extending along the axis of rotation towards the north pole (the rotational angular momentum vector), as well as a second one located at the barycentre of the system and pointed along the normal of the orbital plane (the orbital angular momentum vector, which also defines the ecliptic plane of a planet). Note that the first set of vectors is how north is defined for a body. It is independent of the direction a planet or moon orbits the parent body, but I'll come back to this in a minute.

What does this mean for your question? Well a planet or moon only rotates "in the wrong direction" if the angle formed by the rotational angular momentum vector and the orbital angular momentum vector are more than 90°. This angle is defined as the axial tilt. No body in KSP meets this definition. (One possible exception would be Bop. I haven't personally checked it, and the wiki is a bit unclear.) In reality one planet in the solar system meets this definition (albeit only just): Uranus, with an axial tilt of almost 98°.

As for tidally locked moons, yes there are plenty of them in KSP. Duna is even co-locked to its moon Ike. They are, however, still rotating in the "correct" direction. Even if these moons rotated slightly slower, they would still be rotating in the "correct" direction, since from an inertial frame of reference, they are still rotating in the same direction that they're orbiting. Yes, from a rotating frame of reference, they may appear to be rotating in the wrong direction, but we're not allowed to use a rotating frame of reference. It doesn't matter which direction a parent body rises from, although this is somewhat of a moot point for KSP since it doesn't happen.

  • You should always be looking to enter a planetary system such that you're travelling counter-clockwise when viewing the north pole of the parent body, since this is the "correct" direction and nothing orbits in the "wrong" direction.

  • When encountering a moon that is tidally locked, it effectively doesn't matter which direction you enter from, but since you might not know if a moon is tidally locked, and since nothing rotates slower than the tidally locked rotation speed, your best bet is to also enter in the "correct" direction.

  • When launching from a planet, launch towards the direction that the background stars rise. In the general case, this is usually the same direction that a parent star or planet rises from, and in KSP, is always the case.

From this system, we can extract a number of angular momentum vectors: each body has one located at their centre of mass and extending along the axis of rotation towards the north pole (the rotational angular momentum vector), as well as a second one located at the barycentre of the system and pointed along the normal of the orbital plane (the orbital angular momentum vector, which also defines the ecliptic plane of a planet). Note that the first set of vectors is how north is defined for a body.[See note below] It is independent of the direction a planet or moon orbits the parent body, but I'll come back to this in a minute.

What does this mean for your question? Well a planet or moon only rotates "in the wrong direction" if the angle formed by the rotational angular momentum vector and the orbital angular momentum vector are more than 90°. This angle is defined as the axial tilt. No body in KSP meets this definition. (One possible exception would be Bop. I haven't personally checked it, and the wiki is a bit unclear.) In reality two planets in the solar system meets this definition: Uranus, though only just, with an axial tilt of almost 98°, and Venus, with an axial tilt in excess of 177°.[See note below]

As for tidally locked moons, yes there are plenty of them in KSP. Duna is even co-locked to its moon Ike. They are, however, still rotating in the "correct" direction. Even if these moons rotated slightly slower, they would still be rotating in the "correct" direction, since from an inertial frame of reference, they are still rotating in the same direction that they're orbiting. Yes, from a rotating frame of reference, they may appear to be rotating in the wrong direction, but we're not allowed to use a rotating frame of reference. It doesn't matter which direction a parent body rises from, although this is somewhat of a moot point for KSP since it doesn't happen.


Note:
The IAU doesn't actually use the mathematical definition described above for determining which pole is the North Pole, despite the convenience the mathematical definition affords when doing calculations. They instead prefer to designate the pole that forms the smallest angle with the invariable plane normal as the North Pole. From a physics and engineering standpoint, this is stupid, and may actually cause the definition of north on Uranus to eventually swap due to axial procession.

Made the answer more easily accessible, as suggested in comments.
Source Link
Steve V.
  • 22.3k
  • 36
  • 121
  • 196

Here's The Answer:

  • You should always be looking to enter a planetary system such that you're travelling counter-clockwise when viewing the north pole of the parent body, since this is the "correct" direction and nothing orbits in the "wrong" direction.

  • When encountering a moon that is tidally locked, it effectively doesn't matter which direction you enter from, but since you might not know if a moon is tidally locked, and since nothing rotates slower than the tidally locked rotation speed, your best bet is to also enter in the "correct" direction.

Here's Why:

As for tidally locked moons, yes there are plenty of them in KSP. Duna is even co-locked to its moon Ike. They are, however, still rotating in the "correct" direction. Even if these moons rotated slightly slower, they would still be rotating in the "correct" direction, since from an inertial frame of reference, they are still rotating in the same direction that they're orbiting. Yes, from a rotating frame of reference, they may appear to be rotating in the wrong direction, but we're not allowed to use a rotating frame of reference. It doesn't matter which direction a parent body rises from, although this is somewhat of a moot point for KSP since it doesn't happen.

TL;DR:

In the grand scheme of things, this means that you should always be looking to enter a planetary system such that you're travelling counter-clockwise when viewing the north pole of the parent body, since this is the "correct" direction and nothing orbits in the "wrong" direction. When encountering a moon that is tidally locked, it effectively doesn't matter which direction you enter from, but since you might not know if a moon is tidally locked, and since nothing rotates slower than the tidally locked rotation speed, your best bet is to also enter in the "correct" direction.

As for tidally locked moons, yes there are plenty of them in KSP. Duna is even co-locked to its moon Ike. They are, however, still rotating in the "correct" direction. Even if these moons rotated slightly slower, they would still be rotating in the "correct" direction, since from an inertial frame of reference, they are still rotating in the same direction that they're orbiting. Yes, from a rotating frame of reference, they may appear to be rotating in the wrong direction, but we're not allowed to use a rotating frame of reference. It doesn't matter which direction a parent body rises from, although this is somewhat of a moot point for KSP since it doesn't happen.

TL;DR:

In the grand scheme of things, this means that you should always be looking to enter a planetary system such that you're travelling counter-clockwise when viewing the north pole of the parent body, since this is the "correct" direction and nothing orbits in the "wrong" direction. When encountering a moon that is tidally locked, it effectively doesn't matter which direction you enter from, but since you might not know if a moon is tidally locked, and since nothing rotates slower than the tidally locked rotation speed, your best bet is to also enter in the "correct" direction.

Here's The Answer:

  • You should always be looking to enter a planetary system such that you're travelling counter-clockwise when viewing the north pole of the parent body, since this is the "correct" direction and nothing orbits in the "wrong" direction.

  • When encountering a moon that is tidally locked, it effectively doesn't matter which direction you enter from, but since you might not know if a moon is tidally locked, and since nothing rotates slower than the tidally locked rotation speed, your best bet is to also enter in the "correct" direction.

Here's Why:

As for tidally locked moons, yes there are plenty of them in KSP. Duna is even co-locked to its moon Ike. They are, however, still rotating in the "correct" direction. Even if these moons rotated slightly slower, they would still be rotating in the "correct" direction, since from an inertial frame of reference, they are still rotating in the same direction that they're orbiting. Yes, from a rotating frame of reference, they may appear to be rotating in the wrong direction, but we're not allowed to use a rotating frame of reference. It doesn't matter which direction a parent body rises from, although this is somewhat of a moot point for KSP since it doesn't happen.

added 23 characters in body
Source Link
MBraedley
  • 16.4k
  • 21
  • 102
  • 150
Loading
added 377 characters in body
Source Link
MBraedley
  • 16.4k
  • 21
  • 102
  • 150
Loading
Source Link
MBraedley
  • 16.4k
  • 21
  • 102
  • 150
Loading