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+--- Thread: Stability of Icy moon orbits (/showthread.php?tid=1301)
Stability of Icy moon orbits - Fsci123 - 01-16-2015
Hi everyone, I am interested in placing a small colony near some of the icy moons...most notably Callisto, Titan, and the other Gallilean moons. I have been trying to find some scientific papers regarding the stability of orbits around the moons and the stability of their lagrangian points... But I haven't found any.
Is anyone aware of papers about such a topic or how I may be able to easily simulate them?
Thanks
Fsci
RE: Stability of Icy moon orbits - stevebowers - 01-16-2015
The stability of an orbit around our own moon is mostly dependent on the distribution of mass inside the moon itself; a number of anomalous mass concentrations are present, making low orbits unstable. I would expect higher orbits to be a little more stable.
If there are any mascons on the moons of Jupiter and Saturn I haven't heard of them - but a reasonably high orbit, more than 1000km say, should be okay for a while. General opinion seems to be that any satelite of these moons would need to perform station keeping over time; see
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/lofiversion/index.php/t2902.html
RE: Stability of Icy moon orbits - Dalex - 01-17-2015
If you don't want to waste propelant give them some solar sails or charged tethers (magnetosphere of Jupiter is very strong).
BTW Titan is not Galilean moon.