Monday, 26 April 2010

Can someone explain a Geostationary Orbit in a simpler way?

@Hobbes put the formula:



$V={2pi aover T}$



If you substitute on it $T$ for 1 sidereal day you'll have a one-to-one relation between $V$ and $a$. This seems to imply that you can choose any $a$ and use the corresponding $V$, but this is not true since it does not take into account which force are you using.



The formula above is valid of any object in a circular motion, like a stone on a sling, or a car in a loop. It is also valid for satellites around planets.



But there is another formula stating a relation among $a$ and $T$ when the force is that of Gravity, so you are not free to chose $a$ anymore.



It happens that centripetal acceleration (that of the sling, the Normal force on the loop, or gravity for the satellite) is the Universal Gravity in our case:



$a_c={GMover r^2}$



but it being the centripetal acceleration means



$a_c=omega^2 r$



so we have



$omega^2 r={GMover r^2}$



$omega^2 r^3=GM$



$omega$ is $vover r$ so



$v^2 r=GM$



which gives you a fixed relation between $v$ and $r$ for any planet with mass $M$.

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