Damon asked: > >In my campaign a ship just "jumped" into system, using a jumpgate. The >jumpgate orbits the system's primary at around 100AU. The planet the ship >wants to go to is around 2 AU. What is the formula to calculate the time it >would take (non-relativistically) for the ship to reach its destination >using the acceleration/deceleration method? > This is the worst method, in terms of (fuel consumption) : (travel time); the only reason to use it is whenever there is an acceleration restriction, for example, if the ship crew doesn't support accelerations bigger than 1 g.
The best method is: apply a "kick" at the beginning, then cruise at "constant" speed [I imagine that the ship would be fast enough to neglect the gravitational effects of the Sun], then decelerate with another "kick" on arrival. Those "kicks" will use the classical equation: d1 = 1/2 a1 t1 ^2 reaching speed v1 = a1 t1 and the cruise time [unaccelerated except by the Sun gravity] will cross distance d2 = v2 t2 = v1 t2 = a1 t1 t2 So, combining those three phases, we have: total distance = 2 d1 + d2 = a1 t1^2 + a1 t1 t2 = a1 t1 (t1 + t2) total time = 2 t1 + t2 Now you can play with a1 and t1 to convert between distance and time Alberto Monteiro _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
