It's just down the street from 'Gel's place!!
Stay there, and it requires almost no effort to remain in orbit!!
:-)
-Ben
>So where's the Lagrange _Libation_ point?
>
>-Kevin
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Ben Braver" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>To: "CF-Community" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Sent: Friday, January 09, 2004 9:57 PM
>Subject: Re:Space Colonization -- Good or Bad Idea
>
>
>> Umm, "an L5 point?"
>> Think you mean a Lagrange libration point,
>> one where gravitational forces are equal
>> and keep a station in approximately the same position without fuel.
>> But these were meant specifically relative to Earth and Moon, not in
>general.
>>
>>
>> L5 is the fifth Lagrangian Libration point. But what are libration points?
>They are locations where a spacecraft may be placed so as always to remain
>in the same position with respect to the Earth and the Moon.
>>
>> From http://www.l5news.org/L5whatis.htm :
>> The French mathematician, Lagrange, in 1772, showed that there are five
>such points. Three of them lie on a line connecting the Earth and Moon;
>these are L1, L2, and L3. They are unstable; a body placed there and moved
>slightly will tend to move away, though it will not usually crash directly
>onto the Earth or Moon. The other two are L4 and L5. They lie at equal
>distance from Earth and Moon, in the Moon's orbit, thus forming equilateral
>triangles with Earth and Moon. The Sun is in the picture, and it disturbs
>the orbits of spacecraft and colonies. It turns out (from an extremely messy
>calculation done only in 1968) that with the Sun in the picture, a colony
>could be placed not directly at L4 or L5, but rather in an orbit around one
>of these points. The orbit keeps the colony about 90,000 miles from its
>central libration point.
>>
>> -Ben
>>
>>
>> >>How about this...
>> >>
>> >>Lets fix the problems in the United States first before we to go the
>Moon
>> >>and destroy that also.
>> >
>> >
>> >What's there to destroy. I suggest that we move all the heavy
>> >polluting industries and most of the resource extraction sector to
>> >outer space. There are enough mineral resources in the asteroid belt
>> >to last us at current rates (and double the current rate according to
>> >some) to last us at least 10,000 years.
>> >
>> >I love the idea of an O'Neil colony orbiting an L5 point near
>> >Jupiter. That would truly be way cool.
>> >
>> >larry
>> >
>> >--
>> >
>> >Larry C. Lyons
>> >
>> >========================================================
>> >Life is Complex. It has both real and imaginary parts.
>> >========================================================
>> >Chaos, Panic and Disorder. My work here is done.
>>
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