[amsat-bb] Torque Coil turns vanish?

[Greg Dolkas]

I think that, should you get enough induced voltage in the coil to forward bias a diode, all it would do is to slow the satellite's rotation around that axis, not drag against the satellite's orbit.  Think about it in reverse - if it could change the orbital velocity, then we'd all be running current into coils to push satellites into higher orbits.  And we're not.  So it can't.

Something like that...

Greg KO6TH


On October 29, 2014 7:18:33 AM PDT, Robert Bruninga <bruninga at usna.edu> wrote:
>> I am no rocket scientist, but wouldn't the earths magnetic fields
>tend
>to bias those diodes on as the satellite cuts through them, creating
>subtle drag?
>
>Yes and no.  In theory some, but in practice, no.  It takes a coil that
>is
>thousands of meters in length (usually called a "tether") to generate
>any
>appreciable torque.  And since torque goes as the area, then our coil
>which is 10,000 times smaller would be 0.000000001 as effective or
>something like that. Maybe
>Bob
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