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Apollo Data and Energy



Friends, I need some new insight.

I came across some data, presumably taken from NASA and printed in the
British Nuffield Physics program. It details the altitude and velocity of
the space craft as it travelled to the Moon. I expected to use this data to
show that while coasting , the sum of Potential energies ( Moon and Earth)
along with Kinetic would remain constant. In fact for much of the trip, it
does. However, for some of the early points there is a discrepency. I will
give the data: (hope the format comes through)

R from Earth(10^6m) : 11.054 26.306 54. 356 95.743
Speed (m/s): 8406 5374 3633 2619

My values of energy
in 10^5 J/kg: -8.87 -7.85 -7.79 -7.68
( and then it was constant at 7.68 +/- .01 til
the next burn)

I can make it work if v = 8420 5378 3636

I am I dealing with error in data or concept? Interestingly the data for the
return trip did the same thing making the energy lower for the distances near
the Earth with the same "discrepencies" in the speeds.

Any ideas? I don't see a mechanism for a change in energy once the engines
are turned off.

ken fox