| Chronology | Current Month | Current Thread | Current Date |
| [Year List] [Month List (current year)] | [Date Index] [Thread Index] | [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] | [Date Prev] [Date Next] |
No, I didn't mean that, Sergey, but I do see now that I was wrong. Thanks for the correction!
The moon's orbit is inclined by ~5 degrees to the ecliptic, NOT the equatorial plane, so things are actually a little more complicated than I had indicated. Because the orbital plane of the moon precesses with a 20 year period, unless I'm making another mistake, there must be times when the moon's orbital plane is inclined by as much as 28 degrees and never less than 18 degrees to the Earth's equatorial plane, which would have a non-negligible effect on the apparent angular velocity of the moon reducing it by between 5% (at 18 degrees) and 12% (at 28 degrees) from the value it would have if the orbital plane of the Moon coincided with the Earth's equatorial plane.
Now, I can't help but wonder if I'm making another mistake because my calculations from Bob's film seemed to work out so well under the assumption that the moon's orbit was essentially equatorial.
John Mallinckrodt
Cal Poly Pomona
On Mar 3, 2014, at 7:39 PM, Sergey Sukhotinsky wrote:
On Mon, Mar 3, 2014 at 7:04 PM, John Mallinckrodt <ajm@csupomona.edu> wrote:
There is one other subtle effect related to the inclination
of the Moon's orbit to the Earth's equatorial plane.
Because that inclination is only 5 degrees ...
Did you mean inclination of Moon's orbit to ecliptic?
_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@phys-l.org
http://www.phys-l.org/mailman/listinfo/phys-l
_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@phys-l.org
http://www.phys-l.org/mailman/listinfo/phys-l