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 Incoming links: Velocity kick on a circular Kepler orbit

Past exam of the physics 1 paper of the University of Oxford / 2017 resit / 2 2026-10-25

The source's tangential arrows

a, c

respectively point along and against the original motion;

b, d

point radially outward and inward. Write

r_{0}

for the initial orbital radius,

v_{c} = GM / r_{0}

for the circular orbital speed, and

δ > 0

for the small added speed. The resulting trajectories follow the velocity kick on a circular Kepler orbit formulas. Here orbital energy includes kinetic energy and gravitational potential energy; angular momentum refers to the central object.

Figure 1.
Four Kepler orbits following small tangential or radial velocity changes
. Details.

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