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Russell Borogove
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The absolute minimum delta-v for getting from a circular orbit at 110km altitude to the the surface of a perfectly spherical moon would be around 1736 m/s with an-- a 25 m/s periapsis-lowering-to-surface burn, coast, and instantaneous 1711 m/s terminal burn -- this is effectively a Hohmann to zero altitude combined with an additional burn to go from orbital velocity at zero altitude to surface velocity, which is obviously impractical and unsafe.

The Apollo landers budgeted around 2125 m/s for their landing, or about 22% more than the theoretical minimum.

If you are using a more modern, computer controlled, automatic landing at a prepared pad with a radio beacon on it, you could probably cut that quite a bit. 20002050 m/s is probably a good rule of thumb figure.

The absolute minimum delta-v for getting from a circular orbit at 110km altitude to the the surface of a perfectly spherical moon would be around 1736 m/s with an instantaneous 1711 m/s terminal burn -- this is effectively a Hohmann to zero altitude combined with an additional burn to go from orbital velocity at zero altitude to surface velocity, which is obviously impractical and unsafe.

The Apollo landers budgeted around 2125 m/s for their landing, or about 22% more than the theoretical minimum.

If you are using a more modern, computer controlled, automatic landing at a prepared pad with a radio beacon on it, you could probably cut that quite a bit. 2000 m/s is probably a good rule of thumb figure.

The absolute minimum delta-v for getting from a circular orbit at 110km altitude to the the surface of a perfectly spherical moon would be around 1736 m/s -- a 25 m/s periapsis-lowering-to-surface burn, coast, and instantaneous 1711 m/s terminal burn -- this is effectively a Hohmann to zero altitude combined with an additional burn to go from orbital velocity at zero altitude to surface velocity, which is obviously impractical and unsafe.

The Apollo landers budgeted around 2125 m/s for their landing, or about 22% more than the theoretical minimum.

If you are using a more modern, computer controlled, automatic landing at a prepared pad with a radio beacon on it, you could probably cut that quite a bit. 2050 m/s is probably a good rule of thumb figure.

Source Link
Russell Borogove
  • 171.8k
  • 14
  • 605
  • 714

The absolute minimum delta-v for getting from a circular orbit at 110km altitude to the the surface of a perfectly spherical moon would be around 1736 m/s with an instantaneous 1711 m/s terminal burn -- this is effectively a Hohmann to zero altitude combined with an additional burn to go from orbital velocity at zero altitude to surface velocity, which is obviously impractical and unsafe.

The Apollo landers budgeted around 2125 m/s for their landing, or about 22% more than the theoretical minimum.

If you are using a more modern, computer controlled, automatic landing at a prepared pad with a radio beacon on it, you could probably cut that quite a bit. 2000 m/s is probably a good rule of thumb figure.