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This is exactly how it works and how the orientation of many satellites is controlled. For example, the Hubble telescope has 4 fidget spinners installed, pointing in different directions - although they are commonly referred to as "reaction wheels".
Unfortunately a typical fidget spinner is a bit too light to be really useful:
We have to compare ...
2
Seems like usually 100 newtons - 440+ newtons of thrust. This depends on many different factors, though, including the gas being used, the pressure its being fired at, and the size of the nozzle/the mass of whats being fired.
This wikipedia page has information about the gemini spacecrafts' thrusters.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reaction_control_system
...
2
It's possible to use reaction wheels to arbitrarily alter one's attitude, but a major limitation with reaction wheels is that if an object has rotational momentum and one wants it to maintain a constant attitude, the reaction wheel will have to spin forever unless or until one gives up on holding a constant attitude or one can transfer rotational momentum ...
2
I know this question is old, but I randomly discovered a solution requiring only three thrusters on one thruster block that works if we don't mind introducing small transverse velocities.
We need a thruster block that has is three thrusters at ninety degrees from each other all tangental to the satellite's surface, or in other words, a typical RCS quad with ...
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