Three Body Orbital Mechanics Sim

[Evan]

This is for SketchyPhysics 3.2 on Sketchup 7 only. It demonstrates some of the complexity of the three body orbital mechanics problem. There is no usable general case analytical solution to the three body orbital mechanics problem and after you play with this you will understand why. The model is extremely sensitive to initial conditions. Collisions are treated as perfectly elastic but if they occur under the right circumstances the simulation math "blows up". This is always a limitation with any numerical approach to modeling this type of problem. Try moving the "planet's" starting position to change the simulation parameters. If you save it, save it to a different name as you will never recover the same initial conditions.

Note also that the image shown for this simulation is not correct due to a limitation of the watermark properties.

This simulation always causes SketchUp 8 to crash. My best guess is that it is either a stack overflow or a value is exceeding a variable container limit. The crash will happen sooner or later but WILL happen. No problems at all on SU7.

Edit to add image:
Edit to change link

http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse/details?mid=cd576ace20352dd94322578eaa9892aa&ct=mdsa