This topic accounts for approximately 5% of your exam marks.
stable
Rare
Stable5%
Orbital motion, gravitational fields and circular motion in the solar system tested as shorter questions.
Why orbits happen
The Moon does not fly off into space, and it does not crash into the Earth. Instead it keeps going around at a roughly constant distance
The reason is gravity:
The Moon is pulled towards the Earth by gravitational attraction
But the Moon is also moving sideways (tangentially) very fast
The two effects combine to keep the Moon moving in a near-circular path around the Earth
For a stable circular orbit:
The gravitational pull from the central body acts as a centripetal force, always pointing towards the centre of the orbit
This force constantly changes the direction of the orbiting body's velocity, but not its speed
The orbiting body falls towards the central body forever, but always misses, because its sideways motion carries it past the centre
Properties of any orbit
For any object in a stable orbit:
The gravitational force always points towards the centre of the larger body
The orbiting body moves in a roughly circular path (or, for some comets, a very stretched ellipse)
The speed is constant for a circular orbit (varies for an elliptical one, see below)
The orbiting body is always accelerating, because its direction is changing even when its speed is not
Exam tip
Force that keeps an orbit going
What comes up: "Give the name of the force responsible for keeping [a moon / satellite / planet] in orbit" (1 mark).
Write (two marks when the question has an arrow diagram): (1) the force is gravitational (accept: gravity). (2) The arrow points from the orbiting body directly towards the centre of the body it orbits.
Watch out: the mark scheme ignores "weight", "centripetal", and "centrifugal" for this question — none of them score. "Gravitational potential" and "gravitational field strength" are explicitly rejected. The answer must be "gravitational force" or "gravity" (or equivalent). Saying "centripetal" alone is not enough, because centripetal just describes the direction of the net force, not its nature.
Orbits of planets, moons and comets
All three are caused by gravity, but they look quite different:
around the Sun
Each planet moves in a slightly elliptical orbit (close to circular) with the Sun at one focus
All eight planets orbit in the same direction and in roughly the same plane (the plane of the Solar System)
Each planet has a different orbital radius and therefore a different orbital speed and period:
Mercury is closest to the Sun, fastest, period ≈ 88 days
Earth has a period of 1 year (365.25 days)
Jupiter has a period of ≈ 12 years
Neptune is the furthest planet, slowest, period ≈ 165 years
The closer a planet is to the Sun, the faster it orbits (because the Sun's gravitational pull is stronger near in), and the shorter its year
Moons around their planets
Moons travel in near-circular orbits around their parent planet
The closer the moon to the planet, the faster it orbits and the shorter its period, for the same reason
The Moon takes about 27.3 days to orbit the Earth
Comets around the Sun
Comets follow highly elliptical orbits, which are very stretched ovals
They spend most of their time in the outer , moving slowly. When they swing close to the Sun they accelerate to very high speeds, then slow again as they head back out
Many comets travel through space at a steep angle to the flat disc the planets occupy, and a few even loop round the Sun backwards (in the opposite sense to the planets)
Comet Halley has a period of 76 years; some comets have periods of millions of years; some never come back at all (they are on hyperbolic trajectories that take them out of the Solar System)
The speed of a comet changes a lot during one orbit: fastest at the closest point to the Sun, slowest at the furthest point