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PolskiSolar Sail Navigation: Photon Pressure & Tacking (2D)
2D solar-sail lab: radiation pressure on a tilted mirror sail is computed from the inverse-square light flux and split into radial and tangential thrust, so tilting the sail — tacking — visibly raises or lowers the orbit.
This 2D companion strips the 3D solar-sail scene down to the numbers that actually drive it: a flat mirror sail intercepts sunlight whose flux falls off as the inverse square of distance, and tilting the sail's normal away from the star-line — the pitch-angle slider — splits that photon force into a radial component that fights gravity and a tangential component that either adds energy to the orbit or bleeds it away. The "Tacking maneuver" button flips the sail's trim instantly so you can watch an outward spiral become an inward one, the same way a sailboat changes tack against the wind but with light pressure instead of air.
2D solar-sail lab computing radiation pressure from inverse-square light flux on a tilted mirror sail, decomposed into radial and tangential thrust components that raise or lower the orbit.
2D · HTML5 Canvas 2D · 60 FPS target · runs fully client-side, no install