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How do I know my satellites will stay in orbit? I can get a ship into a stable, pretty circular orbit at whatever altitude, and I understand that once you reach orbit, you stay in orbit (since orbital decay isn't modeled). What I mean is, when I decouple a satellite, how can I be sure that the decoupler's kick doesn't lower the satellite's speed too much and cause it to de-orbit?

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How do I know my satellites will stay in orbit? I can get a ship into a stable, pretty circular orbit at whatever altitude, and I understand that once you reach orbit, you stay in orbit (since orbital decay isn't modeled). What I mean is, when I decouple a satellite, how can I be sure that the decoupler's kick doesn't lower the satellite's speed too much and cause it to de-orbit?

speed up slightly as you release it.. it will counter the rear pushing force when decoupled. or use nova's mechanical decoupler which has almost no decoupling push. so you burb the throttle as you release it and let off on the power so you don't screw your orbit up. it will put the satellite in orbit at the correct speed.

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speed up slightly as you release it.. it will counter the rear pushing force when decoupled. or use nova's mechanical decoupler which has almost no decoupling push. so you burb the throttle as you release it and let off on the power so you don't screw your orbit up. it will put the satellite in orbit at the correct speed.

That's guaranteed to make matters worse, given how imprecise the throttle is. A much easier way is to point horizontally at 90degrees to your line of travel and decouple like that. The magic of cosines will take care of the rest.

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Not to mention thrusting only works if the satellite is not in-line with the engine. If the satellite IS in-line with the engine, the exhaust will fry it.

I think he's assuming an engine->fuel->decoupler->satellite->decoupler->engine->fuel->decoupler->command pod->chute setup.

Me, I front-mount my satellites: engine->fuel->command pod->decoupler->satellite

Much lighter. Harder to land, though. Another possibility is radially mounting a couple of SFBs, parking the sat(s) on top of them, and using the SFBs for your deorbit burn, I suppose.

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I would front-mount my satellites, but I can never seem to get them to fit properly inside any of the detachable nosecones. The nose cone always seems to fall partially off, and dangle to a side, pulling my whole rocket with it, if I have anything more than a command module and parachute under it.

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