What altitude over the sun counts as "low orbit" for science collection?

[allmhuran]

So I was tooling around the Joolian system collecting science for my tier 0 redux attempt, and then this happened:

That's a 6ms burn into an unassisted Laythe slingshot that gets me down to the orbit of Moho. If I warp around for a while and manage to use Jool (or any of its moons) to get a similar effect a second time, I should be able to put myself down near the surface of the sun practically for free. But I want to be sure I know what the maximum altitude is to get the "low altitude science" from the Sun before I commit. Anyone know for sure?

Edited November 14, 2013 by allmhuran

[DomDiaemus]

>>> But I want to be sure I know what the maximum altitude is to get the "low altitude science" from the Sun before I commit

on .19 it used to be safe a bit under 3K km down to 1.5K km if I properly recall it... I've not tried it since.

[allmhuran]

Sure, I'm not looking for the minimum safe altitude though. What I'm after is the maximum altitude that still counts as "low" for science purposes so I know how low I have to be able to get.

[neutron95]

I think that I might have seen somewhere that it is 40% of Moho's orbit, but that could also be completely wrong.

[Sirrobert]

1.000.000m

So a thousand kilometer

[allmhuran]

Cheers, I think I can make that

[KvickFlygarn87]

You're a god; 6 m/s from Jool to (almost)Moho. Also, if you wanna be badass: use Moho slingshot to bring down your apoapsis. This would got you down to almost 10 m/s for Jool to LSO.

[RocketPilot573]

1.000.000m

So a thousand kilometer

What? So my probe was only like 5 Km off? And it's out of fuel too...

[SunJumper]

You're a god; 6 m/s from Jool to (almost)Moho. Also, if you wanna be badass: use Moho slingshot to bring down your apoapsis. This would got you down to almost 10 m/s for Jool to LSO.

Moho's position and low mass makes it an impractical target for gravity assists to any place except itself. Unless you want to flyby Moho for the science, don't do it for the boost.

[KvickFlygarn87]

Moho's position and low mass makes it an impractical target for gravity assists to any place except itself. Unless you want to flyby Moho for the science, don't do it for the boost.

Right, I mindfarted.

But surely you could do a powered flyby and abuse the Oberth Effect to still get a rather efficient Low Sun Orbit?

[SunJumper]

Right, I mindfarted.

But surely you could do a powered flyby and abuse the Oberth Effect to still get a rather efficient Low Sun Orbit?

A powered flyby next to Jool or Laythe would reep much larger benefits than one next to Moho.

[lajoswinkler]

Use the search function.

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/57592-Altitude-required-for-Near-the-Sun?p=769688&viewfull=1#post769688