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To: Lonesome in Massachussets

Plus we are at different points in the Gravity Well, so light travels at a different speeds closer to the Sun than Voyager............


7 posted on 08/27/2026 6:56:34 AM PDT by Red Badger (Iryna Zarutska, May 22, 2002 Kyiv, Ukraine – August 22, 2025 Charlotte, North Carolina Say her name)
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To: Red Badger

The NASA Horizon JPL web page accounts for that. The Horizons database is the result of a massive highly granular calculation of every known body in the solar system, using solar system baricentric dynamical time, which differs from dynamical time (now called Terrestial Time) only by milliseconds due to effects of relativity. Results are translated to Terresital Time or UTC on output.

The results are valid for an observer at the center of the earth who is using a clock beating at the same rate as an ideal atomic clock at sea level. The descrepancy is NOT due to relativistic effects. The measurement is the time measured on the sea level surface of the earth if, in that coordinate frame, a light pulse had been transmitted such that it would arrive at the point where the observer was when it was transmitted.

Voyager tracking is very clever. All communications recieved by Voyager are phase locked and frequency translated and sent back to earth. This removes most of the phase noise and frequency drift from the transponder. The transponder “reply” is recieved by deep space stations in Madrid, California and Canberra. Long baseline interferometry gives excellent angular accuracy and the phase locked transponder gives nearly ideal Doppler and ranging-time performance. The point where Voyager was at the time of reception relative to the receivers is a relatively simple calculation.


8 posted on 08/27/2026 7:19:32 AM PDT by Lonesome in Massachussets ( Thorough planning and careful preparation is no substitute for wishful thinking. )
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To: Red Badger
so light travels at a different speeds closer to the Sun than Voyager

are you sure about that?
12 posted on 08/27/2026 7:43:59 AM PDT by wafflehouse ("there was a third possibility that we hadn't even counted upon" -Alice's Restaurant Massacree)
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