Could the soon to be launched Falcon Heavy be aimed at Oumuamua

[AncientU]

Gravity assistance from Jupiter is useful if you want to accelerate in the plane of the planets.  I am not sure it is useful in this case where IIRC Oumuamua's path is inclined at 60°.

I believe that gravity assist is the best way to change the plane of your trajectory, which you'll need if you are going for any gravity assist maneuvers.

[mikelepage]

It's hard to judge how much detail to include..
One would expect anyone that quotes Oberth effect, to have a very fundamental understanding of orbital dynamics. At least to the extent of knowing that an orbit at 1/10th the height will be a LOT faster.

Yeah, I should explain that my misunderstanding was less conceptual and more about just not being very strong on the math of ellipses.  Of course I understand that a circular orbit at 1/10th the height (i.e. 1/10th the semi-major axis) would be a lot faster,  but I had intuitively thought that for two elliptical orbits with the same semi major axis, a difference in perihelion height of less than 5% of the semi-major axis distance, would not make that big a difference.  It didn't help that the online ellipse segment area calculator I used to check my thinking was actually calculating the area from the centre of the ellipse, not the focal point.  Lesson learned.  Sometimes you just gotta learn the math.

Gravity assistance from Jupiter is useful if you want to accelerate in the plane of the planets.  I am not sure it is useful in this case where IIRC Oumuamua's path is inclined at 60°.

I believe that gravity assist is the best way to change the plane of your trajectory, which you'll need if you are going for any gravity assist maneuvers.

Problem with Jupiter is that it's only in position for out-of-ecliptic plane-change maneuvers once every 12 years (and I think we can assume the path of any interstellar interloper is almost definitely out of the ecliptic).  The faster we can get a probe on it's way, the slower it needs to go, and the farther/cooler it's "fryby" perihelion burn can be.  Would be interesting to keep a probe out at EML1/the DSG that was almost fully built and ready to go, maybe with some kind of "plug-in" RTG technology, that meant you could send it on it's way to Jupiter within a few months of finding a target.  Having that kind of capability would make it much less likely that you miss the next 12-yearly Jupiter plane-change window.

[envy887]

Doesn't Jupiter cross every plane intersecting the sun every 6 years?

[Pete]

...  Sometimes you just gotta learn the math.

Or play enough KSP to get an intuitive feel for what is likely.
That game may not teach one the math or the numbers applicable to the Sol-Earth solar system, but it sure does ingrain an intuitive feel for orbital dynamics, despite its abbreviated sim of the physics.

In my case i did actually not know the exact formula for the speed, but i knew that with the aphelion being hundreds of times as far as the perihelion, i could just work with the escape velocity at perihelion altitude. The error would be  well under 1%
And I got escape velocity by the simple expedient of taking orbital velocity times sqrt(2)

At the sort of speed and gravity environment we were discussing, an exact answer would require a brief discussion with relativity, but the answer would still be correct to several decimals.

[mikelepage]

Or play enough KSP to get an intuitive feel for what is likely.

Hmmm, well I have been to the Mun and back several times, but not yet successfully performed a direct entry from Munar return.  Always had to perform a burn at periapsis to kill off the excess energy.  So I knew it was faster compared to low orbit, but can't say I noticed much of a difference in velocity between periapsis heights on my various returns.  Also haven't yet tried to perform an Oberth maneuver to go anywhere else... been busy saving stranded Kerbals 

Doesn't Jupiter cross every plane intersecting the sun every 6 years?

Technically yes, but pretty sure this Jupiter-assist, Solar-Oberth fryby maneuver is only good for trajectories in that plane, which are on Jupiter's side of the solar system.  It's impossible to go after out-of-plane objects on the far side of the sun from Jupiter.

[Jdeshetler]

To get a better sense how fast Oumuamuaa go, how long will it take to reach the same distance from the Sun as Voyager 1 (launched in 1977) which is now 141 AU (2.11×1010 km), approximately 13 billion miles (21 billion km)?

[Pete]

To get a better sense how fast Oumuamuaa go, how long will it take to reach the same distance from the Sun as Voyager 1 (launched in 1977) which is now 141 AU (2.11×1010 km), approximately 13 billion miles (21 billion km)?

Well, Voyager has a V_infinity of roughly 17km/s
Oumuemuaa has a V_infinity of about 26.3 km/s
Voyager is ahead by 2.11e10 km
.
So it should take mr.longname some 2268817204 seconds, or 71.9 years to pass Voyager1's then distance.
Or, it will take roughly 25.4 years to get as far out as Voyager1 is at this date.

The problem is not that we cannot possibly overtake and (flyby) intercept it, the problem is doing so within your lifetime, and while the investigating probe has a realistic chance of beaming answers back.

Also, the speed difference at flyby is of some concern.
If your investigating probe is 20km/s faster than the target, you will only get *at most* 100 seconds of observation from less than 1000km distance, and under one second at a closer distance than 10km, should you wish to attempt that.

[MaxTeranous]

In short, plan for the next one, don't try chasing the last one!

[speedevil]

Gravity assistance from Jupiter is useful if you want to accelerate in the plane of the planets.  I am not sure it is useful in this case where IIRC Oumuamua's path is inclined at 60°.

I was assuming something like a two stage vehicle hanging out in a distant orbit from jupiter, or trojan,  a ~1km/s or so boost to get it headed towards Jupiter, falls inwards from 'infinity' getting ~55km/s or so at perigee, burn then a couple of km/s at perigee, combined with getting to pick which side of jupiter you fall on gets you ~10km/s in a large slice of possible directions, as well as the possibility of just burning in other directions with your 3km/s.

[rakaydos]

Gravity assistance from Jupiter is useful if you want to accelerate in the plane of the planets.  I am not sure it is useful in this case where IIRC Oumuamua's path is inclined at 60°.

I was assuming something like a two stage vehicle hanging out in a distant orbit from jupiter, or trojan,  a ~1km/s or so boost to get it headed towards Jupiter, falls inwards from 'infinity' getting ~55km/s or so at perigee, burn then a couple of km/s at perigee, combined with getting to pick which side of jupiter you fall on gets you ~10km/s in a large slice of possible directions, as well as the possibility of just burning in other directions with your 3km/s.

If I were designing it, have a "launch safe" inactive reactor sitting on the probe. As the primary RTG winds down on the long wait ad long trip, the reactor is activated to provide transmission power to report findings back, and possibly even slow down for intercept.