Fundamentals of Astrodynamics

Affectionately referred to as BMW (from the author names), this book was the required text for my intro spaceflight mechanics course in college. Not only did I do just about every problem in the book (which helped me blow away the final), but over the next 15 years I kept coming back to it for quick reference. Some of my commercial products contain simple Kepler solvers and orbit integrators that began life in BMW. Compared to other books in this field, it's a deceptively easy read. But I know of at least one rocket destroyed by engineers ignorant of the basics in sections 9.5 and 9.6. Sure, it leaves out chaos and I really wish it used SI rather than imperial units (actually, it favors canonical units, a useful and units-agnostic concept). But BMW is the simplest, most intuitive intro to astrodynamics I've ever seen.

The book isn't intended to be all things to all people. It covers fundamentals. I have worked in the field and keep two copies ;)The review of vector mathematics in the appendix is especially useful for non-specialists who want to start studying this topic.

The sections on the Kepler Problem (given orbit, find position at time) and Gauss Problem (given two points and time between, find orbit) were especially helpful to me. This book was clearly written with computers in mind, even though there is no code in the book. All of the most important algorithms are given in a step-by-step manner, with clear cross-references to the relevant equations. Derivations for allmost all important formulas are given from first principles, so that when an error in either the book or my code showed up, I was able to trace the source of the error. I saw very few errors in the book. Also especially helpful were several fully-worked examples, construced such that I could follow the example and my program in parallel, step by step, and verify that they agree. With the help of this book, I was able to reconstruct the departure and interplanetary cruise of the Mars Odyssey 2001 spacecraft.

If you want to know the science of Astrodynamics read this book. If you work with orbital analysis or orbital mechanics this book for you. For the beginners calculus, Algebra and some geometry knowledge are required otherwise the other aspect are well explained. I like the examples with its solution in this book, it force the reader to understand the principle especially if the subject sometimes is out of our daily vision. I have no problem following up this book, it simple and has all the principle and scientific logic you need to understand the science of space dynamics. It's a very good bargain with its price.

The true measure of the usefulness of any technical book is how many people own it. Every orbit guy I know (including me) has one. Just about every satellite ops person I know has a copy. Very few books indeed are generally known by the authors' initials, but "BMW" is one such book.The book provides information required to perform basic orbital analysis. Even when I'm doing analyses far beyond the technical scope of the book, it is the first one I reach for.