Use of Lunar Gravity-Assists for earth orbit plane changes

For certain missions, the mission design may require the spacecraft to undergo an orbital plane change maneuver. For a given family of final orbits, it may be more cost effective to use a Lunar Gravity-Assist (LGA) to achieve a large plane change. This paper examines these scenarios for Geostationary orbits. Hohmann transfers with combined plane changes are used as a comparative baseline for evaluating the performance of the LGA transfer orbits. On a first order analysis, it is shown that above an inclination of approximately 35 degrees, the LGA is more cost effective than the traditional methods.