Re: gas giants

> >2) What is the surface gravity of Jupiter guessed
> >to be?

Ryan replied:
> Hundreds and hundreds of Gees.
>
> Jupiter has enough of a gravity well that many scientist are
> reasonably sure that at the lower altitudes Hydrogen and Helium are
> metallic liquids rather than	light and aiery gasses.

Well, no, not exactly.	Jupiter's radius (to cloud tops) is 11 Earth
radii, mass is 318 Earth masses.  Gravity in gees is m/r^2.  Assuming
that 100% of the mass were at the center (which it isn't, of course),
at radius R the gravity is G:
R      G
1     318.0
2     79.5
3     35.3
4     19.9
5     12.7
6     8.8
7     6.5
8     5.0
9     3.9
10     3.2
11     2.6
Actual figures towards the center should be lower because much of the
mass is above you.  However...that mass above you is pushing down on
you, and the air pressure will squash you flat *well* before it forces
the hydrogen into a metallic state.   Assuming the jovian storms don't
first toss you around enough to make you go home.
If you want to know how to calculate the air pressure, look around
page 74-76 of Stephen Gillett's book _World_Building_, which is a