Precession
What is precession?
Precession is a property of a spinning gyroscope in which a force applied to the gyro is felt not at the point of application, but at a point 90° away in the direction of rotation. This characteristic causes predictable errors in gyroscopic instruments such as the attitude indicator and heading indicator, which must be periodically corrected. Think of it as: push a spinning gyro, and the reaction shows up a quarter-turn "downstream."
Also known as: gyroscopic precession
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