Mass Transfer in a close Binary Star System

[Lurco8]

Shouldn't the transfered mass fall in a form of an accretion disk?

[mrg3]

@Lurco8 It probably should, although I am not sure it necessarily would if the receiving star is not a compact object (I am not an astronomer). I was primarily working on conveying the basic facets of mass exchange to my students.

I also have to confess that I have not yet come up with a satisfactory (to me) way of animating the accretion disk with POV-Ray (the program I use to create the animation frames).

[tedperkins]

So does this system behave sort of like an hourglass?

[mrg3]

Well, not exactly. Each star's gravity dominates in its vicinity. As the giant expands past its "lobe" of dominance, its gaseous matter will spill into the other star.

A better analogy would be an hourglass on its side, where one side fills with water until the level reaches the connection and then spills over to the other side.

[TOPBLAZER85]

thanks that helped me understand the effect abit betta