How to get to the moons, with an example (sandbox) rocket that can do it.

[Vanamonde]

Landing on the moons of Kerbin is one of the game's major milestones. If you can do this, you have most of the know-how you need to go anywhere else. But a lot of new players have trouble figuring out how to do it, and so I have made this guide.

Note: This is NOT meant to be the most efficient method. Nitpickers: I KNOW the ship is bigger than it needs to be, and there are more advanced techniques which will save fuel. But my goal in creating this guide is not efficiency, but to make something that is easy to follow and understand, with a ship that has more fuel than it needs so a newbie can screw up and still get the mission done. And for the sake of simplicity, I do not use nor explain maneuver nodes during this tutorial. Anyway...

This is the Mark 122b Moon Visitor.

***

Craft file: https://kerbalx.com/Vanamonde/M122b-Moon-Visitor

***

Feature: The ship has an emergency abort system. Hit the backspace key to trigger the abort sequence, and the capsule will eject itself from the rocket.

Then hit action group 0 to discard the expended escape rocket and open the parachutes.

When it's no longer needed or wanted, action 1 discards the escape rocket.

However, the ship is well-tested and launch failures should not be a problem. This feature is included primarily to show a new player how such an emergency system can work.

I will assume you already know how to launch, fly, and reach orbit. (If you do not know how to reach orbit, try my other tutorial.)

Launch the rocket and fly it to Kerbin Orbit. Around 80,000m is good, but the altitude is not critical. During the ascent, the two booster stages will run out of fuel and should be discarded.

You should also hit action group 0 to discard the (hopefully unused) escape rocket.

This leaves the transit stage to establish Kerbin orbit and carry you to the surface of the moon of your choice.

Go to map view and look down on the Kerbin/moon system from above. Click on Mun's orbital line and choose it as "target." Wait until the ship is about 120 degrees clockwise from Mun (we will cover Minmus later), turn ship prograde (horizontal), and fire the engine.

You will see your apoapsis marker climb toward the Mun's orbit, and closest approach markers will appear. It may look like you are aiming too far ahead of the moon, but remember, it will be travelling just as you are, and you are setting up a meeting where the moon will be when you get there. When you see the encounter markers appear,

you know your ship will be reaching the moon, and you can shut the engine down and coast there. Ideally, you could set your lowest Mun approach at an orbital altitude of 20-30kms during this burn, and I do in this example. However, that's an extra step for a new pilot to learn and remember, and really, just about any Mun intercept will do for the sake of this practice mission, so I will advise you not to worry about it now.

Wait until you have reached your closest approach to the moon, then turn the ship retrograde to fire the engine.

You will see the blue projected path line lower and then wrap around the moon. When it has formed a low circle that doesn't hit the surface, turn the engine off again. You are now in Mun orbit, and can take your time looking for a good landing spot.

This is a tricky step. Even places that look flat as you're flying over them can turn out to be dangerously sloped or bumpy, so be sure to quicksave (F5) before attempting a landing. And DO NOT attempt to land on the night side of the moon. This is extremely hard to do, even for experienced pilots. When you have a spot picked out, turn the ship retrograde once more and fire the engine, watching your projected path sink until it touches the spot where you want to land, then shut the engine off.

You are now descending toward a landing, and should hit the G key to extend the landing legs.

I also like to rotate my ship so that 'up' on the navball is facing my direction of motion (west), as I find this perspective easier from which to fly. That is a matter of preference, but the following illustrations will assume that you have done so as well.

Now it's time to kill off your orbital speed so that your ground speed will be zero when you try to land. Descend until you are at about altitude 5000m, and then turn retrograde yet again and fire the engine. This will cause the ship to fall a little faster as well, and you might come down short of your intended landing spot if you don't correct for it. So if you aim the nose of your ship slightly up from retrograde during this burn, some of your thrust will be applied to slowing your fall, helping to keep you aimed toward your original intended landing spot.

Make several burns, shedding speed by steps, as you watch the ground approach. (Note: this is inefficient, but easier for a new pilot to do, and I have given this ship extra fuel, so you shouldn't run out.)

This is the trickiest part of the flight. It is very hard to judge how far you are from the ground, because the altimeter at the top of the screen reads your height above an abstract "sea level," and the place you are over may be much higher. There is an instrument which indicates your true height above the current ground, but it is not easy to use because it is only visible from the ship's internal view, by hitting the C key and looking at the instrument panel.

Switching back and forth from this view is hard to do while piloting the ship, but with some practice, you won't need to. You'll be able to guess your approximate height by watching the terrain detail. It helps if you have the optional "ground scatter" graphics setting enabled, because this puts car-sized rocks on the surface which you can use as visual reference points.

As you get close to the ground, burn to shed your speed until the retrograde marker slides directly under your ship.

When you see this, you are coming straight down upon the surface of the moon. This is important, because if you are moving laterally at the time of contact, your ship may bounce or tumble or slide, causing damage or even destruction of the vessel.

Note: This is the hardest part of the flight. Do not feel bad if you crash at this point, as everyone does. I myself slammed ships into Mun for 4 straight days before I finally got the knack for bringing the ship down gently. You will probably need to try this several times before it works, but that is why I had you quicksave while you were still in orbit. If you do have problems, just hit quickload (F9) to go back to orbit and try it again.

Once you have eliminated your horizontal speed, adjust the throttle up and down to keep your vertical speed in the safe range. The landing gear will absorb the shock of landings up to around 15m/s, but the slower the better. Try to keep your descent down to 5-10m/s. When you see yourself getting close, eject the transit stage. (Try to do it high enough, though, that you don't get hit with debris when it explodes.)

You may need to do some last-second steering to keep the ship coming straight down. Again, you may crash several times. But it's worth it, because bringing a moon lander down intact for the first time is one of the most rewarding game experiences many of us have ever had.

Even if you do everything right, though, you can still crash. That's because Mun's terrain is VERY rough and treacherous. One thing that helps a great deal is to build the lander low and wide, as this one is. Anway, once landed, lower the ship's ladder,

and send the guys and gals out to play and explore.

When you are ready to return and have brought in the crew, hit quicksave, and fire the engine at full thrust and aim about 40 degrees above the horzion on an easterly (90 on the navball) bearing.

This is different from launching from Kerbin. Firstly, you can start building up horizontal speed right away because there is no atmosphere to fight. And while there is still a benefit to flying east along with the world's rotation speed, the boost is quite small on Mun. Every little bit helps, though, so it's still a good habit. And lastly, watch to make sure you don't slam into any hills. Mun's terrain is quite rough, and this is a risk. Anyway, keep burning the engine until you have raised your periapsis to 10,000m. This is high enough to clear any Munar terrain, so coast to that height, turn horizontal, and burn the engine again to establish an orbit.

Zoom out until the white line of Mun's orbital path is visible, and then wait or warp until your ship is over it. This is a good place from which to make a burn to return to Kerbin. You could do this burn in any direction to leave Mun, but this particular route does 2 things. By leaving opposite of Mun's orbital motion, you are shedding Mun's orbital speed, helping your ship fall towards Kerbin. And if you leave in other directions, there is a chance of Mun just scooping you up again as it travels. So turn horizontal and fire the engine, watching your periapsis rise until it exits Mun's sphere of influence (SOI).

Then coast until you are free and clear of Mun. Now, turn retrograde and fire the engines once more to lower your path toward a landing on the home planet. However, now Kerbin's atmosphere will work for you rather than against you. You will fall all the way to the planet and reach quite a high speed by the time you get there, and it would cost a great deal of fuel to shed all that speed before making a gentle landing. But if you set your path to pass through Kerbin's atmosphere, passage through the air will eliminate this excess speed for you. (This is called "aerobraking.") There are some hazards, though. If you come back too high, the air will not slow you enough, you will pass through it, and rise quite high again to make additional orbital passes. But if you try to come in too low, your ship could be destroyed by heat or even slam into the ground before it could slow enough. There is a range of altitudes that will work, but for the sake of this example. set your return periapsis for 32,000m.

You may now coast until the ship hits atmosphere. At that point, you no longer need the lander stage, and its mass would cause you to fall harder anyway, so eject it.

Wait until you reach a safe speed, open the parachutes, and float to a landing or splashdown.

You have now completed your first moon mission.

Minmus

As it happens, just about any ship design that can reach Mun can also reach Minmus. The process is almost exactly the same, but there may be one additional step, because the orbit of Minmus is inclined (at an angle) relative to Kerbin's equator and the orbit of Mun. That means that when you reach the height of Minmus' orbit, you may find that your ship is missing by passing north or south of the target moon.

If so, wait until the halfway point of the transit, where an adjustment will require the least effort and fuel. Then turn your ship due south or north (toward Minmus' orbit) and burn gently, watching the closest approach markers until you achieve an intercept.

This can be tricky, as Minmus is a small target. The rest of a Minmus flight will be much like a Mun flight.

This ship has two additional features. The lander is equipped with lights for night activities (thought attempting to land in the dark is still strongly discouraged).

And although you will not need it for moon missions, the ship comes with a port and RCS thrusters which enable it to dock with other ships. Because, why not?

I hope this is helpful.

[maceemiller]

Great post! I enjoyed reading it even though ive landed on the Mun countless times.

[gustchenchi]

I have no idea what you just did there. I am still trying to get in orbit consistently!

[SpaceplaneAddict]

I remember my first Mun rocket. I overdid it SO much, I got to Duna and back.

[Tatonf]

Without fairings your rocket is not very aerodynamic and newbies (and even non-newbies) will have a hard time doing the gravity turn, due to the well known "fliping rocket" problem.

Edited September 22, 2015 by Vanamonde

[Vanamonde]

Did you try that craft file? Between the reaction wheels of the capsule, the gimballing of the engines, and the fins, it's got boat-loads of control authority, and is actually rather hard to flip, unless you're trying to make it flip. Put that ship on a new heading, and it will hold it.

Also, the importance of fairings is commonly over-empasized. This guy put up a bit of a fight,

but I was still able to fly it to Mun.

[Warzouz]

Stock "Kerbal-X" in sandbox can go to Mun or Minmus. There isn't a big margin for error, though.

[Indoorsman]

Finally managed to land on the Mun with help from this guide... unfortunately I'm stranded there now but hey... those kerbonauts knew what they were signing up for.

[Vanamonde]

Glad it helped.

[Giygus]

Thanks for the guide, it worked pretty well from start to finish, and I think I even learned stuff.

One suggestion I could make though, I was pretty confused on the "How to leave the Mun" part.

On 7/20/2015 at 1:34 AM, Vanamonde said:

This is high enough to clear any Munar terrain, so coast to that height, turn horizontal, and burn the engine again to establish an orbit.

Zoom out until the white line of Mun's orbital path is visible, and then wait or warp until your ship is over it. This is a good place from which to make a burn to return to Kerbin.

These two lines in particular gave me a hard time.  In fact, it took me more tries to clear the moon then it did to land upright.  This could be a personal problem of mine, of course, but maybe a picture or two between could help.  For example, I think the picture of the "moon escape" orbit should be up higher, between the two paragraphs where I quoted you.  Another thing that confused me was not understanding how ship heading would change after I was out of Mun's influence.  Since I did not see the orbit lines changing the way I thought they should, I kept thinking I was doing something wrong.

Also, you may want to include some rough estimates of how much fuel you should have left after the major steps, as I kept getting nervous, not knowing if I was rocket'ing correctly enough to not screw myself later on.

But still, it is very good, and did help a lot!

[fireblade274]

@Vanamonde what happened to the 122a?

[Vanamonde]

59 minutes ago, fireblade274 said:

@Vanamonde what happened to the 122a?

Like I remember? Was almost a year ago.  

[Ozymandias_the_Goat]

Ah... the memories this brings!

[imcute]

On 9/21/2015 at 7:05 AM, gustchenchi said:

I have no idea what you just did there. I am still trying to get in orbit consistently!

get ur apokee to somewhere bigger than 70km and then prograde on (precisely!!!)the apokee