Jump to content

milosh

Members
  • Posts

    57
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by milosh

  1. Surviving this without crashing is a challenge in itself, sweaty hands and lots of LoLs and "Oh sh..." moments are almost guaranteed. But to make it an actual challenge, lets see who can do it the fastest.

    Rules

    1. Build a plane

    2. Start on runway 1 at the far end from the sea

    3. Fly through the satellite dish, under the feed antenna, the plane's body must be at some point completely within the four struts.

    4. Fly under the walkway/bridge between the two dome buildings near the VAB

    5. Land on runway 1 and come to a complete hald without crashing

    Time starts on engine start and ends when the plane comes to a complete halt. It does NOT matter from which direction you thread the needle but is has to be satellite dish first, bridge second. Share a video of your flight, bonus points for hilarious crashes :D

    This probably won't win the challenge but it shows what is expected:

    Standings

    1. Draradech: 1min 22s

    2. milosh: 3min 5s

  2. When flying a plane with default settings, the SAS will be all over the place when making just a small input, flaps are going crazy and even with just a short key press to roll or pitch, it will often go too far and you have to correct back, which goes too far and you have to correct back, and so on...

    But there's a simple solution to this: right click on the wing, click on advanced controls and lower the authority limiter. The default is 30 but you can easily bring it down to 15 for a smooth flying experience that feels more like a real plane to fly. If you feel that the reaction of the plane is too slow, increase it slightly, on my acrobat jet I've set it to 22. This can be set permanently in the VAB or temporary during flight.

    To prevent nose planting your plane while breaking after landing: right click on the front wheel and set Breaking Power to 0.

    Lastly, always disable stearing on the rear wheels, makes it much more easy to hold course during take off.

    Hope this helps ;)

  3. Help build my 9 year old his first SSTO and explained orbital mechanics, build a nice SR71-like jet, build another "acrobat" jet and tried threading the needle through the radio telescope and under the bridge at KSC. I succeeded doing both but not in one flight, will keep practicing tomorrow :D

  4. Well I'm paying the price now for always relying on MJ in KSP1 to do my planetary transfers because I have only a rough idea how it works purely with the map and without any help from plugins.

    I am trying to get to Duna and I think I should be close to a departure window that would get me into it's ROI (if the rightangled triangle method still applies in KSP2). But I don't know what to the icons are trying to tell me and how to adjust my maneuver to actually get captured by Duna. I imagine that I:1 and I:2 mean intercept 1 and 2 of my and Duna's orbit but what is the prograde looking icon about the other I:1 and I:2 trying to tell me? Can I know from the map as seen in the screenshot what I need to adjust? Feeling a bit lost.

    [EDIT]: through try and error I figured that I need to get the I:1 without and with target icon to line up as perfectly as possible and have 0.0° divergence, then I finally managed to get captured by Duna and am sitting now in a nice 100km orbit around it. So to answer my own question - and please correct me if my conclusions are wrong - if I:1 with icon (target) is ahead of I:1 without icon (my orbit), it means the target will be ahead and vice versa and I need to adjust departure time accordingly to bring both together. Or was this sheer dumb luck?

    A2kWuOt.jpeg

  5. Thanks to 1.0.5 we now have MK1 sized ISRU units so I could finally build an SSTO I was dreaming about since I've first used an ISRU: an SSTO that can refuel itself, yey :D It can reach easily an 130KM orbit, refuel at a gazstation stationed in orbit, go to a moon, extract 2300 dV from an ore field and head back to Kerbin. It has enough battery power that it can mine infinitly with max time warp so refueling only takes several RL seconds (several weeks/months ingame though). Sadly I haven't figured out how to transit from one moon to another and land on it with only 2.3k dV, which means that moon hoping always goes via Kerbin.

    En route to Mun:
    [IMG]http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/644374753331513616/DF7DACAB5E625BB8B225034957A6874EC2658791/[/IMG]

    Refueling at gazstation in LKO:
    [IMG]http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/644374753324126719/D18633557A230AE8E455C4E7658A8BC0F8299EEC/[/IMG]

    Mining ore and refining to fuel:
    [IMG]http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/644374753327756244/32E8EE8E5566CDED733FA08F225E70E57FF66C9B/[/IMG]

    Take off:
    [IMG]http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/644374753327755465/79F38AC5B37C23E9CB99266B5C419495FB6BE7B0/[/IMG]
  6. F3 says the link between the side and main tank broke, at least that's the first message after "Lift Off". I had a closer look and found indeed an error, one of the side tanks wasn't properly attached. I fixed that but the plane still explodes as soon as I pitch with the same F3 log.

    @Venus: of course, this is the next generation self-fueling space shuttle NASA never dreamed of building :D As long as I don't pitch over 20° the plane is very stable and given the rocket power (lift off V~150m/s) I should be able to pitch well over 40° soon after liftoff and climb to 10k as fast as possible, if it wouldn't break apart this would be the plan anyways.

    Could it be that MK3 parts are just not made to be attached to eachother sideways so to speak?
  7. This is driving me nuts, I've made an MK3 version of a succesful MK1 SSTO I have, same design just bigger parts and more power. Additional tanks are attached to the main tank and the wings to the side tanks. The MK1 version is very stable, can roll, loop and so on. The MK3 version explodes as soon as I pitch over 20-25° no matter how gentle I try, SAS or no SAS, with or without payload.

    The rapiers are too weak in low speeds which is why I take off with the help of the rocket engines resulting in a much higher TWR at launch (1.5), that's the major difference from the MK1 version. In both planes I've shifted with the offset feature the side tanks a little bit into the main tank which makes them very stable, no wobbling of any parts. I wonder though if the forces in a 200t plane are just too strong or the MK3 parts are too weak for their own weight. Or does anyone see something wrong in my design that's causing it to explode?

    Explodes when pitched over 20°:
    [IMG]http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/644374753331496973/48D68FA7D4402D658817B9AF008AF73C70B41C04/[/IMG]

    [IMG]http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/644374753331497551/51CFF8E7F757FAE93693C55A88F3C69D2F15E137/[/IMG]

    This one works perfectly and is very stable, build after the same principle, only smaller:
    [IMG]http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/644374753331513616/DF7DACAB5E625BB8B225034957A6874EC2658791/[/IMG]
  8. The problem was indeed the suboptimal launch window - I tried it again just now and let time warp for half a year to the optimal launch window. I needed some adjustments to make after the burn because contrary to the calculated path I didn't get into capture range, a small 100dV burn corrected this and I ended up at Eve with a Pe of 60'000km. The difference this time was, that my satellite's orbit followed Eve's for a good time, no "X" to speak of. It cost me only 1000 dV to bring Pe down to 700km and into orbit around Eve aligned polar, another 1000 brought Ap down too. Pitty only that thanks to the thick clouds I can barely make out an ore-rich landing side but that's another story. Thank you everyone again for helping me out ;)

    @Warzouz: MJ for me is usually quite reliable if I don't choose to ignore it's suggestions. Only issue I have is that it does not calculate the amount of trust my engines produce 100% correctly and thus the predicted path does not always correspond with the path I end up after the burn. Thanks anyway for the mod suggestion but I stick to MJ because it get's always updated right away when a new KSP version is out, it's the only mod I use at all, plus astronomers visual pack.

    8CAC76FDBC2787A22C963D5E51E092CCF40F0AF4

  9. When I execute the next node it does already warp to the launch window at max speed (orbit at 640km) but waiting 1.5 years still takes several minutes I didn't want to spend starring at the screen. It's silly and in the end I've spend more time waiting than if I'd initially took the optimal launch window. Or did I misunderstood you, does the alarm clock instantly warp to the set time?

  10. Thank you all for your answes, a lot of usefull stuff here.

    Aerobreaking is not really available for me as I am trying to position a satellite with a survey scanner in a polar orbit, hence no heat shields or anything that a satellite usually doesn't need. Funny thing though, when I tried it once I felt right through the athmosphere and crashed on the surface, the satellite didn't burn up. Anyway, I think this is my problem:

    I'm sure there are plenty of tutorials out there. How to tell if an interplanetary encounter is a "good" one from looking at the map view: If your orbit and Eve's are crossing each other like an X, that's bad. if they're nearly parallel, that's good.

    As I said I use MJ's porkchop advanced planet transfer which does all the calculations for me. When I clicked on "asap" it didn't change the launch window at all, it was the same as "lowest fuel", but I was impatient and chose via the chart a window that was only several days away instead of a year and still cost me about as much dV as my second last stage offered. What I didn't pay attention to is my orbit on arrival though and it kinda was intersecting like a flat X. Now that I read it it makes sense and probably explains why "asap" didn't change. I'll try it again today and use the optimal transfer window, hopefully this will get me better results ;)

  11. Hello all,

    I can reach Eve without problems at a Periapsis of 1400km but once there I cannot established orbit, no matter what manouver I try I need around 4-5k of Dv/s to get any Ap at all and I only have around 2k left. My orbital speed is quite high at ~5600m/s so I wonder, is this always the case when you try to orbit Eve, do you need an insanly high amount of Dv/s left to get into orbit or am I doing something wrong? I use porkchop selection to rendezvous with Eve and some manual fine tuning on Kerbol (sun) Pe to get my rendezvous Pe down from 60'000km. I didn't choose the optimal launch window which would've cost me only 900 Dv/s to escape Kerbin because I didn't want to wait a year, instead I chose a window that cost me 1900 Dv/s but was only 7 days away. I tried aerobreaking through the athmosphere but the engine on my satellite is only useful in space with a TW/R of 0.19 ;)

    Is this where my mistake lies, does the difference in Dv/s add up to that high orbital speed I seem to have to work against? I'm not that good at orbital math so I hope someone can help me out or clarify what's going on.

  12. I just watched this movie and I believe it's a must seen for every KSP fan, as someone on imdb said: if NASA would be to make a movie, this is what it would look like. Also it kind of shows how my Kerbals must feel when I'm bouncing around a foreign planet, I promise I'll take better care of them from now on :D

  13. Succesfully landed my Mun Base today which has housing for 12 Kerbals and a science lab, can mine for ore and process it to hold more than 4000l of fuel, I love it if a plan works out :D

    Launch mass was 900t, the station itself is something over 80t:

    B77EBF3D994009BFC7A95F6C06EE965BAF260788

    Choosing the right landing site:

    F9E30DCA0FA64964965467AF9E037D89B615FCE1

    Deceleration burn:

    BC681390989E6CC642A97F6305B8110F08781545

    All set and done:

    22BEFA45405A64F14A6EB858A54B4F47A4922E41

  14. Astroneer might be a game some people wish KSP to be, I for one sure hope it won't go in that direction. Guess people are just different and have different reasons why they play KSP. To me, exploration per se was never the main goal, it was always about building stuff and the exploration part was just a means to get more creative as in: okay I've managed to build an SSTO who can reach Mun, now build one to land on Eve. Personally I don't even need career mode, the only reason I play in career is to have some consequences when losing a Kerbal and that science modules actually work. But they could've implemented this in sandbox and I would've been fine - in fact I played the first 200 hours solely in sandbox because back then career was a mere joke anyway.

    Nowadays the only thing I appreciate about career are the contracts because it's more convenient to have someone offering you a new idea on what to do than thinking about it yourself. Besides, some contracts present a challenge which I've never would've put myself up to in the first place, like building a Mun Outpost with a housing for 12 Kerbals, Mining Operation and 4000l of fuel storage. Figuring out how to build this and how to bring it to Mun is what keeps me going in KSP and I think my Mun outpost will be awesome :D

    More often than not I find myself thinking about new designs in the minutes before I go to sleep, under the shower or on the train to work but also when I read about concepts in sci-fi books or the latest stuff NASA is up to. That's what KSP is to me, like a childs dream, a means to be a rocket engineer without having to do the math or the constant battle with congress for budged. I've an idea, I build it, I succeed or I fail and try to improve on it. A smooth design and building process is much more important to me than a story or "stuff todo".

  15. Sorry I just get back from work and couldn't answer earlier. First off, I don't know why but when I did a flight just yet to take some screenshots the problem wasn't so severe. The engines still got overheated a bit but I managed to get into 150K orbit without it exploding. I then increased AP to well over 1000k and the overheating was completely gone. I thought maybe they released 1.05 but it's still 1.04 so I don't know what I've done differently this time - demo effect anyone? Anyways, as you see in the following screenshot I fly the most basic rocket to achieve a high orbit of 10'000k for my sattelite (needed for a mission). I usually set ascend guidance->show navball to reach 150k orbit and go from there to the desired orbit, flying manually.

    The four "boosters" (onion routing to main booster) begin overheating at 30K already - which I can somewhat understand given how close they are together:

    75E3756BED948F941371E568BFAB1E5285DA304E

    The two remaining engines start overheating at 70K:

    DE93BC67F28068BCD5ECE1B4A7CBDD47D1E18E43

    And are this hot at 200K:

    1450133A4941283F4580CD29B3AC3FA1167ADA61

    As I said, this flight was much better, when I started this thread my main engine did explode around 130K so I'm guessing that ascend plays a role. Usually I begin my gravity turn around 3-5KM when I've reached ~150m/s and then follow the marker on the navball. The rocket is very stable, no wobbling or anything, it could just use some more RCS when in orbit.

    Note also that I've toyed around with the debug menu and in the end didn't know what the original settings were. So I've deleted my physics.cfg to get the default values back and never touched it again. Did I screw up something by doing so or is there any error in my rocket design or how I fly? In any way thank you so much for investing your time in this thread and trying to solve my problem ;)

×
×
  • Create New...