Martian Emigrant

Hi there. I finally have an entry for the Prize. The K-Prize no less. The ship with the unimaginative name "Cargo Plaine" gets to orbit drops a Micro-Sat and return to the KSC without using the atmospheric engine again. Thanks for watching, ME

Minmus is easier to get to and successfully land than the Mun. Easier to teach/understand precision landing. But to Kerbals it just is tastier than the Mun. ME

Hi again @Andrew1233 I am no expert on orbital mechanic. (I manage) But judging from that picture you are on a flyby through Jool's SOI and you are trying to nudge your probe into the atmosphere of Laythe. I do not believe it is possible to shed that king of energy by aerobraking alone. (Did you try burning all the remaining delta-V right before entering the atmosphere?) (It is sometime possible to plan a course that will burn retrograde and radially to burn ALL remaining fuel before the atmosphere and be just deep enough) When I go to Jool I will do a course correction as soon as my ship is in the Sun's SOI. I will work on the manoeuvre until I get a capture in the SOI. Being in an orbit means so much less energy than a flyby. I do not enter the SOI without a plan. Your probe is inside the orbit of Tylo. The probe came in the SOI on a flyby. IE It as enough energy to get out of the said SOI. It is now inside the orbit of Tylo. Without seeing your fuel remaining and actual course I believe it is too late. Reload an earlier save. Or save your actual game under a new name and look at your backup folder for an earlier auto-saved game to try again. We all have lost probes, ships and Kerbals. ME

Hi @Andrew1233 Not sure I can help. Sometime a mission is too far along to make it work and the only thing to do is go back to the drawing board and do it again. I can't tell where your probe is in your last save. Is it still around the sun, in Jool's SOI, on a flyby of Laythe? Can you provide your last save for me or others to look at? ME

Hello all. It as been a while. My potato crashed. Should be mashed. New PC much faster. I am back. ME

Hey all Kerbonuts. Got to play some more. Did an easy contract on the pad. Then built a new ship (well a mod of the previous ones anyway) to gather some sun science before proceeding to Eve. Boring run of the mill orbit and escape. Sun science was gathered. The relay was left behind by the science return capsule. A quick burn to re-enter Kerbin's SOI. Now there was a loss of signals shortly after the burn. And the signal was reacquired halfway between the Mun and Minmus. So me think that there will be a big zone without control if the return capsule doesn't have extra antennas. Hum. No mid-course correction. I will chance it. Keep the return capsule light and have more antennas on the stay behind relay. If that fail the we will just have to do it again. Return of the capsule from the Sun. Science and funds. Easy contract. For next time. ME

@Jeb x Valentina Hi. Part of my issue (Not a big one, granted) is that when you do something like go to Eve. Then the game propose missions that involves Eve. And drops proposing the close easy ones. Same for asteroids. Having easy satellites orbit Kerbin, Mun or Minmus contracts are easy and close by. You can combine getting the easy contract with exploring a new biome for nearly free science points. But a bit boring. I feel that I will get some Sun science first then do a mission to Eve. Break the Eve mission into a relay-lander followed by a relay-Gilly lander-return. Question-comment. RCS? Personally I never put RCS on ships. To reduce the part count. I will have RCS only when I want to dock a ship then move it around the station to another port. For close maneuvering with the main engine you can right click the engine and de-rate it to a few percents. (I like to think that I am doing a software update-patch to the engine computer) Same for docking. Once close enough you get the relative speed down to zero (With your de-rated engine). Line up to the docking ports, switch ship, line up the ports from that side. Switch back to the docking ship and give a quick burst forward. ME

Hi all. Another day another dollar Root. Funds. \F So on this session. Redesigned the rocket. More Delta-V per stage. Better legs, big reaction wheel, forgot to replace the probe core with the better one I purchased last time I played. Sigh. Worked out anyway. It looked OK enough to start the mission but I am not sure why I put so much delta-V in the return stage. We have two contracts for prograde satellites in a mun equatorial orbit. (Hand rubbing) Easy money. Let us go then. Now let us land on the Mun. Dropping altitude. Leaving the relay behind. Committed. The lower relay isn't the one orbiting with the probe. It is the one that toppled on the previous mission. Success. F5 quick. Science. Waited for the orbiting relay to pass overhead. On retrospect I should have launched retrograde. Going prograde makes the Apoapsis opposite from Kerbin. Going retrograde would have put the AP on nearside. Once circularized both the returning vessel and relay are opposite to Kerbin. The mission kept contact through another relay from a previous launch. Science and funds. Got the LV-N "Nerv" Atomic Rocket Motor, liquid fuel tanks and better solar panels. Contracts for next time as of yet. Now. Do I do more Mun-Minmus mission and do science? Or go to Eve? ME

Now the landing didn't go so well. Live and learn. No F5-F9 here. Fuel management first. Committed. Almost there. Gosh. Golly. Getting lemonade out of this. So....What have we learned? Lander as a high CofG. Puny legs. Too much of a slope for the mentioned above. Just wait till next time. So got some better parts. More contracts. Easy peasy. Another easy one. Contracts as of now for next time. ME

Hey all. Back at it. Easy contract at the launch site. Chose to go to the Mun and do the retrograde satellite contract. So rebuilt the previous rocket with more delta-V. Should be enough. Getting there. ME

Hey all. Back in the saddle. Done one contract. Accepted another. Now I have 3 contracts for the Mun and one for Minmus. Minmus first. As it bested us last time. And we want to see if we built better. So the plan was to get the probe to satisfy the contract, leave the relay part in orbit of Minmus, land, leave a science relay on Minmus and return the science. That was the plan. However. The first stage was lacking a bit on delta-v and the transfer stage was used....A bit. The landing stage was used to get a capture in Minmus SOI. The consequence was that the relay part was left to orbit Kerbin and was not available for the mission. The landing and return parts were a bit fuel heavy to start with....So on we go. Transferring propellant and oxidizer to assure a landing on Minmus. Planning for a suicide burn. Successful landing. After transferring the remainder of the fuel and oxidizer back to the return ship the takeoff and orbit went well. However the return planning was sporadic as the radio coverage was spotty. We had wait two orbit to get a window. Then there was a signal loss at the end of the burn. The burn was a bit long putting the craft in a low Kerbin intercept. Nothing to do but wait for the signal to be reacquired. The craft probably could survive that entry but there is a bit of delta-v left so the PE was raised a bit. More parts Another upgrade. Contracts for next time. ME

Hey all Kerbonuts. Getting back to the game. And trying to make sense of my screenshots. Last time I reported to have two contract tests at the launchsite and two satelites contracts. One equatorial one polar. That was easy. Easy equatorial contract with some science bonus. Easy contracts at the launch site Yeah new parts. Now let us get back to that polar satellite. Ready? Launch. Spending roots (Money) on an upgrade. Next I built (Badly) a ship for Minmus. The idea was to have an orbital relay to leave around Minmus. And a stage to land on Minmus to return the science back to Kerbin. The relay half didn't have probe core and was useless. The other half was out of range from Kerbin without the relay. So science high and low was gathered around Minmus and the whole thing came back. Not a total lost. Science was gathered. Learning from mistakes. More parts. More contracts for things I intend to do anyway.

Hey all. My escaping-Kerbin-probe got some sun science. That got spent on research and a VAB upgrade. Built a mun rocket The ship's next to last stage as the science package that will remain in the Mun's orbit. It will from now on be a relay for mision control. The very last stage brings the science back to Kerbin. Nice science haul. Let us spend it on "Research". A few contracts more to do. All the satellites will be relay stations. Of course. ME

Hey all. Last time we earned 140 science. Let us spend it. Got a proper probe core. Better rocket parts and a few facilities upgrade. Got to orbit Kerbin. More upgrade. Escaped Kerbin for a contract. I have to remember to revisit that probe for some "Sun science". Now a few contracts for Roots and send something to the Mun for Science.

Hey all Kerbonauts. Started a new career and posting a mission report about it. Space Is Dangerous, A new career without a single Kerbaled mission The plan is to complete all upgrades to the KSC, get all the devices science can buy, without having a single Kerbal (Or pony) risking his simulated life. So far a sounding rocket as reached space. Next to orbit something. ME

Hi all. Our first sounding rocket to reach space? Two of every scientific devices know to Kerbakind. The plan: Go straight up and gather high altitude science, space science, recover the data intact. Then spend the science points and money. Kaching. Now we can afford a proper probe core and better rocket parts. ME

My bad. Sorry. Moderators. Just noticed I am in the wrong section. How do I erase or move this? ME

Our first sounding rocket. Not quite enough to get a reaction wheel. Getting a material study from the launch pad made the difference. Now let us get some contracts. Next time we will get some science from space. ME

Here is the premise. Playing a new career, normal difficulty, stock. My only mod is the space ponies, for giggles. Not a single Kerbal will fly a plane, rocket or ship. Got the usual first contracts. Get all science from the launch pad and the runway. Some astute viewer might say "Hey, you were flying over Kerbin's shores" Yes. I did. Little known fact. If you jump and time your EVA report just right, you get a flying report. That works off-world as well. Bought some hardware. But still need 39 sciences to purchase a coveted probe-core. So let us get some science caveman style. Like pushing a science laiden ship to a new biome. Running to a new biome for a crew report. (Less painful with physic warp) When you walk-run to new places you get to play tourist. Still shy one science. So another mystery goo did it. Now I own the Probodobodyne Stayputnik. ME

Hi @Jeb x Valentina When I first read your post my thought was hit f5 then f9 to force a reload. Or go to the space center and comeback in. Same difference. But you solved it well enough. One would have to recreate the bug to see if it is consistent or a one off. Perhaps when they did the debugging it never occurred to them to try an empty ship docking to an inhabited one. So a little coding might be necessary but this late in the game....Not happening. ME

Hi all. Today I got rid off assigned two crews to the Kerlab. Crew 1 in Kerpollo 1 on approach. ME

Hi all. Finishing a new career and launched just for fun the Kerlab. Next time I will launch and park assign a few of those rescued Kerbals in there. ME

Have you tried it yourself? Just so we know what we are challenged to do? ME

Hi. -112°c? There could be explanations for the oceans being liquid but how are Kerbals walking without a helmet? ME

Hi. I like to make the nav ball smaller to save screen real-estate. But when I am trying to follow a marker faithfully my old eyes have a hard time. We already have a key to minimize the ball. Could we be able to select 2 sizes for the nav ball? And cycle through them has required. Personally I would choose 25% and 200%. Since talking about the navball when several markers are on top of each other it is hard to see the one you want. Could we have the one selected (On the edge of the ball) on top? Thanks for reading this. ME