sturmhauke

For Commander level, 16 is plenty. Also please remember that you're rescuing crew from a stranded shuttle and not a station (or maybe you meant a hotel shuttle?), and the stranded shuttle still has to be at 350+ km orbit at an inclination of 25-30 degrees. And as always, stick those landings! Yeah, I have some reformatting and editing in mind already. But first I have to wrap things up on this thread.

First off, let me say that I really like your shuttle designs. I'm also a big fan of the Near Future suite, and I like all your swappable modules. However, and I really hate to do this to you, I can't in good conscience award you all of the mission badges yet. The missions are intended to be flown according to spec and in a specific order. STS-1 and 1a can be flown together, as well as STS-2 and 2a, but you've charged out of the gate and gotten way off in the distance, as well as mixed other missions together. This makes it difficult to judge whether the requirements have been met. So here's what I have for you so far: STS-1 - A solid first mission, and a nice landing. Here is your Commander badge: STS-1a - Unfortunately your orbit was out of spec. At the time of release of the fuel pod, your screenshot shows an Ap of 100.774 km and a Pe of 99.0139 km, for a difference of 1.7601 km. The mission spec requires a difference of 100 m or less at that height. I'm willing to overlook this, in light of some of the more serious issues I'll get to later... Here is your badge: STS-2a - I'm sorry, but I cannot award a badge for this one at this time. While your 3 comsats appear to be in the correct orbits, I can't tell from your screenshot if they are arranged in an equilateral triangle. It also took multiple launches before you got them repaired and into position, when it should have only taken one. Please fly the mission again in a single launch, and be sure to show the final arrangement from one of Kerbin's poles so that I can see the geometry. Here is mine for reference: STS-2b - Pod goes up, pod comes down, badge goes here: STS-3 - Telescope looks good, and I like your MMUs. Here is your Pilot badge: STS-4/4R - There are a few problems with this one. First of all, you don't have enough labels on your albums. That plus the liberal mixing of missions makes it very difficult to verify the mission requirements. Now, while the stranded shuttle appears to be in the higher, inclined orbit for the Commander level, the rescue shuttle ran off the edge of the runway and broke its nose gear. I'll allow a Pilot badge; if you would like a Commander badge please redo the rescue and landing portion of the mission. STS-5-8 - I like big stations and I cannot lie. But as before, the landings need some work. The shuttles need to stick the landing on the runway for that Commander badge. Here's a Pilot badge for now: I'll get to your Mun missions another time, but it appears you started the LOP-G series before completing the ground base series. That is definitely not the intended mission order, but I'll sort that out later. In the future, please be more careful about following the mission specs, mixing missions (when in doubt, ask first, or just don't), and labeling your screenshots better. Keep up with the cool designs though, those are good.

More fine work! I especially like the gratuitious functional robotics you added to the space station. A Commander badge for you:

OK, here we go with my first official certifications. A nice, traditional shuttle design, and two textbook missions. Well done! Here is your badge: ...And here we have a distinctly non-traditional shuttle design. Also an overachiever. I like it! However, since you landed on a hill somewhere rather than a runway, that's a Pilot badge for you. Feel free to demonstrate a runway landing if you want an upgrade.

Thanks @michal.don for entrusting me with this challenge series. I hope that I will live up to the legacy. To the entrants, I will review the entries over the next few days. Please hold any new entries until the new thread is up.

Not quite enough boosters, I think.

I posted a bug on the tracker about the ALG Large not stowing properly. https://github.com/shadowmage45/KerbalFoundries2/issues/52

It's even more difficult to use gravity assists in real life, but NASA and other space agencies have a bunch of PhDs available to crunch the numbers.

I haven't seen that anime, but the weeb-net tells me it's maybe a Santa Cruz fighter-bomber.

I already have a craft that can survive lithobraking on Tylo, I should be able to stick an engine on it and chuck it at the Munar surface. https://imgur.com/gallery/wDXsKiX

I don't think I've seen anyone swap engines on and off the orbiter like that before. Might have to steal that one.

As far as I can tell, it's used for animating the doors on the VTOL engines and maybe a couple of other parts.

I split the construction vehicle into two separate ones - a crane and flatbed truck. I'll either have to send the crane on a separate launch, or strap it onto the side of the shuttle somehow. I don't feel like redesigning the whole shuttle at this point.

You're protesting a mod because of some rando who doesn't actually have anything to do with it? That doesn't make sense.

Sure!