AHHans

While you can split water into hydrogen and oxygen by simply heating it, I understood it that in steam plants you typically have the water reacting with some of the structural materials/metals (e.g. the zirconium of the nuclear fuel cladding). Oxidizing the metal and leaving hydrogen, which then tends to escape the steam system(*) and can form explosive mixtures with atmospheric oxygen. (*) Hydrogen considers steel piping more a strong suggestion and not an impenetrable barrier.

I think the March 2022 (not '21) date is not because of the first orbital flight of starship, but that they expect to be ready for real live testing of their calibrated camera by then.

Jeb has probably more physical strength than Val, but as all the controls come with power steering this doesn't matter. Val is definitely the better pilot! O.K. well, let me explain: when it comes getting a craft (rocket, spaceplane, airplane, whatever) out of a tight spot, doing precision flying, withstanding high g-forces, or so, then both are equally capable. But Valentina is the more level-headed pilot who is more focused on getting "the job done" and doesn't do so many risky maneuvers "just for the fun" as Jeb is prone to do. So Val doesn't get into tight spots where her superior piloting skills are needed as often as Jeb. For me that's the sign of a better pilot, but YMMV.

Have all the checkmarks the green ticks next to them at the same time? Running the test will only be successful if you do it when all the checkmarks are green at the moment you hit that "run test" button. (Or stage the part in case that's what you should do.)

Hmmm... Well, it's no gas giant like we have in our solar system: it's *bleep*ing hot and close to its star. Because of that I thought it is something like mercury in big, i.e. with essentially no atmosphere. But now that you mention it: its also really heavy (a rocky planet the size of Jupiter!), so it's incredible gravity may also prevent some atmosphere from being blown away by the star. Hmmmm.... But if it had an atmosphere with molecules in it, then they should have seen these molecules in the spectroscopy that they did. But I haven't seen anything like that mentioned in the paper. (I haven't read it completely, though.) I kind of would have expected that though... So I'll revise my opinion from "no way that there is iron rain on that planet" to "I think it's rather unlikely that there is iron rain on that planet". P.S. When writing papers to be published in Nature or Science it is somewhat usual to mention something that the data doesn't really warrant but sound awesome. In the paper itself they mention rain exactly once as: "Hence, it could literally rain iron on the nightside of WASP-76b". Which is not the same as "we have evidence that it rains iron [...]".

Where do these people actually see evidence for droplets and/or rain, in contrast to condensation on the/a surface? *grrrr* They actually do mention rain in at least one of their papers: https://www.eso.org/public/archives/releases/sciencepapers/eso2005/eso2005a.pdf (last sentence on page 6). But they only mention it as a possibility and don't really give evidence that it actually happens. I though about this some more, and I think that you'll get only rain when the atmosphere cools faster than the surface, otherwise the vapor will condense on the surface and doesn't form droplets. Molecules - like water or methane - can effectively cool via radiation, so the atmospheres on Earth, Titan, and other cool bodies (where molecules are stable) form clouds. But AFAIK mono-atomic metal vapors don't radiate efficiently, compared to liquids of the same material. Thus the surface should cool faster than the atmosphere and all the material condenses there without forming clouds.

Same here . . . kind of. You shouldn't trust my opinion about people (I don't!), but about things (well, physics etc.) I'm usually right. Which can be quite annoying when other people start taking your word as gospel, i.e. don't bother checking if my guesses are actually right. Until you start writing a paper, then you actually have to prove that you are right.

@kerbiloid

I have two issues with that: one is that this is a good example of argument from anecdote or maybe appeal to probability. Just because it happens often, or even more often than not, doesn't mean that it always happens. And the other is that I don't believe that iron vapor condensing from a planet's atmosphere means that it rained down there. It could just as well have condensed at the surface of the planet, without forming droplets. Considering that iron melts at 1811 K: it'll be orange, like a heavily dimmed incandescent light. O.K. I'm stupid: how does the material used in iron or steel casting look [Edit: during the casting!]? Like that!

Why? May I quote from the video description:

No. You are right, that - assuming an at least approximately steady state - if you have a liquid then you'll have a gaseous phase above that, or the liquid will evaporate. [After some more thinking:] Actually, that's not totally true: Superfluid helium-4 is obviously liquid but with next to no vapor pressure as long as you keep it close enough to absolute zero. [Even more thinking...] Well, the first statement is true: Superfluid helium will evaporate, but very slowly! Actually it will evaporate with the speed of energy that you transfer to it. So at the very least it will evaporate with the energy that the cosmic microwave background will transfer to it. But this leads to one scenario: you have a liquid that has only a very low vapor pressure so that the "atmosphere" above it is so thin that you can essentially just ignore it when considering your rocket performance. What you could also have in theory is a liquid with a high molar density so that pressure above the surface drops really fast and the "atmosphere" above the liquid is very thin, maybe even significantly thinner than the mountains around the "sea". That way you would land in a vacuum, but still have an "atmosphere" above the "seas". Hmmm... I guess that materials for scenario 1 are either very cold (like liquid helium) or very viscous (like vacuum grease). The latter because in order to have a low vapor pressure the molecues will have to stick together rather well, which I believe also makes them viscous. So I think to get the visual effects you want you'll have to go with scenario 2.

I guess they'll do that when they earn more revenue from selling ads for the launch livestream than from the launch itself.

I think you are missing this tutorial:

Not sure if that's your question, but: assume you have your typical airplane and want to control the ailerons on the starboard wing with one action group and the ailerons on the port wing with a different action group. In that case you need to not have the the two ailerons in symmetry, e.g. by placing them and then removing one of them from symmetry.

If your question is: "How do I fold the wings to the body so that they don't affect the aerodynamics during launch?", then the answer is: you don't. In the KSP physics model there is no such thing as "wind shadow". If your question is: "How do I move the wings on my starship recreation?", then my answer would be: with a hinge from the BG DLC. (E.g. the G-32W Hinge.) Otherwise: could you specify your question?

How do you plan to tilt the wings in the first place?

In addition to the written tutorials there are also many video tutorials on your video-sharing platform of choice. E.g. this one:

I put my Kerbin refueling station into a 500 km orbit. So 230 km is totally wrong! And you immediately need to change it to the only acceptable value!!111! P.S. In case you didn't notice: If you did some irony here, feel free to keep it.

There's also an iterative process to improve a maneuver node: Without changing the position (on the orbit == time of the maneuver node) of the node, increase the radial dV of the node until it gives the minimum inclination. Because the widget shows only one digit after the decimal point there is typically a wide range where the inclination stays at the minimum value. Use the lowest dV to get to that value. Move the maneuver node around the orbit line (== change the time of the burn). When you move the maneuver node closer to the ascending/descending node then the resulting inclination will be lower, so move the node to where the resulting inclination is minimal. Again: because of the widget limitations there usually is a wide range where "nothing changes", but here try to get to the center of that range. I usually only need two or three iterations of these steps to get to a maneuver that gives me "0.0 deg" inclination. (And then I usually mess up the burn, but that is a different story... ) P.S. When I do have the AN and DN displayed then I start my radial burn somewhat before the node and "push" the node to keep it in front of me while reducing thrust. That way I can get a very precisely matched orbit. (E.g. when a single puff from the RCS thrusters moves the AN and DN halfway across the orbit.

As @18Watt already mentioned: I usually don't care if the dropped boosters collide with each other or are only destroyed when they impact the ground. But that's not what you asked. I noticed two things: one is that the rocket is not pointing straight into the wind (== pointing prograde in surface mode). That means that that wind could push the discarded boosters into the remaining rocket. (I.e. if you would keep the rocket pointing prograde while dropping the boosters then you might not need the sepratons. But, jaja, that's off-topic again...) The other - and probably relevant - issue is that the sepratons spend most of their effort rotating the dropped boosters and not pushing them apart. Actually: once the boosters rotated more than 90 degrees they actually push the boosters back towards each other again. So my suggestion is to place the sepratons around the center-of-mass of the empty boosters (probably far to the bottom because the engine is heavy), so that they don't rotate the boosters much. At least make sure they burn out before the boosters rotated more than 90 deg. P.S. My guess(!) as to why it's always the same boosters collide is that it's some "strange" aerodynamic effect of the sideways wind on the boosters while they rotate.

Yes, it does. The amount of power that the OX-Stat-PD does not depend on the celestial body it is placed on. (Yes, yes, it doesn't make sense. Just go with it.)

Hmm.... Er... Now that you mention it... They are normal parts in the tech tree. So for career and science modes you need to unlock them first but after that you can include them in your designs like any other part. (Same for the BG parts btw.)

No, you can't. The Mk2 command pod does not have the capability to control probes. For that you need the Mk1-3 Command Pod, the Mk2 Lander Can, the Munar Excursion Module, or one of the two Remote Guidance units on the piloted vessel. Have a look at the table on the wiki page that @antipro mentioned. If you use only a command pod you will need two pilots to control probes from the craft. Your piloted craft has the RC-001S Remote Guidance Unit on board, so it works with only one pilot. Without that you would need two pilots in the Mk1-3 Command Pod.

AIS is meant for collision avoidance and works - like all traffic laws - because nobody is intentionally trying to break the system. There is no skill involved in faking an AIS transmission, so anyone could spend a few hundred bucks and declare their 12m yacht to be a Nimitz class aircraft carrier on AIS. So nobody uses AIS to identify military vessels or for IFF or something similar. You could probably cause more chaos by sending out fake AIS signals claiming to be loads of sailing yachts (== too small to show up on radar, but under sails so motor ships (even large ones) are supposed to make way) on collision courses with the regular traffic. Also: I just was on a sailing trip on the Baltic sea (https://track.alex-2.info/track_map.php?trip=19121), and as far as I can tell all navy ships we saw had their AIS switched off. (*Bleep*ing annoing, but not my problem as my job was only to pull on ropes after being told to.) So AIS or not has no influence on merchant raiding! But if you want to do that, then the civilian side of seafaring wouldn't pose an obstacle to that. Just take a ship that can take you where you want to raid, bring some fast RIBs and some grunts with assault rifles, and off you go. If you want to capture the ships then bring spare crew for prize crews, if you want to sink them then bring plenty of scuttling charges. The real risk to such an operation is the response of the navies.

Not an answer but another question - or a remark if you want, - if you have a vessel that is not connected (e.g. via a Klaw) to the asteroid but following that asteroid (in its "wind shadow") while it enters the atmosphere: will it actually be shielded from atmospheric effects? The way I understand KSPs physics engine, if you are separate vessels then you experience the full atmospheric effects, no matter where you are in relation to that big asteroid.