adinfinitum

I haven't gotten any pilots to where they're experienced enough to use target tracking, but could it be because your relative velocity is too low? I know that when I'm landing and using retrograde hold, as soon as my velocity gets below a certain point it automatically switches to heading hold. The game does this so that the ship isn't trying to flip itself around as the markers flip around. I suspect it might be something similar Edit: Looks like I was probably wrong

Have you tried lining up your CoT directly below the CoM? The shorter the distance between the two, the less torque there is, and the easier it is to compensate for the nose up tendency.

If you're having trouble netting a profit from tourist contracts, try waiting until you have multiple tourists with the same destinations, or ones that overlap. For example, Dudley Kerman wants a sub-orbital flight, but Lazie Kerman wants a Kerbin orbit, both can be completed in the same flight. I've found that it's more cost effective to take multiple kerbals on a flight than launching separate ones.

Um, wow... that puts my computer to shame I can't really recommend any specifics, but like you said, processing power is more important than graphics power for KSP. Since it's not really a multithreaded game, your going to want higher speeds for each of the CPU cores. Anything over 4 Gb of RAM will let KSP use as much as you can while still having room for other programs to run, aaannnd I think that's all the advice I had.

Cool, thank you!

Ah, well that's at least one of the issues answered, I never played 0.90 so that's interesting to know. I vaguely remember it being an issue back in one of the 0.2x versions, but I thought they had fixed it once between then and now.

There's not really a way to select the precise location of your AP or PE for a maneuver node, but you can get pretty close by comparing the time to maneuver and time to AP/PE. You'll know you got it almost spot on when your AP and PE switch location almost instantly with the addition of tenths of m/s dV, that should give you a AP and PE that are only a couple hundred meters apart.

In this case I had about 25m/s dV. I was trying to complete a return ore to Kerbin orbit contract, so if I was able to get my periapsis up to 70km I could complete it then lower it right back down. I doubt I had enough dV to actually do that, but I don't want to add more than a couple hundred dV when I tweak my craft, to keep costs down. I'll try coming in at around 45km next time and see how that works. I'd never noticed the orientation changing speed on reentry before, most of my other ships just entered directly prograde, I'll have to give that a try with some of my other ships. As a side note, does anyone know the equations KSP uses to calculate drag and atmospheric pressure now? I know that without doing some serious differential equations work I won't be able to calculate the change in energy exactly, but I might be able to get some rough estimates for future ships.

I would very much like something like this, as long as the periapsis isn't too low. As long as the the target has a solid 6 or 7 orbits before it actually comes in for lithobraking, it would easily be a doable contract. Of course this is assuming that Squad changes it so that unloaded vessels actually slow down in the atmosphere.

Okay, I've got a couple semi-related questions. I'm playing normal career with no reverts and no quicksaves, so trial and error is a rather expensive option for me. I've got a couple ships that I'd like to be able to send to Minmus and then return to a low Kerbin orbit. The return stage is pretty much capsule shaped as far as drag is concerned, the heatshield covers up anything that's behind it. Does anyone know a good altitude to set the periapsis at so that the craft doesn't end up landing, but doesn't require more than 1 or 2 aerobraking passes? I tried it and 33.9km, and that gave me a reentry. I know that every craft creates different amounts of drag based on what's facing the airstream, but it seems like anything that's roughly capsule shaped should have similar drag characteristics. Second, when the heatshields are facing slightly off-center of prograde, they produce lift. Are they any benefits to having the lift vector pointing a certain way? For example, if the lifting force is facing up, will the pass through the atmosphere produce less drag because you don't descend nearly as fast? And will the lift component create a significant amount of lift related drag, so that the apoapsis after passing through the atmosphere is much lower than a directly prograde alignment?

I'm running v1.0.2, with no mods installed. The original reason I created this thread was because when I had a gigantor solar panel landed on Minmus, it still produced electricity when the Sun had set. At first I thought it was because I had entered timewarp before the sun had set, but even after I slowed down to real-time it kept on providing power. Since there are other threads with different but related issues, I figured I'd make this a more general solar panel weirdness thread, and link those threads here. OX-SAT solar panels still provide power when inside closed service bay Bug - Solar panels generate power while the sun is blocked by Minmus OX-STAT work inside closed Service Bay OX Solar Panels are not obstructed by closed Service Bay Doors Bug: Solar Panels work while covered by closed Service Bay

It's always been pretty inconsistent for me, I'd say it works the majority of the time, but there's definitely a significant number of times it doesn't work.

I've got at least one rocket that starts at half throttle. It's got two SRBs on the sides, but their thrust isn't quite enough for lift off. Adding a third would be overkill, so having my main engine at half throttle gives it just the right amount of thrust. However, the majority of my rockets are tuned for full throttle lift off, so I do wish it started at full instead of half.

It's definitely possible, you can make fairings that connect to a different part of your craft instead of closed on top. From what I've read though, if your rocket has too much wobble it'll rip apart the fairing.

Well, at least as close as I could get to a Cessna and still find a place for that huge turbine haha

But you can enter into a retrograde orbit that isn't a free return. I'd like to add that my small annoyance is that nowhere in the description of the science lab does it say that it requires 5 electricity/second to process data.

Ever get tired of the stress of managing a space program full of little green men who would rather eat snacks than do anything useful? Get yourself a Skyjay today for the low price of 12000 credits! There's no better aircraft for afternoon flying, with it's spacious one-man cockpit and whisper-quiet turbojet half a meter from your seat. And what good would a craft thread be without pictures? Skyjay Download Flight notes: Because of the new location of the turbojet's CoM in 1.0, I wasn't able to get the CoT to line up with the CoM exactly. The horizontal stabilizers are rotated a couple of degrees to compensate for this, but this also means at low power levels there is a stronger nose down tendency. It's still not much more than a few degrees of nose up trim, but do watch out for it when in low thrust situations. Cruising speed is about 140m/s, using 1/3 thrust. I haven't tested it with higher thrust levels, but if you want to push it all the way up and see what it does, go right ahead. At cruising speed, about a half a degree of nose up trim should be necessary to maintain straight and level flight. Rotation speed is 35m/s, and takeoff occurs shortly after at about 38 or 39 m/s. I've got the control surfaces set to standard configuration for an aircraft, and the torque from the cockpit is disabled. Only the outer ailerons actually control roll, the inner ones are just there to streamline the wing. I think that's about it, if you have any tips and tweaks just let me know

Perhaps another easy fix would be to increase the amount of science required to unlock the research nodes?

The contracts for anything around Kerbin and its moons give like what, 15 science max? Sure its a nice little bonus, but it in no way replaces actually going out and doing experiments. I don't know what player would place hundreds of satellites in orbits to unlock the tech tree, so I don't see it as negatively affecting gameplay.

Can you extend the comms arrays on their own?

Wat... there's no calculus involved. The equation for deltaV is g*Isp*ln(m1/m2), where g is 9.81 m/s, Isp is the given value in the VAB, m1 is the mass with fuel, and m2 is the mass without fuel.

What we need is a wind tunnel. Something where once you get your R&D center to a certain level, it opens up an area where you can subject your craft to different pressure and airspeed conditions, and give you feedback on drag and lift. This would also let you plan aerobraking maneuvers better than save spam. I play with no reverts and no quicksave, because if I make a mistake I like it to feel like its a serious issue, but losing my pilots because the rocket flipped or the aerobrake was too high/low is almost random chance.

It'd be nice if they had some sort of hydraulic jack too, just like a vertical landing leg that can move up and down a certain distance. Then all your buildings and vehicles wouldn't have to be the same exact height.

While what I suggested is a realistic mechanic, it isn't realism for the sake of realism. I've been going off the pictures of pre-1.0.0 craft in this thread, and what they've got in common is that the wings are bring used to encase the fuselage, or create a flying wing type structure. Like you said, in game design you work backwards. Those crafts should definitely be able to fly, but they can't because the every wing adds lift and drag. Adding a tweakable to wing parts would work, but what happens when you've got 30 wing parts, and you missed one of them and don't know which it was? Sure, what I suggested is easier said than done, but if done right it would accomplish the same thing as tweakables while being less clicky. It's just coincidence that it's realistic

It isn't necessarily an unknown amount, Kerbin rotates once ever 6 hours, so if you know how long it will take to go from burn to target, you can lead it by the angle Kerbin turns in that time. You'll have to eyeball the angle, but its better than a random guess.