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Shuttle Challenge v5 - The STS thread [Stock and Mod Friendly] - MAJOR CHALLENGE ANNOUNCEMENT! - 30.3.2020


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On 8/24/2019 at 9:22 AM, ZZetho said:

fixed it! :)

Good thing the sats were over-engineered then :) In that case, here's your badge, congrats!

E6Sskam.jpg?1

And on to your STS-3...

On 8/23/2019 at 7:34 AM, ZZetho said:

Mission report for STS 3.

Very nicely designed telescope (I especially like the huge solat panels!) and flown mission, the only thing preventing me from awarding the commander badge is indeed the orbit inclination. Other than that, very good job!

J8qsBMX.jpg?1

21 hours ago, Cormorant - Mayflower said:

Final touches in progress...

Before wasting a load of time trying to figure out how the shuttle survived your average RyanAir landing, only to find out that "rigid attachments" were more powerful than expected :P

Welcome to the challenge!

Looking forward to seeing your entry here soon :) 

 

Michal.don

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My submission for the STS-1a Pilot rank, with my space shuttle Columbia: https://imgur.com/a/xUvfy1Y Note that this is the same mission I chronicled on my own thread here (which was mission STS-4 in my own numbering scheme, sorry for the confusion...)

I am using the following mods: TAC Life Support, DangIt! Continued, DecalStickers R2.0.

I don't think this counts as a cheat, but in the interest of openness, the shuttle's crew compartment is actually two Mk3 cockpits clipped together (manually), mostly for balance reasons. Additionally, I manually edited the save file to rename the kerbals.

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On 8/31/2019 at 12:36 AM, ZZetho said:

Mission report for STS 4 with shuttle Smol

That's either a pretty small shuttle, or a monstrously huge external tank (or, possibly, both :) )! But as thay say, if it works..... :) Nicely executed mission, here's another badge for you:

F2x1Z9Q.jpg?1

congratulations!

 

9 hours ago, ShuttleHugger said:

My submission for the STS-1a Pilot rank, with my space shuttle Columbia

Welcome to the challenge!

Judging by your nickname and avatar, I think we have a new shuttle fan here :) 

Regarding the mission - I don't have any objections, you certainly met all the requirements, and then some more. A bonus payloas, a functioning robotic arm - I'm looking forward to see more of your shuttle in the next missions for sure!

About the cockpit clipping - certainly not against the rules, and it's a creative solution to the balance problem, that certainly did not cross my mind. Just wondering, does it cause any excessive drag issues?

Anyhow, here's your first pilot badge (for reaching commander level, you'll have to master runway landings):

YgXYW8T.jpg?1

Congratulations!

 

Michal.don

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13 hours ago, michal.don said:

About the cockpit clipping - certainly not against the rules, and it's a creative solution to the balance problem, that certainly did not cross my mind. Just wondering, does it cause any excessive drag issues?

I haven't noticed any excessive drag, though my shuttle does fly like a brick (much like its real-world inspiration...).

13 hours ago, michal.don said:

Regarding the mission - I don't have any objections, you certainly met all the requirements, and then some more. A bonus payloas, a functioning robotic arm - I'm looking forward to see more of your shuttle in the next missions for sure!

 

...

Anyhow, here's your first pilot badge (for reaching commander level, you'll have to master runway landings):

I'll certainly be going after the higher-level badges, though it might be a while, as I'm going through a strict historical progression of flights in my game... I'm also not yet confident enough in my re-entry targeting to be able to achieve a runway landing, but hopefully soon.

And thanks!

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49 minutes ago, ShuttleHugger said:

I'm also not yet confident enough in my re-entry targeting to be able to achieve a runway landing, but hopefully soon.

I would suggest the Trajectories mod, but it hasn't been updated for 1.7.3 yet. I had to remove it because it was causing excessive lag. If you're running 1.6 you should be ok I think.

If like me you're eyeballing it, here's what I do. Set a maneuver node for your reentry burn about 60 degrees west of the KSC grounds. Make your trajectory hit the ocean off the coast, about twice the distance as the island runway. This should put you approximately over the KSC by the time you slow down to subsonic. Adjust as needed depending on your shuttle characteristics. I generally include jet engines on mine, but if you're a better pilot you can manage without them.

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Thanks @sturmhauke, Trajectories looks excellent and I'll keep an eye out for updates.

21 hours ago, sturmhauke said:

If like me you're eyeballing it, here's what I do. Set a maneuver node for your reentry burn about 60 degrees west of the KSC grounds. Make your trajectory hit the ocean off the coast, about twice the distance as the island runway. This should put you approximately over the KSC by the time you slow down to subsonic. Adjust as needed depending on your shuttle characteristics. I generally include jet engines on mine, but if you're a better pilot you can manage without them.

I am eyeballing the deorbit maneuvers; mostly I'm having some issues with accounting for the effects of the rotation of Kerbin between when I set the maneuver node and when the maneuver occurs. At this point I can hit the desert basin north of the Dessert Launch Site, but I just need to gather a few more datapoints to be able to nail the landing.

I don't want to include jet engines on my shuttle as I'm going for a reasonably accurate recreation of the IRL shuttle program, and it was glide-only. Otherwise I'd definitely consider it.

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6 hours ago, ShuttleHugger said:

I am eyeballing the deorbit maneuvers; mostly I'm having some issues with accounting for the effects of the rotation of Kerbin between when I set the maneuver node and when the maneuver occurs. At this point I can hit the desert basin north of the Dessert Launch Site, but I just need to gather a few more datapoints to be able to nail the landing.

I don't want to include jet engines on my shuttle as I'm going for a reasonably accurate recreation of the IRL shuttle program, and it was glide-only. Otherwise I'd definitely consider it.

Well, the deorbit procedure (the where and when to burn) varies greatly from shuttle to shuttle. But if you are successful in aiming for a general area, the landing is just a question of time - and trying. Once you try it several times, you learn the characteristics of your shuttle and learn what to do if you are a bit short/long. Then comes the first runway landing, and in a moment, you'll be able to land from any kind of orbit, don't worry ;) 

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Mission report for STS 5-8.

https://imgur.com/a/PBOZbnR

the pictures are really out of order for some reason, sorry.

On 9/3/2019 at 12:04 AM, michal.don said:

That's either a pretty small shuttle, or a monstrously huge external tank (or, possibly, both :) )!

it is! the shuttle is a 1.25m body (cargo bay scaled down) and the tank is 10 meters.

ps: how do i actually use the badges? like put them under where i say things?

modlist:k0uQ9mR.jpguprCOdm.jpg

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30 minutes ago, ZZetho said:

Mission report for STS 5-8.

https://imgur.com/a/PBOZbnR

the pictures are really out of order for some reason, sorry.

Alright, I admit, I'm really confused by that one, I can't even tell how many flights happened :D (It's more than four I guess?)

Would it be possible to take a screenshot of the whole station, and then somehow label what was added in which mission (for example in MS paint)? Thanks!

 

About the badges, you go to "Account settings" (upper right corner), then "Signature", and paste the badges there ;)

Michal.don

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18 hours ago, michal.don said:

Alright, I admit, I'm really confused by that one, I can't even tell how many flights happened :D (It's more than four I guess?)

Would it be possible to take a screenshot of the whole station, and then somehow label what was added in which mission (for example in MS paint)? Thanks!

i think there was 7 flights in total.

imgur really messed it up.

oh wait there's a rearrange button, oops.

fixed it: https://imgur.com/a/PBOZbnR

also:bJ7GUJe.jpg

 

 

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2 hours ago, ZZetho said:

i think there was 7 flights in total.

imgur really messed it up.

oh wait there's a rearrange button, oops.

Yeah, imgur is pretty well known for making an utter mess in your albums... :) Thanks for the screenshot, that's all I needed, here's your badge:

jj3FAr1.jpg?1

Congratulations, and happy asteroid hunting!

Michal.don

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11 hours ago, Kerbolitto said:

I've just finished my last mission, had this idea since a long time ! I hope you'll enjoy it, I took some time to legend the pictures and post moAR screenschots ! : D

This is pretty awesome, I have to admit that :) It seems your shuttle has no real limits to where it can go ;) Just a heads up though - some of these things may appear in some of the upcoming missions, so you might have to go to some of these places again, if you want the badges..... :D 

Michal.don

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5 hours ago, michal.don said:

This is pretty awesome, I have to admit that :) It seems your shuttle has no real limits to where it can go ;) Just a heads up though - some of these things may appear in some of the upcoming missions, so you might have to go to some of these places again, if you want the badges..... :D 

Michal.don

Many thanks ! :p

I thought about pm-ing you in case you were preparing something like this .. I have to say it's pretty hard to land overthere, even with an ISRU stop ..!

I've never flew so close to Kerbol before and I learned a lot of stuff. Next version will have lighter but more powerfull rocket engines, I've only used them to boost TWR during landing / ascent, and Wolfhounds are very heavy for the little thrust they provide .. !

Next fly might be a Jool5, not sure yet .. The Hi-Thrust version might use some tricks to land on Tylo :p

What about creating an " STS What ? " mission, with very little requirements but flying to various / unusual places at once ? :)

Edited by Kerbolitto
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3 hours ago, Cormorant - Mayflower said:

So, ummm... this took a LONG time, much longer than expected, but anyways, here's my submission to STS-1

Mod list (used and not used):

mRQX6JC.png

 


https://kerbalx.com/TM31/Aquilla

Nice looking shuttle, but you have some stability problems there. I'd suggest checking your dry CoM to make sure it hasn't shifted behind your CoL, and also adding more vertical stabilizer. Rotating the rudders you already have to vertical instead of slanted will probably do the trick - you should have enough pitch authority without them.

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On 8/19/2019 at 9:43 PM, michal.don said:

Aaand since I'm back, there is a new mission for you guys,

We're going to Minmus!

The Minmus missions will not be as difficult as the Duna/Eve/Jool ones, by far, so I expect you to impress me with great designs of the payloads ;) 

I know I promised the new missions a long, long time ago, but hopefully, there will be a few of them in a much more reasonable timeframe than usual :D And we're slowly, but steadily approaching "The big thing" we've been building towards the whole time. So, send my regards to the little moon, and have fun, the mission is in the OP right under the Eve mission.

Michal.don

WAAAAH I missed this until I was browsing through the thread and checking in.  Seems like this might orient around base building as the missions progress.  Count me in (at some point)!

Also did I see that there is some sort of super mission planned?!

SM

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Alright, we have a few new entries here, so, let's take a look at them:

On 9/9/2019 at 2:15 PM, Cormorant - Mayflower said:

So, ummm... this took a LONG time, much longer than expected, but anyways, here's my submission to STS-1

Well, designing a proper shuttle takes time, so no worries there :) The shuttle looks like a mighty one, and capable of going pretty far, especially with the dual-rocket launch system. I suspect though, even when they look cool, the tilted tail fins cause a fair share of your reentry instability - you seem to go into a flat spin, which is caused by insufficient vertical stabilisers 99% of the time (in my experience) - maybe a slight redesign could help you a lot there ;) 

You managed to meet all the mission objectives though - I'm not just certain if there are any modded parts in your shuttle and launch system, could you clear that up for me to award the correct badge? Thanks!

 

On 9/9/2019 at 3:37 PM, Kerbolitto said:

What about creating an " STS What ? " mission, with very little requirements but flying to various / unusual places at once ? :)

Well, if you put it like that... There actually is a badge for doing unspecified crazy/impressive stuff with the shuttle, and the more I think of it, the more I realize that this is indeed a worthy mission.

So, for the third time in tho almost two years od running the challenge:

W0Cdh2Y.jpg?1

I award you the Skunkworks badge, wear it proudly and don't stop being awesome ;)

Congratulations!

 

On 9/10/2019 at 10:42 AM, Speeding Mullet said:

WAAAAH I missed this until I was browsing through the thread and checking in.  Seems like this might orient around base building as the missions progress.  Count me in (at some point)!

No worries, there is no hurry, the mission will be available for a long time ;) Yes, there will be some sort of infrastructure building involved in the Minmus missions, I'm already curious about the designs that will appear here. But you have a good point, I should edit the challenge title to be a bit clearer about the new missions.

On 9/10/2019 at 10:42 AM, Speeding Mullet said:

Also did I see that there is some sort of super mission planned?!

Yes :) I already wrote some "little" spoilers some time ago in the thread, and some people got a pretty good idea what it will be about. And then life got in the way and I still did not finish the mission, so.... :D But, hopefully, soon :) 

 

On 9/10/2019 at 11:44 PM, DunaManiac said:

After looking for KSP Challenges I stumbled upon this. I realised that I haven't built stuff like this in a while, so I decided to tackle this challenge.

Welcome to the challenge!

It seems the first mission did not cause you too many problems, and you even got the reentry right enough to get you to very close proximity of the KSC - bravo! There seem to be some minor difficulties, but a slight modivication of the design will probably get it all right.

Just one minor thing - I get that screenshots look better with the UI turned off, but it makes it difficult for me to udge what's going on. For the next report, could you please make at least a few of the important ones with the UI turned on, so I can see the orbital parametres etc? Thanks!

(Oh, and I assume that the shuttle is stock, f that's not the case, please, let me know!)

Congrats, here's your first badge:

QThe6Sf.jpg?1

Michal.don

46 minutes ago, ZZetho said:

Mission Report for MINMUS STS-1

trying for commander with this one.

ah, a new entry, just as I was typing.... :)

You, sir, certainly got the commander level this time!

It seems that your split-shuttle design makes it quite easy to adapt it for different payloads, we'll see how far it will get you ;) 

Good job on the mission, here's your badge:

ET5vJlM.png?1

Congratulations!

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2 hours ago, michal.don said:

I'm not just certain if there are any modded parts in your shuttle and launch system, could you clear that up for me to award the correct badge? Thanks!

Well, at the bottom, you can see the craft file, pure stock, which was posted while the mission was in progress. But if you didn't see that then here: https://kerbalx.com/TM31/Aquilla

Anyways, I decided to modify the orbiter's OMS with 5 Cheetah engines, and move 4 of them to the front (and didn't interfere with the solar panels for some reason...), which I think will counteract with the offseting CoM as fuel drain
tO3Oyru.png

Yaw instability seems to stop now... Craft

Cursed screenshot
 

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5 hours ago, michal.don said:

Well, if you put it like that... There actually is a badge for doing unspecified crazy/impressive stuff with the shuttle, and the more I think of it, the more I realize that this is indeed a worthy mission.

So, for the third time in tho almost two years od running the challenge:

W0Cdh2Y.jpg?1

I award you the Skunkworks badge, wear it proudly and don't stop being awesome ;)

Congratulations!

Wow,

Thanks a lot michal !

This really means a lot to me as I spent hundreds of hours trying to learn about SSTOs before switching to space shuttles ..!

In return I can say that this is by far the best challenge I've participated. I've learned a ton of stuff about lighter and sleeker designs. It really pushes us to create and adapt our payloads and missions around a standard cargo bay at the center of a winged space device :p

Side note, Jool 5 + Jool STS 1 with a lone High Thrust / Extended Shorpa should happen soon, it's starting to look quite good (on paper) :p

I'm also having a few ideas to test an STS Eve (surface) using but this will require many "simulations" :D

Edited by Kerbolitto
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