Eve Lander

[KingDominoIII]

Is it better to have a wider stack (e.g. 3 meter) or more small stacks (e.g. several 1 meter stacks) when taking off from Eve?

[Foxster]

5 hours ago, KingDominoIII said:

Is it better to have a wider stack (e.g. 3 meter) or more small stacks (e.g. several 1 meter stacks) when taking off from Eve?

Several small stacks is usually better, with size 0 being even better than size 1 for drop tank stages.

Thinner stacks are less draggy, which is the cause of much of the losses on Eve, and you can do more staging. 

If you want to post a picture of your craft I might be able to give you a couple more tips. 

[Cpt Kerbalkrunch]

12 hours ago, KingDominoIII said:

Is it better to have a wider stack (e.g. 3 meter) or more small stacks (e.g. several 1 meter stacks) when taking off from Eve?

I've used a single-fuselage design with a Mammoth and multiple stack designs with 1.25m tanks. They both performed equally well, and it had it's advantages and disadvantages. The single fuselage was very aerodynamic, and cut through the soup pretty well. I used a four-stage design to dump mass as often as possible and take advantage of higher ISP engines as the air got thinner. The disadvantage of it is that it's a single stack; so it starts to get very tall. You need a good truss system under it to land it safely.

The multi-stack design was short and squat, and therefore easy to land. You can put as many engines as you want and dump them in any manner you see fit. The biggest drawback is that it has more surface area and is not as aerodynamic as a single-fuselage, so doesn't cut through the atmosphere quite as well.

Both designs can work and are a lot of fun. If you're in the testing and design phase, you might wanna try both. As always, much will depend on your payload. How many Kerbals, if you have a service module, making a direct ascent return or refueling in Eve orbit; all the usual stuff. No matter what, the feeling of accomplishment when you're successful is unmatched by anything else in the stock game. Hope all goes well.

Edited March 20, 2018 by Cpt Kerbalkrunch

[Human Person]

I usually go with 1.25m parts. One terrier stage and mostly aerospikes underneath (core and boosters). For thrust and steering at liftoff you also might want to throw in one or two vectors (don‘t need to hold onto them for very long)

Edited March 20, 2018 by Human Person