How do you handle Mun surface surveys?

[Kerburettor]

In an unwise attempt at gathering science at all costs, I accepted surface survey missions on the Mun.

You might be tempted to answer "you just have to decline them".

But hold on, I don't want to impact my reputation by doing so, plus I'm a stubborn mind who's ready to do things the most kerbal way if possible.

Do I pack Dv_s and cross fingers? This could be unrealistic because a series of take offs and landings on the surface of the Mun might be too much (I have 7 sites to visit). I haven't done calculations but this MIGHT be possible. Someone like Stratzenblitz75 or Turbo Pumped would find a way to achieve that with less than 5 tons, but I'm no Stratzenblitz.

I was thinking about a rover, but this will take an eternity to get from one site to another. I have relatively few items unlocked in the tech tree (see figure below):

I was also thinking about harvesting the surface of the Mun and exploiting the ore to produce fuel and supply my needs for a lengthy mission. But again, this will take days if not months if not years!!

Considering the current state of my tech tree do you think it can still be a conceivable endeavor? Or do I better give up for my sanity?

[Kerburettor]

For some reason I can't insert my picture from an existing url (from the steam website) so you can find it here:

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/937214613627046551/5D67826B326539820B7F25CFEB3CCCB712C60865/

 

[Superfluous J]

It depends a lot on where the surveys are, how close they are together, and what you have to do. But the best way to do it is to just do it.

If you're not comfortable precision landing (within a km or so) this will be the impetus to either learn how, or learn to live with yourself after canceling contracts

But basically what I like to do is plan my route, and instead of down-and-up do little suborbital hops, roughly burning 45 degrees each time to use the least of your dV reserves as possible. Do that until you have 1000 or so dV left (or you run out of sites) and then come home.

It can be very rewarding, and Mun has some very pretty areas that you'll never see if you don't force yourself to go wherever they tell you no matter what.

[Aeroboi]

@Kerburettor

What are your launchpad and vab facility levels? If both are level 2 (I would assume) you should have enough part and weight restrictions to make a multi part vessel. If you have 7 sites to visit one single surface vessel (rocket) should normally not have enough Dv to hop to all 7 areas.

Instead you should pack 2 identical rockets or 3 if necessary with about ~2000m/s of Dv (more or less depending on how far apart each landing area is) Alternatively use one single rocket with the science equipment with with a fuel tank in Munar orbit to refuel.

Remember that you only need a capsule, FL-T400 + a FL-T200 (or a FL-T800), a terrier plus the science equipment. Let's not forget the landing legs. If you are confident with landing you might install rover wheels on the rocket so you can use it as a rover on the ground. Don't land to hard to they might break.

You want to launch with 2 or 3 MEM's in a fairing or a single MEM instead of 2 or 3 but with a larger fuel tank in orbit to redock with once in orbit of the Mun. You want to position this vessel into a polar orbit and then retro burn one of them as the target area zips underneath. In all likelihood you will see the surface target drift away due to the Mun's rotation. Try to guesstimate where you'll end up and thrust normal or antinormal to follow the target in the map view. With F5 and F9 you should be able to land pretty close but I'm a pilot and someone else might not. Use that same vessel to hop over to any of the other surface areas. Launch back into polar orbit and meet either the other MEM or the fuel tank to refuel with and then repeat the process untill all areas are visited.

[bewing]

In the past I've tried to see how many random spots on the Mun I can visit in one go, with the most efficient design I can figure. No matter how I do it, I pretty much max out at 4. To hit 7, they will have to be quite close together (less than a few hundred kilometers). The inefficiencies involved in landing at unknown altitudes, doing reasonably precise landings, and making sure you can clear unknown terrain during your hops just burn up your dV like anything. Additionally, if the science reports require a crew, that makes it harder. If the science reports require a scientist, that makes it even harder. And if the science reports are surface samples, that also makes it harder.

But if it's a survey that a robotic probe can do -- then you may also have communication difficulties, depending on how you are set up for CommNet.

One other thing is the number of stars on the contract. If it's 3 stars, then it will require you to land super close to the waypoint.

 

 

Edited February 1, 2019 by bewing

[Snark]

7 hours ago, Kerburettor said:

I was thinking about a rover, but this will take an eternity to get from one site to another.

I generally avoid the surface-survey contracts, just because I find them tedious (a lot of futzing around, a lot of my time, not all that big of a payoff).

This right here is one reason they can be a pain.

If you have a surface-survey mission where they're all clustered closely together, then a rover can be a good option.

If you've got them scattered all the way around the Mun, then one relatively straightforward option is to have a fairly simple lander with enough dV to go from Mun orbit to the surface and back, once, with enough safety margin that it can do a reasonable amount of inclination change.  Send it to the Mun, docked to a big fuel tanker that never lands.  Put the tanker/lander combo in orbit around the Mun, in an orbit that's inclined enough from equatorial so that it will pass over all the spots you need to survey.  When the time comes, you undock the lander, send it down to count coup on the target site, then wait for the tanker to come round again before ascending, docking, and refueling.  Repeat for all the target sites.

Since you're only schlepping one land-and-return load of fuel for each target, then the overall size of the mission (i.e. mass of lander plus tanker) is reasonably modest-- you're making an end run around Tsiolkovsky.  It's easy to pack boatloads of dV if you're not actually schlepping most of the fuel for most of the dV operations. 

[GoatRider]

One thing that makes these surface-survey contracts so tedious is that hopping between them is below the no time-warp orbit level. Or if it's doable with a rover, you usually can't even physics-warp without the Kraken attacking. So it takes a ton of real-time.

[bewing]

1 hour ago, GoatRider said:

So it takes a ton of real-time.

But some of us think that wasting real-time is the whole point of playing a game. :p

[GoatRider]

14 minutes ago, bewing said:

But some of us think that wasting real-time is the whole point of playing a game. :p

OK, you've got me there. But then, why have time-warp in the game at all?

[Kerburettor]

There's a lot of common sense in your comments. I've decided to put that project between brackets for the moment and focus on a station-around-Mun mission instead, which proved to be far easier. I'll go rescue a Kerbal who's stranded in a low Kerbin orbit and make her go plant a flag on the Mun or something, this will clear up a few slots in my contracts. 

I checked the Munar map and you were right, these 7 sites are amassed into two main regions on the Mun. I'll send up two rovers for each one of these if I manage to collect a bit more science until then 

12 hours ago, GoatRider said:

OK, you've got me there. But then, why have time-warp in the game at all?

I guess you don't want to spend unnecessary time for elements which bring nothing from a gameplay perspective.

[Duck McFuddle]

Just try. Normally you can do something with enough quicksaves and reverts. If you really can't then just give up.