How to reduce costs?

[Wizard Kerbal]

I'm launching a Jool Probe mission, And my other missions cost pales in comparison to it. Even a Saturn 5, and my other interplanetary vessels are less expensive than it. I'm recovering the orbital insertion boosters(1 for the nuclear tug, 1 for the payload), but that barely saves me 400,00 out of a 1.2 millionmission. Is this just how Jool missions are?

By the way, my payloads are 2 "Science bombs" to Laythe and Jool itself, a lander to Vall and 6 relays to deploy in high orbit. 

Edit: How do I edit the poll? I meant to make the second question multiple-choice.

Edited March 19, 2021 by Wizard Kerbal

[Wobbly Av8r]

I personally derive my KSP pleasure from attempting to accomplish my space program as if I had to deal with budgetary concerns as well as semi-reality in launch vehicles, meaningful to only one person, but that person happens to be me, so...

In so doing, I find others making ENORMOUS ships that fall outside the boundaries I try to set on my own program, both in cost and reality potential. Instead of building ginormous vehicles, I strive to build more compact, powerful, reusable vehicles and attempt to make use of an orbiting fuel station around Kerbin as well as Minmus that can refuel heavier payloads for deep space travel. Very large vessels are built to complete their assembly in orbit with docking ports. This kind of planning (to me) causes me to 'extract' maximum performance from the parts I select, both from a weight perspective as well as a cost factor. My most expensive projects cost well under 200,000 Kerbucks, most less than 100,000 and I recover part of the booster almost everytime so my cost decreases even further.  Just a few thoughts if such a thing appeals to you...

Edited March 19, 2021 by Wobbly Av8r

[bewing]

When you go beyond "hard" mode in career (by manually reducing the contract reward percentages even further), you have no choice but to be cost-conscious. The main way to make more money per launch is to have each craft complete more than one contract during its life. The second way is to land every vehicle back on the runway, and recover it from there for a 100% refund. This makes airplanes and Kerbin-based contracts especially lucrative. But it still applies to any other rocket, because you can fly all of them down from space and land them on the runway too -- if you design them properly. Once you can mine and process fuel in space, then you don't even have to launch all that heavy stuff from the ground anymore. That saves even more money.

And now that we can take satellites apart in space, and mix-and-match their parts to make new & better satellites, there are even more opportunities for frugality.

 

 

Edited March 19, 2021 by bewing

[paul_c]

I did NCD Caveman challenge and cost-control is very much part of that. It takes a LOT of clicking thru the contracts to select the most profitable ones. Anything tested at the launch pad is great, but they don't pay that well. In flight or splashed down tests pay about 4x more, and anything suborbital can normally be bundled into 1 or 2 stages and fully recovered (2 stage can be recovered so long as you blow the chutes before separation; and keep it in physics range of the stage with the controller).

I never did quite get 100% reuse from anything orbital, so you just need to suck up the costs, with other contract work. "take Kerbal on a xxxxxxx flight" never paid that well - it was always going to be ~9000 earned for an ~8000 flight. So in the end I only did "satellite to Mun/Minmus" and coincide it with my own science goals; and "science from xxxxx" which always pay well once you have the craft in orbit/surface landed.

I never did make anything interplanetary profitable, so I effectively planned it out then saved up using other contracts to do that bit.

[Curveball Anders]

I reduce cost by efficient(-ish) designs.

 

[Guest]

I find myself making very ‘Spartan’ craft (just the basics) to keep the costs down initially. Not enjoyable for me as it hinders creativity.

[magnemoe]

1.2 millions sounds very expensive for an probe mission, I have build fleets for less. How many RTG do you use? 
They and the advanced science instruments are expensive. 
See how much the payload cost and break down from here, one tips is to use more batteries and less RTG, solar still works out there but is less efficient than RTG for the weight. 
 

[Wizard Kerbal]

5 hours ago, magnemoe said:

1.2 millions sounds very expensive for an probe mission, I have build fleets for less. How many RTG do you use? 
They and the advanced science instruments are expensive. 

Yeah, I have all the science experiments the probes can use in their situations, and they all use RTGs.

Edited March 19, 2021 by Wizard Kerbal

[Superfluous J]

9 hours ago, Curveball Anders said:

I reduce cost by efficient(-ish) designs.

 

This. I build my payload as small as possible so my lifter can also be as small as possible.

For various definitions of "as possible" usually up to and including "as much as I'll bother to"

[king of nowhere]

when i was playing career i was trying to reuse everything. once i got isru, after establishing a few heavy multipurpose vehicles i never launched anything else.

shortly afterwards, i stopped playing the career because there was no challenge anymore.

another thing i do if i want to run things cheap is launch ssto. simply because the game makes it easier to recover the cost, unless you have a mod for booster recovery. during my no contract career challenge i developed the reliable Donkey launcher composed of a twin boar, 2 jumbo fuel tanks, and a 25 ton payload in a fairing. simple, low part count, fits into a level 2 launch pad, and can be recovered entirely. it launched stuff at 400 kerbucks per ton in orbit.

if the first stage is not reusable, using solid boosters instead of liquid fuel engines also saves money.

nowadays i generally maker big elaborate expensive missions. saving money is uncomfortable. i mean, yes, ok, i could put a hecs1 instead of a hecs2 and save 6000 funds, if only i want to deal with not being able to track manuevers and having less control on the ship. meh, no thanks. i know i can pilot a ship with little control. i made mun landings without SAS. but i don't like doing it and i don't have to prove anything in that regard.

 

regarding your 1.2 million mission, it's definitely big. some people completed a jool 5 with less than 30k. but then, one needs to look at the objective. if your grand lander comprises a baguette tank with an external seat on it and an ant engine behind, and all you're going to do is plant a flag for the bragging point and get back, then of course you can do it cheaply. you are launching a full fleet of multiple crafts to jool, and those crafts have long term objectives. so of course that mission is going to be more expensive.

[Curveball Anders]

6 minutes ago, Superfluous J said:

This. I build my payload as small as possible so my lifter can also be as small as possible.

For various definitions of "as possible" usually up to and including "as much as I'll bother to"

I also tend to re-iterate over lifter designs to get them 'good enough', and then reuse the same or very similar designs over and over again.