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What did you do in KSP1 today?


Xeldrak

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First crewed mission to Duna breaking orbit. My first survey probe to Duna should arrive in orbit in 10 days to begin scouting landing sites.  The mission is probably overkill with redundant landers and rovers. 

Rados & Sanbin - Pilots

Teddard & Bartrie - Scientists

Leevis & Bill - Engineers

Bill's the only one with any real experience, so he's going along to keep the kids in line.

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After a five month hiatus from the game, I download v. 1.4.5 and my usual array of mods, fired it up and started a new career save. Just got done taking Jeb up into LKO for the first time to collect sci readings. Next up: saving up some cash so I can head to Mun sometime in the near future.

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Decided to start designing a new vacuum dropship based around a mk3 bay... my old one required too many vernors, too much shifting of fuel, had too much torque, was a bit difficult to fly:

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My new one has the vector engines farther from the COM so that their gimballing is much more effective, no vernors needed (the RCS thruster blocks are for docking in space), it balances very well when full or empty, and tolerates shifting of the COM from different payloads.

Here it is after a test on Kerbin.... I wish we had engines that were weaker than vectors that had similar gimbal... I don't need it to VTOL at kerbin sea level, but it does. Payload: 1*36 ton orange tank (fuel locked), that shifted the COM forward

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Started on the runway, translated forward, and landed... should be much easier on Mun.

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(RSS/RO) Earth Easter eggs hunting !

So I maid a manned version of my solar powered plane, Solarius-2! try to look at solar impulse 2, but performances ar faaaar from it

Mass: 6.932 kg.

Width: 32m/Lenght: 13m.

take off speed: 40 m/s. Nominal speed: 60 m/s. Autonomy seems to be about ~8 hours (day time) from I calculated.

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Leslie is really enjoying!

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Will see if there's an easter egg close to a launch site, because if not, it will take eternity to travel!!

Edited by kurgut
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An other version with custom cockpit, saved my 500kg! EC consuption is better now, but still not infinite:

Openable cockpit :)

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And closable of course!

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Ioups!

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Getting closer to solar impulse 2, I'll make it. I swear it on all  Kerbals ancestral Divinitys!

Edited by kurgut
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13 hours ago, kurgut said:

Definitely, you should. it's absolutely a great tool for us, "Realism overhaul/RP-oners". Quite a lot of testing at the beginning to understand how it works, but then just watching the PEG program putting perfecly your rocket the desired orbit (even not circular like pe 200km, Ap 35.000km, with any inclination, and more) is a glorious feeling. :) 

I did some experimenting with PEG last night and learned some things...  My manual ascents have not been as efficient as they could have been.  PEG is getting me to the same orbits with extra fuel left over.  :mellow:

For anyone wondering what we're talking about, there is an implementation of NASA's Powered Explicit Guidance algorithms that ran on the space shuttle flight computers for MechJeb's Ascent Guidance module.  The details of it are found here:  ttps://github.com/lamont-granquist/MechJeb2/wiki

PEG is a little tricky to configure, because you have to tune the parameters to your vehicle characteristics and desired orbit.  Solutions for some vehicle/situation combinations are simply impossible, so you may have to launch into a parking orbit then maneuver into your desired orbit.  It's a really neat tool to play around with in RSS or 10x rescale games if you're interested in how ascents are done in the real world.

It's probably not going to work well at stock KSP scale, though...

Edited by RoboRay
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1 hour ago, RoboRay said:

I did some experimenting with PEG last night and learned some things...  My manual ascents have not been as efficient as they could have been.  PEG is getting me to the same orbits with extra fuel left over.  :mellow:

For anyone wondering what we're talking about, there is an implementation of NASA's Powered Explicit Guidance algorithms that ran on the space shuttle flight computers for MechJeb's Ascent Guidance module.  The details of it are found here:  ttps://github.com/lamont-granquist/MechJeb2/wiki

PEG is a little tricky to configure, because you have to tune the parameters to your vehicle characteristics and desired orbit.  Solutions for some vehicle/situation combinations are simply impossible, so you may have to launch into a parking orbit then maneuver into your desired orbit.  It's a really neat tool to play around with in RSS or 10x rescale games if you're interested in how ascents are done in the real world.

It's probably not going to work well at stock KSP scale, though...

Ye, and for presition, PEG is great because it handles a single burn to orbit (real engines cannot restart or throttle: a lot of them, and all early ones,(not speaking of upper stage engines,etc) ).

I tryed in stock KSP using PEG, and not, it doesn't like Kerbin scale at all :D

Edited by kurgut
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What did I do yesterday?  Sent my new Duna Tanker, complete with non-clipped solar panels, on its way to Duna.

Finished up a tourist mission with trips to the Mun, Minmus, and Kebol orbit.  I nice chunk of funds was earned.

I also got a mobile lab setup around Kerbin.  I've got all science tech researched through the 160 level.  Only a few 300 level techs left, and then 550's and 1000 level.  Think I counted about 9300 more science needed to research the whole sci tree.

 

Now working on getting some ore scanners around Mun and Minmus, building some smaller ore miners, waiting another 280+ days for Duna Tanker to arrive, and reviewing transfer windows to open for other planetary bodies.

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When I created Kerberos plane yesterday I thought that some air-launch system would fit it. So I made one today! It is capable of puting Kerberos on trajectory with Ap around 45 km. Only problem with this launcher plane is that it REALLY wants to pitch up with  Kerberos on board, little hard in the beginning but you get used to it. However without any payload it really flies perfectly. Then I decided to make another spaceplane because Kerberos in air launch mode has only 600m/s dV left in LKO. So I added moar fuel tanks to Kerberos and scaled wings a little bit. Now meet Magni, new addition to my spaceplane family. It is capable of docking and also has 4 more crew capacity. It will be perfect tool for getting kerbals to my space stations. Thanks to bigger fuel tanks it has around 2km/s dV in LKO when air launched and 3,5 km/s dV when fully fueled. Since it has RCS ports it is very stable on reentry, landing went also good, but it could be better. Thanks bumpy landing gear!

Very exciting day today!

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A realism overhaul motobike (my first!) , fully nuclear powered, will use that in my next Earth anomaly survey mission! max speed: 16 m/s

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Will be used in conjunction with a suborbital rocket, and powered landing. Still designing now  :

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I know, strange design :)

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8 hours ago, RoboRay said:

PEG is a little tricky to configure, because you have to tune the parameters to your vehicle characteristics and desired orbit.  Solutions for some vehicle/situation combinations are simply impossible, so you may have to launch into a parking orbit then maneuver into your desired orbit.  It's a really neat tool to play around with in RSS or 10x rescale games if you're interested in how ascents are done in the real world.

It's probably not going to work well at stock KSP scale, though...

Correct -- per Grayduster and Nathan Kell, PEG does not handle launches with a coast phase before first apogee (which is almost all launches with reasonable TWR from Kerbin).  I've seen MechJeb shut down a stage with propellant remaining when the apogee had reached the requested perigee value, however, presumably intending/expecting to circularize with the next stage, rather than (for instance) pitch down to continue building velocity without further raising the apsis.  Where I have trouble is that PEG does unexpected things if, for instance, you don't quite have enough dV for the orbit you're after.  It can also make things complicated if you need to stage fairly early (as, for instance, when your launch vehicle burns Ethanol90 with a 2+ minute burn time); it will turn over early trying to make the requested orbit, and then you wind up staging at, say, 30-35 km and Mach 2-3.  Which doesn't work out well when you have an engine with 2 degrees thrust vectoring, and a big fairing up front, and no fins...

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12 minutes ago, kurgut said:

Well, there's an option for that: "coast after KSP stage: ... " :)

Can't tell if you're joking here -- I'm not finding such an option (or anything similar) in the Ascent Guidance section of the MechJeb version I have installed (the one called out in the Golden Spreadsheet). 

There is the option to turn off auto-staging after a chosen stage number, that's the closest I know of.  And it's not obvious to me how to set MechJeb to do things like create, edit, and execute a maneuver node.  I haven't been able to see the screen well enough in Nathan Kell's videos (I usually watch them on my tablet, which was $70 three years ago).

Edited by Zeiss Ikon
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1 minute ago, Zeiss Ikon said:

Can't tell if you're joking here -- I'm not finding such an option (or anything similar) in the Ascent Guidance section of the MechJeb version I have installed (the one called out in the Golden Spreadsheet). 

Not joking at all :) There's an option, but never used it.

Ah! But we've not the same version, Lamont maid an other one recently, with a far better ascent guidance program.

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Just now, kurgut said:

Not joking at all :) There's an option, but never used it.

Ah! But we've not the same version, Lamont maid an other one recently, with a far better ascent guidance program.

Aha!  I just asked CKAN to check for updates a few days ago, it must have been really recent.  I'll have to go check ...

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Good grief!  This discussion ought to be in the RO/RSS/RP-1 thread instead of clogging up "What did you do in KSP today?" -- but if I tried to keep up with every source for everything KSP, I'd never have time to actually play the game.  :sticktongue:  Generally, it's sufficient if the versions I have installed lack game-breaking bugs and cooperated with each other.

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Well, on a different note, I've been playing around with the Historian mod to get automatic documentation for my screenshots...

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Building a custom overlay or just modifying a default layout appears to be pretty straightforward.

Edited by RoboRay
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I've re-thought my return craft strategy. Originally I'd modified my existing return craft design to accommodate six people instead of four in order to leave room for a ground crew, but then I decided that in the event of an emergency evacuation I'm not going to want to have to send a transport craft to the surface, land on my base, send it back into orbit and then rendezvous with my station in order to send my crew back to Kerbin, so I settled on a two-craft strategy.

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They're similar in design, but while one is just meant to return to Kerbin from a station in orbit around the Mun or Minmus, the other is meant to land on the body in question, dock with an upward-facing docking port, and then launch and manoeuvre itself onto a return trajectory without needing to dock at the station. I've sent one of these to both my Mun and Minmus bases (with the Mun craft carrying some extra drop tanks to give it the extra dV it needs due to that body's higher gravity) and they're currently sitting on their respective ports, fully fuelled, supplied with snacks and ready to launch at a moment's notice.

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(I also landed science rovers at both the Mun and Minmus, as shown here.)

Finally, with 2.5m docking ports and other essential parts unlocked I've started building a new space station around Kerbin.

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It's just got the bare essentials at the moment (probe core, electricity storage and generation, some crew space) and doesn't have anyone aboard (not even the two engineers needed to deploy its centrifuge) but it'll come in handy as I work towards getting my fleet of SSTOs up and running again.

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