What did you do in KSP1 today?

[Delay]

Tried Scatterer in combination with EVE today. Guess what: Combine two beautiful mods and you get an even more beautiful install of KSP.

I first tested it in flight. Works really well. The numbers go red when I go into physical timewarp, but the fps are still okay, so I don't know why.

And I'm still fascinated by what Scatterer does to the ocean. It gets me every time.

I also tried launching into space, where the majority of the game takes place. (Calm down @Triop, I mean for most people)
Again; I don't understand why KSP is complaining in physical timewarp, the fps are still great!

Edited September 27, 2018 by Delay

[Fraktal]

Not to muck up the others' basking in the glory of the above screenshots with minimum-spec horribility, but I though this was worth mentioning. While doing some inane science gathering at Kerbin today, I suddenly noticed something was wrong with the sun. Since it was sunrise, I thought the game glitched out and the sun is only supposed to look like that while under the horizon, only I didn't remember it looking like that through the planet.

Then I checked the map and realized that was no glitch.

That was a solar eclipse.

 

[adsii1970]

Took a break from a lot of stuff on my plate and decided to have some fun with some things I enjoy doing. Now I warn you, while I was playing the game, Windows and Adobe decided to update at damn near the same time. There's a couple of instances where the screen will have a slight pause, but considering what all was running in background (Windows and Adobe update, OneDrive, and three other programs), I don't think it is too bad. This is actually the very first "for fun" video I've done for KSP.

And for those of you who read Kerny's Journal, this is the Koos Mark 2 in actual flight. I've upgraded my computer since the last time I've had the chance to play around with KSP and because of increased performance, it is almost like relearning the game.

I hope you enjoy... If not, keep the mean comments to yourself!

 

Edited September 27, 2018 by adsii1970

[Triop]

Not the best place to run out of electricity . . .

[Atkara]

4 hours ago, Fraktal said:

That was a solar eclipse.

Ain't it grand? I remember being halfway between Kerbin and the Mun when I saw my first one. In my case, my craft's solar panels were suddenly "blocked by the Mun". After looking around, I realized what was going on -and isolated one of the batteries to keep some juice in case something happened in the meantime

[Fraktal]

Yeah, this one was accidental too. And the timing was impeccable: the sun was just below the horizon as seen from the runway but as soon as I took off and rose a few hundred meters, there it was, just 2-3 minutes before the eclipse hit totality. I was on a polar flight and by the time I got there (one hour later, as the plane is subsonic), the eclipse was completely over.

[Atkara]

You'll see a lot of them, don't worry

[Triop]

Flying the K-16.

 

[Cavscout74]

My second Duna & Jool transfer windows arrived.  I only sent a few more probes to Jool in order to afford a proper manned mission to Duna.  Most of the way through launching various craft for both destinations, I acquired enough funds to finally upgrade my R&D center & unlock (among other things) the graviolli detector.  So some craft have them but most don't.   Happily, at least for the Duna craft, KIS & KAS save the day (again)

Launching the crew to meet Duna Courier.  You may notice there is a shielded docking port stacked on top of a MOLE Mk 2 docking port.  This is intentional.

Waiting for the rendezvous maneuver

After transferring the crew to Duna Courier.  Note the "extra" shielded docking port is left attached to the Duna Courier so once around Duna, it can be attached to the Duna Lander via KAS.  It is way too big for a single kerbal to carry, so that's why I decided on this method.

Transfer burn to Duna

Also going this time are a comsat for Ike, a small station with lab, extra quarters & more snacks, 2 tankers & a Duna lander.

 

 

[Geonovast]

Started the lifter.  5m  center core with 5 mastodons, two 3.75m boosters with 7 vectors each, and two more helper boosters with 1 vector on the shuttle itself, which will be jettisoned after achieving orbit.

Pretty nice launch, I think.  Had to play a bit of musical engines with the mastodons to keep it flying straight, but it worked.

Actually kept the boosters until the center tank was about half gone... ditching them when they get empty means you do not go to space today.

Nearly empty before ditching the tank!  I usually have a lot of extra fuel!

Hopefully those poodles have enough oompf to get me though that arduous circularization burn.... 12 minutes from now.

Phew!

 

Played with the payload winches a bit.  This dummy payload is actually a fuel truck that will be operating at a Mun mining station.  Shuttle will land, lower the truck, wheels will be attached with KAS, then the truck will be disconnect.

Re-entry was mostly ok.  A little bit of yawing, for some reason.  Ok, at least, until I go low enough for there to be a substantial amount of atmosphere.

Which is when I realized I forgot to re-balance the re-entry CoM with the CoL after installing the life support modules up by the cockpit.

Whoops.

Good thing it was unmanned!.... because I killed Val, Jeb, Bill, and Bob on an earlier F12-based test that couldn't be reverted due to quicksaving

 

 

 

I need to figure out something with the main tank decoupler, though, since it "mounts" to closed cargo bay doors... and artifacts are left behind after decoupling. 

[Jacke]

1 hour ago, Triop said:

Flying the K-16.

Again!  Fly under the overpass in R&D! 

[Triop]

Edited September 28, 2018 by Triop

[Cupcake...]

Did a spot of carriering...

Enjoy!

 

Cupcake...

[capi3101]

With my funds a tad too far on the low side for my taste, I decided the time had come to get a few more of my contracts taken care of. To that end, while I was waiting for Bob to finish up his gravioli gathering mission at Mun, I launched the Kerbinport space station to LKO with scientist Antrey Kerman in command. Tourists Bilbald, Siecott, Merrey, Joner, Natafield and Aldfurt Kerman went up with the station as well, as did Bill, scientists Barley and Ludson Kerman and engineer Naford Kerman. In retrospect, I should've replaced some of the other KSC staff with pilots; the contract I had for Kerbinport specified two pilots aboard. Later in the day I launched the ferry ship Necessary Evil with pilot Nedbus Kerman at the helm. He docked at the station to pick up the passengers, and later still I launched a Spamcan 7b lander to the station to drop off pilot Libsin Kerman at the station, finally fulfilling the contract. Necessary Evil then departed Kerbinport for Minmus; she'll arrive there in six days. The Spamcan was sent on to space station Munport, arriving there this morning (and inadvertently fulfilling the space station contract for Munport by delivering sufficient liquid fuel - so I got a two-for on the 'Can).

Meanwhile, the Spamcan 7 2-passenger RCS lander I'd sent to Minmus a few days ago arrived:

Spamcan 7 at rendezvous with Next Objective, with an Old Bessie 7 tanker lander deep in the background.

The craft docked successfully with Next Objective already in Minmus orbit. Val and tourist Sanrim Kerman took the craft down to visit the Greater Flats, where Val performed some needed flag-planting training; she became the second kerbal to visit the surface (after Bob). 

Spamcan 7 on return to Next Objective. That dark little circle below and left of Kerbol is Kerbin.

The craft returned safely to Next Objective, though it did pass within 50 meters of the Old Bessie 7 tanker on its way back. Val and Sanrim transferred back to Next Objective and the Spamcan undocked. Next Objective is now on her way back to Kerbin, where she should arrive in four days. She's scheduled to head on to Mun at that point.

Bob finally completed his science mission and burned for home, having just enough fuel to get the job done (had 12 m/s left at re-entry). He brought back 1,887.8 sci from his mission, enough for me to finish unlocking the rest of the tech tree with about 850 sci to spare.

A few other little things happened last night. I landed the Hellhound 7 rover I'd launched to Mun a few days ago (finally) close to its intended mission area; I'll send Jeb down there to meet it as soon as the Spamcan arrives. I finally got around to landing the Auk XII 6-passenger plane that had delivered Val's tourists to Next Objective. I went ahead and launched the spaceplane pier adapter for Kerbinport and successfully docked it to the station, and then an Auk III tanker plane I launched a few days ago made its way to Kerbinport, dropping off the remainder of its payload fuel. I'll try to land that plane later today; those things are too expensive to just leave lying around in orbit. Finally, this morning I launched a Beep-Beep 7 probe to an high equatorial Kerbin orbit for contract.

So far today, what I've got in the pipe is Mun landings and landing that tanker plane. I finished up the Munport mission last thing a little while ago and I didn't look to see what the replacement contract was before quitting the game; going to have to that too.

[ShadowZone]

I did a BFR thing.
 

 

 

Album SgQAM2n will appear when post is submitted

[SpaceMouse]

I don't have a pretty picture but i used my Mach Effect thruster and a reactor from KSPI to aerobrake a huge asteroid into Kerbin orbit with like .05KN of thrust. lol.

[Aeroboi]

7 hours ago, Cupcake... said:

Did a spot of carriering...

Enjoy!

 

Cupcake...

I really enjoyed that. That are terrifically cool vehicle designs

[Delay]

Further testing of Scatterer+EVE. While doing so I managed to capture this rarity:

Vall casting a shadow onto Laythe, which in turn casts its shadow on Jool. What are the odds? Yes, I know their orbits are in a 2:1 resonance, but what are the odds of me arriving there at just the right time to allow for this to happen?

The mission I set for myself was as simple as it was pointless: Strand on the surface of Laythe.
A series of gravity assits and one quickload-due-to-burning-up later I managed to slow down...

...and land...

... and I almost landed with a view on Jool. Well, you can't have everything.

[Tyko]

First mission to Thalia in my 20% science, 2.5x GPP game. Needed over 5.5k DV for Thalia transfer burn (gold foil stage), entering orbit and maneuvering (onboard fuel). This is the heaviest craft I've launched at 3.5 tons and I don't have 1.875m parts/engines yet.

Launch stack assembled, before the fairing is attached:

 

Sunrise launch - always love these.

 

Booster separation - Korolev Kerman was very pleased

 

Sustainer stage separation - solar panels and direct antenna extended. There's a shorter range relay antenna too. Once all the science is complete this satellite will be boosted to higher orbit and will act as a repeater to provide better coverage for a larger relay to be sent later.

Edited September 28, 2018 by Tyko

[Cavscout74]

Didn't get a whole lot done today - mostly just partially assembled my Minmus Station.  It needs a few more pieces, but I met the requirements for the contract i had.

One of the fuel wings maneuvering to dock.   It is mostly empty, although any excess fuel from the transfer unit will get transferred in. 

Since I needed a break to build my funds back up, as well as research some new technologies, I decided to send my assembly crew home for now - especially since the greenhouse is one of the parts still needing to be researched, so they're snack supplies were limited.

[RoboRay]

I have had little time for KSP, but managed to work around the RO/RP-1 life support issues with the Gemini capsule and return to manned spaceflight:

Note the Mission Elapsed Time...  this crew set a two-week orbital endurance record.  That's long enough for lunar missions with a few days of safety reserve, leaving me to consider a manned lunar flyby and maybe even manned lunar orbital missions if I can get a transfer module with enough ∆v launched and docked.

But first, I need to prove I can dock.  I've got an Agena-like target vehicle ready to roll out, and another Gemini spacecraft under construction.  The prime and backup crews are studying rendezvous theory now.  We'll see how that goes in a couple of months.

Meanwhile, remote exploration of the moon continues with a landing at the Sea of Crises (which turns out to be a misnomer, in this case).

The upgraded launch vehicle and kicker performed so well that I think I could actually dispense with the hypergolic maneuvering stage between the kicker and lander probe.  Previously, the kicker  was just right on the edge of handling the translunar injection burn...  now, it had enough propellant left to capture the spacecraft into orbit around the moon, then deorbit itself! 

The maneuver stage brought the horizontal motion to a halt a couple of kilometers above the mare, so only little of the lander's fuel was used to perform the vertical descent.

I'm tempted to get rid of the maneuver stage, but I only have one mission left for this lander design to fly, and the cost of re configuring and testing the changes would probably eat up the cost savings of leaving that stage out.  So, I'll just let it go.  There's always the chance that the AJ10 on the kicker will fail to restart for the capture, which is something I don't need to worry much about with hypergolic propellants.

The improved launcher and kicker performance is making me think that the robotic lunar surface sample return contract I was just offered may be doable now, though.  Let me see what kind of design I can come up with for that...

Edited September 29, 2018 by RoboRay

[Hotel26]

I had reported earlier that my Kerbals were working on a photo-recon spy plane, code-named Skunk, and had shown an artist's impression of the machine:

Now have some better shots of how it turned out:
 

Spoiler

 

[R-click View Image to enlarge]

The in-flight photo is a night-time shot and very dark, but you might be able to make out that KER reports the periapsis as 30.9988 km, the apoapsis as 33.3658 km and the speed as 2184.0 m/s.  The vehicle is actually in a 31x31km orbit in the atmosphere with a very small boost from the twin RAPIERs to compensate for the drag.  0.29 kallons/sec LF draw to maintain flight in this state.  Endurance, though ample, appears to be limited eventually by heat build-up on the weakest part (a PB-NUK).  (My engineers want to experiment with moving this inside an equipment bay.)

The first unit off the line is now heading to Mawson Station on the ice shelf near the southern pole to conduct daily recon missions between there and our base on Flamingo Island (1S 119E), in order to overfly the Kerbean Peninsula where trouble has once again broken out near the 38th parallel.

 

 

 

Edited September 29, 2018 by Hotel26

[capi3101]

Not a whole lot accomplished yesterday going by my logs. I did a quick Mainsail test at the launchpad for 50k, then landed the Auk III tanker plane I flew up to LKO a few days ago. I never do get the entry profile right on that one; overshot KSC 09 by nearly a hundred klicks, but was able to get her turned around and landed safely at KSC 27. The plane's return gave my program a much-needed √250k - I might've mentioned yesterday that the III was an expensive plane...

After that, I did an up-and-down flight of an Auk I rescue plane, with tourists Donming and Burfrey Kerman staying in Kerbin's orbit just long enough for me to cash in...

The three degree glide slope descent always makes me a tad nervous. "Straight ahead, Mun. The bright dot below that, Minmus. Just below that and directly along our current flight path, Mount Kill-a-Kerbal..."

Ended the day with the launch of an Old Bessie 7 tanker craft. Launch was a success and then the craft was sent on to Mun. Its rendezvous with space station Munport has been set at this point, and once it arrives I should be able to commence some landing operations there. I'll get to that next chance RL gives me.

[Triop]

A day in the desert . . .

Looking for blue footprints.

[Francois424]

After nearly 2 years of not playing (except maybe a tiny weeny bit last January, if I remember right) I started a new game roughly 2 weeks ago.  I already roved around Minmus for Science, and today I finished roving on the Mün.
 

After reaching the last of my planned biomes (Twin Craters), I landed the MRV (Münar Recovery Vehicle) near the rover, and Jeb took a picture of Bob walking from one to the other.

 

Here is a close-up shot of the MRV... I had to try the LEM part from Making History at least once, and it seemed fitting.  Tho with me needing 5 seats to bring the crew home, I had to improvise a bit !

 

So with the crew all safe inside, we lifted-off and started cruising to the maneuver that will bring us home.  I had to finish the burn with the RCS... Until I noticed some LF/Ox in the LEM.  I didn't notice it, gonna have to take another look at it later.

 

Sweet, Sweet science...  But still missing 1'000 science to finish the tech tree.  Looks like it's time to take the gravioly detector to Minmus as I didn't have it back them.  That should do the trick.

 

Slowly settling down into KSP.  I'm a bit rusty, and taking my time configuring my install.  Trying to get an older version of Laythe (1.1.3) into 1.4.5 and still trying Making History parts.
I haven't seen any propellers so I guess I'm going to have to do some more customization as I need it.   It's good to be back tho