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What did you do in KSP1 today?


Xeldrak

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I dusted off some old parts that I made for Sandcastle and updated them:

KUrJXLW.png

These are Firma-like parts for making bases with. I'm experimenting with parts to see what sizes work best, and I'm finding that the 2.5 by 2.5 form factor does the trick- except when it comes to IVAs. For crewed parts (and the sake of my sanity), crewed parts will be 5m by 5m by 2.5m instead of the 2.5m cube. The cubed parts will be structural, while the larger parts will have storage, resources converters and crew spaces with IVAs. To keep the part catalog entries down, I can see the structural parts having options for windows, while the crewed parts will be windowed only. I can see having a dome part and various structural corners along with an airlock part or two with compatibility with Pathinder's expandable parts.

Combine them with a 3D printer powered by Extraplanetary Launchpads, and you'll be able to make permanent bases on other worlds. :) Anyway, the storage floor now uses my newer omni storage module to hold whatever you want in it, and the converter parts will use omni converters, enabling buildings to be configured for a variety of different purposes. This isn't set in konkrete of course, but this might end up as Pathfinder's endgame part set. :)

Edited by Angel-125
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I continued testing my Mk 3 Shuttle, resulting in this.  Apparently my adjustments were in the wrong direction.  I put that design back on the shelf for now

OXd7fUe.png?2

I also threw together a drone aircraft for Laythe exploration & caught the back end of a Jool window.  I made a few test flights from KSC and it flew surprisingly smooth.  How it handles atmospheric entry & staging away the transfer stage are both still unknown.  I also completely forgot to add either a narrow band or surface ore scanner, which was the original purpose for this.

h1Ibiq3.png?2

BZjKPTY.png?2

Edited by Cavscout74
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Over the weekend I wrapped up my first Minmus expedition. Three flags on the surface in three different biomes, and about 300 science transmitted per landing - not counting what is being processed in the lab or onboard for recovery. Alas, Kergard is getting homesick, and refuses to work nights if the electricity runs out (quite often at high transmission rates). The other two, Bob and Verlan, are getting their nerves frayed a bit too. Even so, supplies and fuel are running low, so the Valentina broke orbit and headed for an eight-day drop back to LKO.

  screenshot158_zps3fmv3lc6.png

Before departing, they crew left the Oryx lander in Minus orbit, for eventual reuse. Minmus colony plans are second on the priorities list for now, after commissioning a new interplanetary ship.

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Leaving Minmus behind, the crew keeps themselves busy with processing science gains. The KSC staff are rapidly constructing an RT-2 Benderi resupply craft, and a Vaquita crew return craft. Also in development is a new 2-crew, Mun/Duna capable lander, which may see service with the Valentina soon.

Also launched on a C-2 Tern rocket was a deep-space relay RZ-2 "Bandicoot" satellite, stationed in a 30,000-km circular Kerbin orbit. This puts it between the Mun and Minmus, and redirects signal down to the RZ-1 "Bilby" network covering Kerbin.

screenshot156_zpsgffiyj7q.png

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This is the small dish of the SIGINT dishes. Before getting past the Mun it could pick up transmissions from the Minmus lander's whip antenna, so yeah, it's pretty powerful. I might put more in orbit based on need and funds availability.

Also worked some on the KS-2 design, the Val's successor, to be assembled in orbit. Still working on finishing touches and a 3.75m lifter to get sections of it to LKO, but it'll be a big one.

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3 hours ago, Triop said:

~ Shameless promotion ~

 

 

I had a plan for today: Build a bigger, better, superimproved, asteroid-katcher!

Ermmmm, instead I did install the Races! mod, loaded @Triop 's track and built a new race buggy.

....Jeb doesn't want to get out of the car anymore, he seems very determined to get a good lap-time!

...which might take a while :confused:

LaGpwLv.png

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Well... I did this:

IcQPrti.png

...which was awesome. I've been looking for this monolith passively since I first learned about Minmus having only one of them.
The bad news? I killed every last kerbal on the way home LOL! Val and Bob (pictured above) smacked into a hill attempting to return to the refinery.
Jeb and Bob managed to take off from Minmus and circularize 75km above Kerbin, but the SSTO I sent to retrieve them doesn't ditch in the water.
RIP veteran crew... RIP :rolleyes:

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25 minutes ago, Dark Lion said:

Well... I did this:

IcQPrti.png

...which was awesome. I've been looking for this monolith passively since I first learned about Minmus having only one of them.
The bad news? I killed every last kerbal on the way home LOL! Val and Bob (pictured above) smacked into a hill attempting to return to the refinery.
Jeb and Bob managed to take off from Minmus and circularize 75km above Kerbin, but the SSTO I sent to retrieve them doesn't ditch in the water.
RIP veteran crew... RIP :rolleyes:

You found it because it appeared as an anomaly on a scan from orbit correct?

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43 minutes ago, XLjedi said:

You found it because it appeared as an anomaly on a scan from orbit correct?

Negative. I've still not properly used Kerbnet for that. Just ore... 

I was testing a little ion-powered-- thing. I set orbit at lowest safe orbit at Minmus, burned hard retrograde, then changed my inclination ever-so-subtly to match where all my other kerbals were, at my Minmus refinery. After time-warping a bit, I noticed I was still a little off course and when I dropped out of time-warp: bup! I was basically looking directly at it from orbit! I tried to wipe it off my screen and everything like, "what's that lil dark speck?" :rolleyes:

At this point, I quickly took note of the approximately 54km between my current position and the distance to target (my refinery.) After that, I reverted, switched to the rover pictured above (which was parked up at the refinery) and Val and Bob went monolith hunting! Easy enough to find, but tense to drive all that way. Took about an hour to drive it... On the way back, I decided to use the boosters and just "hop" back to the refinery and refuel. Bad idea. Splattered, less than halfway. LOL

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Took screenies of yesterday's activities, but they were all boring, so I'm not going to share them with y'all. Trust me: it's better this way...

After the launch of engineer Phimal Kerman aboard the Piper Alpha 7 refinery craft yesterday, I decided to busy myself getting together the rest of my infrastructure for Minmus. Scientist Leing Kerman was put aboard a Munport Core 7 craft and launched towards Minmus - her craft will become space station Minmusport upon arrival, which is scheduled in seven days. A Hellhound 7 rover was also launched towards Minmus on a quest to find a good spot for surface mining; it will arrive in just over five days. This morning saw the launch of another Piper Alpha 7 refinery craft with engineer Julfry Kerman at the helm, again headed towards Minmus. Her craft, which will become Deepwater Horizon upon arrival, is scheduled to arrive ahead of both Minmusport and the as-yet-unnamed rover, which just figures...

Meanwhile, Necessary Evil arrived at Minmus and docked with the Spamcan 7 lander already in orbit. Pilot Nedbus Kerman and tourist Bilbald Kerman went down to the Great Flats  - where Nedbus planted a flag - before heading for a rendezvous with the Old Bessie 7 tanker craft also in Minmus orbit. The craft refueled and then made its way back to Necessary Evil, and then a second excursion with tourists Siecott and Natafield Kerman then took place, landing successfully in the Greater Flats before returning. Evil herself will need to dock up with the Old Bessie to take on fuel before heading back to Kerbin, something that is scheduled to happen later today.

I also did a quick low altitude haul of a Twitch engine for contract with a KerBalloon, and flew an Auk IX four-passenger spaceplane to space station Kerbinport to deliver tourists Philsy, Barvin, Franler and Gercal Kerman.. The plane delivered its passengers and returned to KSC 09 safely. I've also launched my first Bill Clinton 7 LKO grabber probe of this career save on a junk retrieval mission; the probe's rendezvous with its target should take place in just under an hour.

The refinery launches have left me strapped for cash - they come in at just under √1M a pop. Right now my space program has all of √24k to its name, so I'm hoping to start wrapping up some contracts and make some coin soon. Good news there is that all the infrastructure I'll need to support tourism - orbital way stations, intermunar ferries, passenger landers, refueling tankers, scout rovers and surface refineries - now all exist and are either in place or en route.

Next step - save up enough funds for an Alcubierre Drive ship. The design I've got costs about √26M...

Edited by capi3101
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Inspired by @Atkara's Drone Tug Mk1,  I wanted to try his concept with the Mk-3 fuel fuselage for interplanetary distances.  (I already had a very light-weight orbital tug called Sparrow with four nukes around a simple X200-16 fuel tank   plus a Klaw).

Wouldn't hurt to add 4 Kerbals in a 3.9t cockpit for the long trek, I thought, since the fuel fuselage is already 28t.  And I couldn't resist a tail fin with a couple of flags, because senior management at KSC tend to be old farts like me from the early jet age...  [this screenshot shows it already with wings but the previous rev really had only the useless tail fin and no wings!  It was never intended to return to Terra Firma]

IJBmjlk.png

 

This project was showing all the symptoms of being totally out of control now.  That tail was just begging for wings and landing gear, we thought...

8p7buHt.png

We had to switch the tail fin for re-entry.  Losing the Klaw is inevitable, so we had to install a heat shield behind it to protect the cockpit.  The result is kinda charming in a Kerbalish kartoon way!

It works pretty well, too, as long as you use like a 45-degree glide slope to the threshold!  And the name -- the hardest part of the project, in the end -- the HMS Beagle.  Yeah, I think that suits it pretty well.

:)

And thank you, Atkara!

P.S. worth pointing out the primary intended mission for this bird is to push items like space planes to their atmospheric destinations, e.g. Laythe, Duna, Eve...

 

Edited by Hotel26
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8 minutes ago, Sharpy said:

What sort of launch stack do you use for that?

Truly excellent question!!  And I'm glad you asked.

I'm in KSP 1.3.1 for the moment, so I made a rev-eng copy of Atkara's Launch Vehicle Mk1a, which I can highly recommend for its simplicity and ultra-reliable performance.  I used that to launch the Beagle.

A large bonus from this two-stage lifter (Launch Vehicle Mk1a) is that the second stage Rhino winds up in orbit with the payload.  It could conceivably be refueled to be used as a first-stage booster for interplanetary transit injection.

All of Atkara's stuff is worth taking a good squiz at!

Edited by Hotel26
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27 minutes ago, Hotel26 said:

A large bonus from this two-stage lifter (Launch Vehicle Mk1a) is that the second stage Rhino winds up in orbit with the payload.  It could conceivably be refueled to be used as a first-stage booster for interplanetary transit injection.

Hence the Mk1b variant :)

Glad to hear these new toys are serving you well :D

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Today Sharpy began painstakingly building an artificial ring around Eve.

 

Well, almost. But let's start from the beginning... that is finally collecting science from 4 nearby biomes on Eve. Shallows, sea, lowlands and midlands. Including splashing down. Long range flies terribly in the atmosphere. I savescummed a lot. And was too busy piloting to think of screenies.

But hey, got it done... and got nearly full science possible from the seismic hammer experiment. Especially that the ship was acting as a third seismic pod, with the experiment performed at least a kilometer away...

pyzuUUj.png

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Well, parking it into the bay for transport between biomes and recharging (no own power source, just batteries) ended with breaking the docking port... which was painstakingly aligned through the SPH editor, so a hacky replacement from spare parts had to be assembled...

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Luckily setting SAS to Radial Out allowed for operation of instruments that required ground contact.

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Then came the launch. Again, too busy piloting to remember screenies. Starting with TWR of exactly 1.00 and nearly 13km/s of delta-V, climbing painstakingly, most of the way below 60m/s vertically up... I arrived into Eve low orbit with almost 2800m/s... and to get to Gilly to refuel, I'd need 1200 for transfer and over 600 for capture. With nothing left for landing too. Never mind that would require perfect burns. Dark Drive takes some two seconds to spin up, and good 10 to shut down entirely. You can't do perfect burns with it. So, what to do? Hah, I went Mark Watney on the ship. The rover and the Jetwing stayed on Eve... but there was so much stuff not necessary for Gilly...

First, no need for so much TWR anymore.

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Docking port?

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I have twice as much cooling capacity as I need!

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Compressing important spare parts into two storage lockers, two others have to go! Then I decided I don't need the airlock eiher.

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Landing legs? Ladders? On Gilly? U mad?

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Now I have over 300m/s of reserve for Gilly maneuvers and landing. With this sort of budget I can get anywhere around there! And that's Long Range Compact:

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Whoops. There was a bunch of science stored in that airlock... it was nearly a kilometer away by the time I recalled!

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And so, tidal forces will spread the junk evenly, and Eve will get its first ring!

ggsrDSY.png

Now 5 days  left until transfer to Gilly... To Be Continued.

ABU0VmU.png

 

Edited by Sharpy
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Finally got started on my new career save, with 150% Funds rewards, 50% Science rewards, Maximum starting funds and science.   I still like the idea of collecting science, and typically, I'm not always very efficient in building.  This setting keeps me from having to start at zero tech rockets, but still requires me to grind a bit to unlock the 500 Science and above techs.  

I also made myself a good checklist of items I want to accomplish. As much as I always THINK about doing some things, I've never really done them.  Orbital fuel station around Minmus, SSTO's, better drilling and refueling stations, etc.  Checked off the first item, Kerbin geosync satellite network.

For not being an efficient builder, I did come up with one of my simplest and very effective craft for Kerbin  SOI. Simple Skipper Engine, Rockomax 64 fuel tank first stage, followed by a Terrier Engine  hooked up to a FL-T800 fuel tank.  That little combo so far has been my Kerbin orbital craft, science craft, tourist transport for anywhere around Kerbin and the Mun.  I imagine it will do just fine going to Minmus when I am ready to head out that way.  Currently running 3 different variants.  Below is the unmanned variant shortly after takeoff, with a satellite payload at the top.  This ship runs anywhere from 22K-24K funds so far, depending on what I put on top.  Will likely be using it to send an  unmanned Mun and Minmus hopper to gather up some more science.

mxL9lUX.png

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