What did you do in KSP1 today?

[QF9E]

I just completed a test flight of my own Easter Kerbal challenge: https://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/topic/207791-easter-kerbal-challenge/. I delivered all 5 Kerbals to the helipad in 8 minutes 19, which gives me a score of 401 according to the rules of the challenge.

There's definitely room for improvement as I am not a very good helo driver. So why not give it a try yourself and see if you can do better?

 

 

 

I haven't been flying many helicopters in KSP but I started to appreciate their versatility when doing the Chernobyl challenge recently, which turned out to be a lot of fun: https://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/topic/186284-breaking-ground-chernobyl-liquidation-challenge/

 

[Echo__3]

So, I tried catching a first stage booster with a helicopter.

 

[IncompetentSpacer]

Today's gaming session is finished with my first crewed orbit in Realism Overhaul. For those not familiar with that mod, you play in real sized solar system, using approximation of the real life engines. Rockets need to be built (takes time) and parts can and do fail. My first attempt was less than glorious....

I reused my lunar probe rocket (I produced two in expectations that the first would fail) which would have more than enough of dV if the damn mod mechanics did not insist on loading the tiny capsule with full contingent of food and water (14 days) despite being told otherwise. The kerbal pilot, Joshua Coleman, almost passed out because the rocket was not human rated.

I reached barely an orbit which would have given me a safe decent for the Vostok capsule (had to use RCS to give me last  few km). Have to mention that just before the tanks were empty for fuel, main booster engine failed.

After lot of close calls and less than ideal start, the Vostok capsule settled in a orbit around earth, where it will stay for day and return with 72 science.

 

[uscespc]

How about a fake helicopter meaning it uses no aerodynamic forces just Unity rigidbody magic.

The model isn't much but it looks like a helicopter, is colorful and works to test with.

This is just an exercise in writing a mod.

This version of the mod allows the craft to take off, turn to, fly to and land at any lat/lon selected by map, target, waypoint or saved location.

And BD Armory is always fun.

 

[Kerb24]

I did nothing, because the thing I'm working on is getting nowhere.

[cantab]

A short atmospheric test flight of what I hope will be a shuttle orbiter. Uses all-moving canards with a servo in order to get plenty of pitch authority. Now I just need to figure out why the servo was ignoring trim.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2796094084

 

[Axelord FTW]

Recovered the Jool mission crew. The Moho rover has roved and done stuff. The Duna lander has landed and did lander things. The Dres probe is still in transit, which is now the only ongoing mission left.

I decided to add to the Mun orbital station, just so I can build stuff in orbit outright. Kinda forgot to transfer some of the leftover fuel from the lifter stage but no biggie.

[MythicalHeFF]

Messed around some more with Kopernicus, and added a new ice planet between Duna and Jool, which I called Frigra. It’s a little bit smaller than Laythe, with a radius of 460 km and a gravity of 0.7 g. It also has a thin, cold atmosphere with a pressure of 0.3 atm and a surface temperature of 180 K (or about -93°C, -135°F), which is slightly colder than the coldest temperature ever recorded on Earth (-89.2°C). The atmosphere also contains oxygen, which allows for the use of jet engines, although they aren’t very effective thanks to the low atmospheric pressure.

 

There is also a ring system present, which can be seen in the picture above. In addition to rings, Frigra also has two moons, Wollal and Chester. Wollal is the small inner asteroid moon, barely visible here next to the rings, (radius 10km, gravity 0.003g) while Chester is the larger, outer moon (radius 90km, gravity 0.08g).
 

In testing, Wollal’s gravity was so low and its rotation so fast from the tidal lock that the apparent gravity at the surface was basically zero, and a kerbal could pretty much achieve orbital velocity by just jumping. After I added the rings, I moved it farther away so that this would be less of an issue (but still make for a fun challenge)

 

View from the surface of Chester:

All surface textures are handmade apart from Wollal’s, which is currently just a map of asteroid Bennu from NASA, but I plan to change this later.

[Jcklemme]

1 hour ago, Jack Joseph Kerman said:

Messed around some more with Kopernicus, and added a new ice planet between Duna and Jool, which I called Frigra. It’s a little bit smaller than Laythe, with a radius of 460 km and a gravity of 0.7 g. It also has a thin, cold atmosphere with a pressure of 0.3 atm and a surface temperature of 180 K (or about -93°C, -135°F), which is slightly colder than the coldest temperature ever recorded on Earth (-89.2°C). The atmosphere also contains oxygen, which allows for the use of jet engines, although they aren’t very effective thanks to the low atmospheric pressure.

Looks great, are you planning to release it?

[MythicalHeFF]

1 hour ago, Jcklemme said:

Looks great, are you planning to release it?

It’s currently a work in progress, so there’s still a lot to be done before any release. For one, I’m currently just using placeholder normal maps, at least until I get my own to work (right now they are quite buggy). I also want to rework the height maps, as the terrain currently just shoots up in sheer cliff faces whenever its color changes. I also want to change Wollal’s texture to a unique one instead of the asteroid texture I have currently.

[Jcklemme]

1 hour ago, Jack Joseph Kerman said:

It’s currently a work in progress, so there’s still a lot to be done before any release. For one, I’m currently just using placeholder normal maps, at least until I get my own to work (right now they are quite buggy). I also want to rework the height maps, as the terrain currently just shoots up in sheer cliff faces whenever its color changes. I also want to change Wollal’s texture to a unique one instead of the asteroid texture I have currently.

Are you planning on implementing custom biomes?

[Axelord FTW]

One of the things I am aiming toward right now is using some of the less... expedient KA, NFP and FFT engines in my unmanned designs. The X-6 Clarke engine is currently being used for my Dres mission, and I'm planning to use it again to visit some of the OPM worlds. It's got a (somewhat) low TWR but the 'throwaway' fuel design and great ISP are making up for it.

The next probe will have a large contingent of mystery goo and the material study parts. Something else I generally don't do. Its first destination will be the Joolian system. With something like 100,000m/s of dV, I expect to get most of the orbital science done, and then move on to Sarnus, which I've never been to before. After that, it'll probably still have inordinate amounts of dV left, but I'm undecided.

Edited April 19, 2022 by Axelord FTW

[MythicalHeFF]

5 hours ago, Jcklemme said:

Are you planning on implementing custom biomes?

I have already added custom biomes to Wollal and Chester, but haven't added any for Frigra just yet.

Biome List:

Wollal

Equatorial Regions

Polar Regions

(only really need 2 for such a small body)

Some better pictures of Wollal since it was basically just a few pixels in the last post. It currently just has a map of the asteroid Bennu as its surface texture.

Chester

Peaks

Highlands

Western Lowlands

Eastern Lowlands

Poles

Craters

"Disco" Craters (the white, ice-covered craters that someone from a very old Space Engine video said reminded them of a disco ball)

like this random ice world from Space Engine that Chester is more or less based off of:

Frigra (planned)

Mountains

Highlands

Lowlands

Poles

Active Ice (where there is a subsurface ocean, imagination. Filled with cracks)

Dead Ice (where there is not a subsurface ocean, imagination. Heavily cratered.)

Concorde Island

Crab Island

Mount Kessler (extinct volcano)

Craters

 

I might also add a third moon to the Frigra system if I feel like it. It'll probably be in between Wollal and Chester in terms of size, perhaps about the size of Minmus. Any suggestions for names?

 

In other news, I've decided to finally do a Kerbin Elcano run, in a vessel that I've named K.E.L.P (Kerbin ELcano Propeller boat). It can go a little over 50 m/s on water at 2x time warp, provided that the rotors are set to about 240 RPM. Any higher than that, and even 2x warp will cause them to shake off and explode.

Spoiler

The first design of the K.E.L.P, which could only go about 30 m/s on water before becoming unstable.

Second and current design, with a top safe speed of about 52 m/s. I found that the ideal deploy angle for the fan blades is about 23 degrees. It's also faster thanks to the added structural fuselages on the sides, which reduce the number of parts in contact with the water, reducing drag.

Of course, 52 m/s is only its top speed on the water. On land, it can do over 80 m/s, which was the highest speed over land ever achieved by me in any previous Elcano run.

I also made a custom flag just for the occasion of this mission:

If you look in the top left corner, you’ll see the Kraken constellation.

Edit: KerbalX craft file: https://kerbalx.com/MythicalHeFF/KELP-Kerbin-ELcano-Propeller-boat

*By the way, you may notice that these images are lower resolution than my usual posts. That's because I'm currently stuck playing on a weaker laptop than my gaming laptop, which I am currently unable to use since its charger broke. I should get a new one around the beginning of May or so. Until then, I'll have to play on 720p resolution instead of 1080p. Sadge.

Edited April 19, 2022 by Jack Joseph Kerman
craft file

[Hotel26]

Continuing the story from:

...in which the rescue ship HG1 Goblin is attempting to capture the hapless HA2 Atlas, inbound to Moho from Kerbin...

On 4/17/2022 at 1:35 PM, Hotel26 said:

Let's see how this works out... 

Well, huzzah!  Goblin makes contact with Atlas and prepares to dock:

Moah celebrations in Mission Control!

And now for the capture burn:
 

Spoiler

Mission Log states:

• "orbital speed was reduced from 807 m/s to 687 m/s,
• whereupon fuel exhaustion occurred due to miscalculation of the much greater (empty) mass of Atlas
• capture required a reduction to 433 m/s for success; a shortfall of 254 m/s

Both craft marked "lost in space".

Mission Controller, Gene Kerman, promptly issued a summons for the Fuel Management team which, under intense interrogation (& blame), proffered the following reasoning (excuse): "but Gene, you DIDN'T consult us!!"

Well, live & learn and there is a happy ending to this sad story:

Spoiler

Under Orbit rules, HA2 Atlas was magicked into a a geostationary Kerbin orbit for subsequent rescue and deorbit (under the No Astronaut Leff In Space regulation) and -- in  a 'mind/matter spoon-bending of the rules' -- Goblin was returned to a stable low Moho orbit.  Just as if nobody ever made any horrible mistakes and all available lessons were learned.  "At KSC, our motto is: 'space is kind'."  Hmm.  How about: "no pain; no gain"...  (meaning, "we prefer it that way")

 

 

Edited April 19, 2022 by Hotel26

[stephensmat]

Gather round y'all, as I tell you the tale of luck and survival. As I've broadcast to the world on this Forum, I only recently managed to pull of a Mun Landing and return.

Still too wussy to attempt docking manoeuvres, I've tried my luck instead with rovers, creating a Lander than carries a decent Rover underneath, dropping it upon landing. Having succeeded in landing a rover on Minmus, I tried for the higher gravity (and better traction) of the Mun.

And it worked, except I can't, for the life of me, find a totally flat place to land. Which is why, after landing and deploying the Rover... My lander tipped over.

Thought that incline was slight enough, but apparently it wasn't.

I replayed the landing twice, and both times, I tipped again before I landed. It's really getting annoying. I reach for the F9 Key, when muscle memory fails me, and I accidentally hit F5. I now reload at the scene above, more or less.

So here I am, with my third stranded crew. I landed slow enough in a low-gravity environment, so the lander is intact, but for the sake of the Rover, it's too tall to stand back up.

But as luck would have it, this is my first mission with a Magnetometer Boom. It's up on the capsule, so I can take readings in different areas around Kerbin.

Wondering if it'd work, I extend the boom, and it starts pushing my Lander upright! I mess around with the spring strength of my landing legs, but it just won't stay upright. Plus, the things so turned around that I don't know if I'm pushing the controls to point me up, or down or sideways until the Cockpit gets moving again.

And that's when I have a brainwave. For communications, I have an orbiting relay satellite over the Mun. And for simplicity's sake, my Landing site is along the equatorial line... So finally I get the idea of setting the orbiter as my target. I Warp ahead to when the Orbiter is directly over my landing site, I use the boom to push my nose up a bit, and I gun the return boosters for just a second. It's enough to get me off the ground. Takes me four tries, but I managed to land soft, and upright.

My Rover's first task is to take the rest of my crew to the new landing site.

That extra take off and landing nearly sunk me anyway. When I got back on course for Re-Entry to land on Kerbin I had 4 Delta-V left.

But I made it. When I saw I was on course to land, I felt like I was watching the end of Apollo 13.

 

[Axelord FTW]

Alright, this time with pictures.

Primo, I created a new micro-factory rover (called it the Fat Cricket) and sent it eastward on the mun by a few kilometers to begin work on a new High-Energy Exotic Fuel Facility. Estimated build time: 115ish days.
That started, the main factory started building the new VLR probe. Build time: 2 days. That done, I launched it and parked it in an orbit between the Mun and Minmus. As luck would have it, there is a moderately efficient transfer window opening up, though I overshot the best possible time by two weeks due to the orbital period. Still, the probe has enough dV to get me to jool, and back 30 times in a row so I don't care about efficiency all that much at this point. As I type this, it's about 40% of the way through its transfer burn.

[fleventeen]

On 4/17/2022 at 9:35 AM, IncompetentSpacer said:

This rocket can be turned around in 5 days and relaunched minimizing the time it keeps the build line busy.

I have to ask is there is a reason those control surfaces are angled slightly off? Now that I've seen it I can't unsee it. 

[IncompetentSpacer]

1 hour ago, fleventeen said:

I have to ask is there is a reason those control surfaces are angled slightly off? Now that I've seen it I can't unsee it. 

Not sure what you mean but everything is where it should be, doing its job when being launched up in the air ? I take pride in building for function only.

See - it makes sure nose is pointing the right way when flying up:

Examples from Airships: Conquer the Skies:
 

Spoiler

This is an carrier airship example, from Airships: Conquer the Skies that I played some times ago, the top one is built by a user I do not remember now (sorry buddy):

My abomination (actually rebuild of another design) -and this one is pwetty compared to others:

 

 

Edited April 19, 2022 by IncompetentSpacer

[Akagi]

https://kerbalx.com/Akagi/AAI-Station-Escape-Pod-1-Kerbal

Updated my escape pod

[chadgaskerman]

New Interplanetary ship I'm working on, based of an old idea of a decentralised colonisation system where plenty of outposts are spread out around a specific area on another planet. The two fuel tanks strapped to the top and bottom of the forward cargo area are the equivalent mass of the Dropship/ Reusable skycrane system to transport the different outposts to their landing zones.

The various outposts will have supplies and crew transported to them via a mobile base;

(This was really just an excuse to include a base crawler). The Crawler can carry auxilaury vehicles and also has a space to land VTOL air/space craft. It's also equipped with a full IRSU suite.

This Current mission is designed for Duna but can easily be adapted to any other planet or moon with the exception of Eve and Laythe. For those two I'm planning on having floating outposts and a Large ship as opposed to a base crawler

[dci]

Finally did non-explosive ferry between KSC and Island Airfield. KAS fixed telescopic joints did their work and almost safely held payload connected to deck and no unrecoverable situations occured.

Cars are ready to embark.

 

Each car has mass about 15t and can not climb ramp itself, so KAS winch help is needed.

 

Loaded and fixed to deck, now go to the ocean...

 

...and head to Island Airfield. Reused radar kOS script, which I wrote earlier for old boat design.

 

Another critical part was climb this slope.

 

Almost there...

 

Unloading was way easier than loading, there were no wheel breaks and no winch assistance was required.

 

Done, heading back to KSC.

 

Losses: 4x winglet, 1x KAS winch and about 20x repair kit for wheels. One landing wheel was recognised as stowed and unused.

Scatterer ocean waves are tough to master, but it is more satisfying watch boat swaying through scatterer ocean, than sprinting through waveless stock ocean.

[Death Engineering]

As I approach my ninth year playing KSP and on the forums (!!!) I am replacing my avatar.

The original avatar I used was taken from some publicity material from a former employer, who doesn't even exist anymore. It was time to move on and leave the old "Science Meter" avatar behind and embrace the future..

Goodbye old me..

Spoiler

 

edit: When I say "future", I am reminded that the new avatar pic is dated 2018... 

Edited April 19, 2022 by Death Engineering

[Hotel26]

1 hour ago, Death Engineering said:

As I approach my ninth year playing KSP and on the forums (!!!) I am replacing my avatar.

Well done!  (As one 'mad scientist' to another.)

                                                                                

Meanwhile, returning from a reconnaissance mission in the KSC mountains west, landing on Flat Top Mt before returning: a just-delivered Kuryakin 2.  (Need to update that flag!)  This machine is great.

[swjr-swis]

40 minutes ago, Hotel26 said:

landing on Flat Top Mt

Nice! No footage?

 

I have quite a collection of planes based on concepts you started, triggering the good ole 'Hmm but what if...' tinkering juices. Same with the Kuryakin.

Speaking of things you started, a work in progress of the past days:

I know, right? Me and stock props? Even Jeb looks flabbergasted.

 

[MythicalHeFF]

I found an underwater tree. I have now seen everything.

And another one way underwater (bottom left)