You Will Not Go To Space Today - Post your fails here!

[kraden]

@Hotaru any landing you can walk away from, amiright? 

[Chakat Firepaw]

On 25/08/2017 at 4:23 PM, Angel-125 said:

Most amusing launch failure I've heard to date!

I have to correct you:  It was a non-launch failure.  As in, he failed to not launch.

 

[CaptainTrebor]

https://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/topic/27292-what-did-you-do-in-ksp-today/&page=1448#comment-3158614

[Alpha_Mike_741]

Well kids, this is how a RUD booster ends up

Edited August 28, 2017 by Alpha_Mike_741

[53miner53]

So I was landing Columbia, uneventful reentry partially due to good design, partially due to the 16 reaction wheels shared between the spacetugs in the payload, and then comes landing. I think to myself that landing this shuttle has become very routine recently because I use the shuttle so often, and then proceed to land it. Except I forgot one thing: opening the landing gear. *facepalm* *quickload*

[invision]

i  was on a sarnus moon, slate maybe? the gravity was so low you could fart and reach orbit. so without thinking i got out my ship to plant a flag and i look back and my ship is now floating away  downhill and proceeded to tumble and roll so i try to get in the way with my kerbal to stop it, i get knocked out of the way and the ships proceeds to smash into the ground....very slowly, and break apart.............FML

okay FINE......go back to VAB cause i am not waiting that long for rescue and put a harpoon on the ship, fly and land  back there, set the harpoon into the ground and stake the ship in place and plant that flag WOOT!

Edited September 6, 2017 by invision
keyboard fails

[septemberWaves]

On 9/6/2017 at 5:46 PM, invision said:

slate maybe? the gravity was so low you could fart and reach orbit.

You'll find that Slate fits the exact opposite of this description. The moon with a gravity so low that it'd be excessive to describe it as a "force" is Ovok.

[The Aziz]

CHECK YO STAGIN'

[[insert_name_here]]

I've already posted this on the "What did you do in KSP today" thread but I thought I should re-post part of it here.

Last week I made my first trip to the Mun. It was manned because I hadn't researched probes yet. The entire journey to the Mun went just fine and I entered Kerbin SOI and de-orbited without any problems.

However, when I separated my final stage and prepared for landing, I encountered a problem. For some reason the decoupler was clipping into the heat shield. I didn't know it at the time, but I had accidentally put two heat shields on top of each other instead of one. So I jettisoned the heat shield and hoped for the best. However, instead of getting rid of the first heat shield I stupidly got rid of the second heat shield, which the first one was attached to. Jeb blew up in the atmosphere.

[G'th]

 

Well I went to space, but a rather precarious situation presented itself when I was alt-tabbed during reentry. 

[septemberWaves]

Okay, so my Aptur 2 rocket has two enormous solid rocket motors on either side of the core stage (both the core and the SRBs are 1.875m diameter), and overall it's a pretty big rocket to get 7 tonnes to low orbit (though I am playing at 3.2x scale so it fits). The first launch, I forgot to add the separation motors for the boosters, but though the boosters exploded the core stage was fine so the launch continued. The second time, I made some edits to the spacecraft but I forgot to fix the separation motors. This was the result:

Luckily the crew survived because I always implement effective abort systems for my spacecraft. Even so, it was an expensive failure; this is the largest rocket I have so far in this save.

[[insert_name_here]]

So, I was planning a Mun mission. This mission consisted of a large rocket with a Mk II lander can carrying a payload - a little Mun lander - into Munar orbit. The lander had a docking port attached to the top of it. Basically, the plan was (quite a lengthy list, I know): 

1. Get into Munar orbit
2. Rescue Jeb, who is stranded in orbit of the Mun due to a failed Mun mission
3. Complete a contract (test Small Hardpoint in orbit of the Mun)
4. Get into low Munar orbit
5. Transfer Jeb to the lander
6. Detatch the lander
7. Complete the second contract (test Small Landing Gear on a suborbital trajectory over the Mun)
8. Land on the surface of the Mun near Val, who got stranded on the Mun when her lander tipped over
9. Rescue Val
10. Get heaps of science
11. Get back into Munar orbit and rendezvous with the rocket
12. Dock with the rocket (completing contract number 3 - rendezvous and dock two vessels in orbit of the Mun)
13. Transfer all science data to an experiment storage unit on the main rocket, which is encased in a service bay next to the lander can
14. Transfer Jeb and Val over to the main rocket
15. Undock
16. Get back to Kerbin and complete the fourth contract (transmit or recover science data from the surface of the Mun)

 

But then a lot of things went wrong.

 

Fail 1: There was no space for Jeb and Val on the ship. I had filled the lander can with other kerbonauts.

Fail 2: Apparently, to complete the contract for the Small Hardpoint, it actually has to decouple something. I had just slapped it on the ship with nothing attached to it.

Fail 3: Due to a staging error, the landing gear was decoupled before I was able to test it.

Fail 4: Apparently to qualify for docking two spacecraft in orbit of the Mun, the spacecraft have to come from different missions.

 

At least I completed one contract and got a bunch of science. But I'll have to plan a second mission to do the rest.

[DAL59]

I tried to land on Eve with the two stage Universal Atmospheric Lander.  

1.  Bill couldn't do SAS

2. I forgot to attach a mechjeb

3. The heatshield was blocking the engines, so I couldn't deorbit.

4. So, I had to detach the heatshield, and use the first stage's precious fuel to slow down reentry.  

5. For some reason, all the tanks had very little oxidizer, effectively halving the fuel.  At this point I realized that a rescue mission would be needed. 

6. The lander had no ladder, so I would have to tip it over for Bill to EVA.

7. I didn't even have to tip over, as the landing gears exploded on touchdown.  

Thankfully, the mothership got home safely.   

Also, just did a Minimus flyby mission.  Was admiring raster prop monitor for too long, and I didn't deploy the parachute soon enough.

[Geonovast]

I can really only blame this on a glitch... since it all started with a wheel exploding inside a fairing on launch. 

Final prep work.  10 crew, six in the main core, one in each arm connecting the nacelles to the core.

First 1/3rd of second after launch is fine..

Then one of the stowed, unloaded wheels gets all "stressed out" and explodes.

This almost looks on purpose.

He's probably fine..

Nope.

Dunno where that one ended up, maybe he got to space?

I think Verfry has issues.

6 out of the 10 crew survived, the ones in the core.  Way more than I'd expected.  Was pretty fun to watch though.  Managed to fix it by launching with the brakes on.

[Archgeek]

13 hours ago, DAL59 said:

Also, just did a Minimus flyby mission.  Was admiring raster prop monitor for too long, and I didn't deploy the parachute soon enough.

I have something disappointing to tell you, about Minmus...

(I'm sure you meant on return, but the thought of trying to capture at Minmus with a parachute made me chuckle.)

Edited October 9, 2017 by Archgeek
Dropped an article

[DAL59]

No, I mean when I was reentering.

Edit- Now I read the small text.  Nevermind.  

Edited October 9, 2017 by DAL59

[Delay]

I'm currently having a lot of failures with probes... Here's a list of things that I do differently when launching a probe in "L"KO:

Manned: Apoapsis: 75,000 - 85,000, wherever my gravity turn puts it, Circularization at Apoapsis

Probes: Apoapsis: 120,000 - 150,000 as far away from KSC as possible, Circularization 20 km after apoapsis

Why? Because I have to worry about connection. I don't have a geostationary satellite network for relay yet (antennas are too weak), so I need to push the apoapsis as far as possible (to guarantee a connection to the next station) and as high as possible (to establish a connection as soon as possible and to not immediately fall into the atmosphere) because signal clipping (is that what it's called?) is at 0. Sometimes it works, other times my probe just burns up.

Or, how about this: You're currently doing a transfer to the Mun. And then, seconds before you cut the engine, you lose connection.

But that's not it. My last Minmus mission was filled with problems:

Landing on Minmus. Went perfect, but the landing legs (the first you get in the tech tree) are kinda... weird. They really don't like keeping things upright, so while I was planting my flag (looking worried at the lander) the lander started falling over. I ended up closing the service bay to push the rocket up and then lifting off like nothing ever happened. Except...

EC was running out. So whenever I needed to turn, I had to ignite the engine. Minmus' low gravity made that a bit of a problem was really helpful there. But in the end, Jeb got home safely.

[Geonovast]

23 minutes ago, Delay said:

EC was running out. So whenever I needed to turn, I had to ignite the engine. Minmus' low gravity made that a bit of a problem was really helpful there. But in the end, Jeb got home safely.

This is why, whenever I do a game where I have to build the tech tree, my first priority is always unlocking the first solar panel.  Glad you got home!

[Delay]

I had them, just... 30 part limit.

[DAL59]

2 hours ago, Delay said:

30 part limit.

What I do is I unlock the docking jr. and launch a probe with its own engine to LKO, then launch a crew lander to LKO.  With a terrier and a fl-400, the probe should be able to do TMI, MCC, and half of orbital insertion.  Then the lander can finish circulization, land, and return.    If docking is hard without RCS, you can instead sent the probe with an empty capsule to munar orbit, send another capsule with crew to near it, EVA, land, and then return and EVA to the first capsule.   

[Atkara]

Not my failures, technically speaking, but I was nevertheless surprised, when tested launchers with also tested payloads started exploding on the pad. Turns out it was the 1.3.0 bug with fairings and their explosive interaction with struts and fuel lines  

Anyway, it's been fixed and everything returned to normal

Edited October 12, 2017 by Atkara

[NateisKerbal]

When you're going in at 3000 m/s and forgot heat shields or parachutes

[HerrCrazi]

I made a manned exploration mission to Mimnus, involving two Kerbals, a lander, a rover, and a survey probe. Went to Minmus just as usually. Nothing to say. Exept when time for separating the lander and the probe came up. *Booom* Those wheels explosions are violent !

[Atkara]

There was one other occasion which counts as a "you won't land back on the Mun today".

I maintain orbital refineries around Kerbin, Mun and Minmus, with the long term plan to establish one of these around each major planet & moon. Anyway, the miner I've got stationed on the Mun, had just delivered it's cargo on the refinery. So I undocked, maneuvered out of the refinery's path and initiated the intermediate orbit altitude change I always do, before the de-orbit burn.

I thought I had enough clearance. It's the first time in playing this game that knowing I couldn't do anything to prevent it, I just watched the event unfold -in shock and possibly, even horror. The miner crashed into the refinery. They didn't just disassemble -they literally disintegrated each other, with few bits and pieces floating around. I wasn't laughing. But:

KSP is a game. So, I reverted. But I did learn my lesson: When you think you have enough clearance while departing from a station, check again.

[Zeiss Ikon]

Well, my career save's new four passenger Munar orbit tourist bus, Taxicab IV, is, um, a little marginal on aerodynamic stability at launch (it ought to be okay on reentry, with empty tanks, it's just got multiple big wings up front on the orbiter, and heavy boosters in back).  More so than Taxicab III (two passenger LKO carrier) or Taxicab IIIm (the two passenger Munar orbit bus).  The first couple launch attempts did amazing flips when I let the nose get a little too far off the center of the prograde marker.  I got it into orbit on the third try, after adding elevons to the Swept Wings serving as fins on the boosters (but even with that added pitch authority, it's squirrely -- clearly I need to come up with a better way to launch and recover tourists in quantities > 2).