Realistic Solar System Crafts - MEGATHREAD

[NathanKell]

Can you post pics of the wobbly craft in question to the RO discussion thread? We can take a look there and try to figure out what's wrong.

Regarding keeping the interstage fairing attached: you have KJR installed, so you can indeed do so. Examine my staging list. The floating node on a proc interstage is the node with the (fake) decoupler in it, but KJR makes the fake decoupler real. That means if you attach the floating node to the place you want to decouple from (the bottom node of the central engine, or the bottom node of the tank if an engine cluster), then add your fairings but have them decouple the stage *after* the base's decoupler does, then it will work fine. Retros are suggested as well, of course.

[Comet Tail]

First I was just going to show off an SSTO I made using one of the super-light "TEST" pods from one of the mods I have. Then I decided to try it with a Mercury capsule.

Then when I thought; "Why stop there?" and decided to try to get a useful payload out of it. Big Gemini+Gemini: 8 astronauts into orbit.

Note two RL-10's supplementing the aerospikes. I learned the hard way that aerospikes don't gimbal

Also, I decided to try for some high-altitude parachutes, thinking that my craft was so lightweight empty, that those might allow for a plasma-less reentry, doing away with the need for a heavy heatshield over the whole thing (aside from bragging rights, what's the point of a non-reusable SSTO?). Well, they worked a little too well - took me down to 1500 m/s at about 70 or 80 km or so. G-forces killed the crew and nearly destroyed the craft.

I would've spent more time with it to make the thing work fully; but I'd proved it's possible, and I'd rather get back to work on the Galileo and the rest of my Grand Tour crafts than spend a lot of time with that.

- first image is the mercury setup. Since the tank is a procedural balloon cryo, I decided the "Atlas" skin was fitting (I got to knock on one of those they got lying down at the Huntsville Space and Rocket Center. Darn, those walls are thin! It feels like if you had a plate of it, you could almost bend it with your arm strength). Note how the engines cut off during ascent to reduce G-forces. Also has the added advantage of making a larger portion of the thrust come from engines with higher vacuum ISP.

This has been a fun project of mine, though. I had a dream once that me and some friends were escaping a tyrannical, evil empire or something of the sort, and we went to this field where big SSTO's would come down and take us out to Laythe to escape the baddies. Ever since then I've really wanted to make an SSTO that can fit the bill - land and take off again with no reliance on infrastructure on the ground - or at least minimal infrastructure. That way can take refugees away to Laythe (Though kinda moot point now that I use RSS) (Also very useful for docking to an interstellar spacecraft if you're going out to explore potentially habitable Earth-like worlds).

The idea with this one is that it could be refuelled on the ground by minimal facilities that use electrolysis to convert water into LH2 and LOX.

I'll get to designing something that can re-enter with full tanks eventually. Only way I can imagine doing that, though, is a lifting body, and Kerbal isn't very nice for designing those...

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Now for the latest on the Galileo...

I found that, amazingly enough, using a Gemini pod with the ablative shielding removed and an Apollo docking mechanism, is lighter than just using a NASA covered docking system. So I went with that. Added crew capability (though it adds 2, realistically it'd be 1: need to make access room so you can get to the docking tunnel...), no annoying flukes with the fact that the Big Gemini Passenger Compartment wasn't meant to be used as a pod, and more sleek, cool looks.

I must confess, one of these pictures don't belong. One of them has the two cooling fins across from eachother. I tweaked it so they're not across from eachother anymore - that's the only change among these pictures. Has to do with how it'll dock on the mothership - it needs to fit, so cooling fin needs to move (now they're about 90* from eachother).

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Proven to be mission-capable: Can land and take off from Mars and all of the Galilean moons. The thing on the bottom - the decoupler and heatshield - is for Mars entry. It's jettisoned, then the craft lands under its own power from subsonic speeds. The resulting configuration is for the rest of its missions to Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. Now that I have this thing designed and I know how much propellants it needs for the various Galilean moons, I can go on to work on its ferry: the Dragonfire. The mothership will enter orbit over Callisto, then the Dragonfire will tug it around to the rest of the Galilean moons.

EDIT: On the other hand, though, I may need the superior strength of the NASA docking system. It might take some strenuous G-forces while docked to the mothership; all of those forces travelling through the docking mechanism. So I dunno... I'll have to do some more research on this. Any advice/tips on this?

Edited December 8, 2014 by Comet Tail

[Comet Tail]

As most of you may know, I've been working on Realistic Progression Zero, an ultralite career mode for RO (prices! contracts! tech!). To test it out, I've played through about 1962 or so in terms of technology development. Here are the craft I've used (I have not yet done a lunar flyby, mostly because we don't have something as light as Pioneer 0). All craft use stock parts (with Ven's Stock Revamp), Proc Parts, Proc Wings, and Proc Fairings...and nothing else. They thus can be a tutorial of sorts for RP-0.

Most are (mostly) real. in the descriptions, I explain what's real and what's mostly-real. I snuck in a couple action pics at the end, using pingopete's awesome RVE.

All pics 2560x1600, so click that "view full size" option!

http://imgur.com/a/mLBeY

Nicely done! I'm also rather jealous of those visuals. They're amazing!

(My own mod setup is a long story. But I'm running an old version of the game. Took me days to get it to work, I'm really not looking forward to doing that all over again with the latest version of KSP - and again every time it updates and invalidates old mods :I )

[Comet Tail]

Sooo... For the past few months (since about August) I've been working off and on on this "Grand Tour" thing. I've suspected since the beginning I'd have this problem, and, well, here it is - frame rate issues. Really, though, I'm not all too excited about it anymore. I guess I just burned myself out on it, heh, though I might come back to it sometime.

But anyways, the following craft isn't exactly nicely polished, but it should be able to perform the mission with a refueling in orbit over Callisto, and possibly even without one: Go to Mars, enter orbit by aerocapture, drop the Galileo lander, have it return, fly a powershot around Venus, aerocapture over Jupiter, enter orbit around Callisto, have the lander go to Callisto and return, use a tug (not shown) to ferry the Galileo around the Jovian system (to Ganymede, Europa, and Io), then finally discard the lander over Io and the ferry returns to Callisto with crew, then itself gets left in orbit over Callisto. The mothership then drops into a highly elliptical orbit to do a powershot past Jupiter (Oberth burn) to go to Saturn, where the Titan lander does its mission, returns the crew to the mothership, then the mothership returns to Earth.

Here's the Titan lander and said Mothership.

(Darn, Titan's atmosphere is thick, btw! Orbit is < 2 km/s, yet it took that much to make it (screencapped ~6 km/s vacuum). And yeah, the craft with the inflating heat shield is an earlier version of the finalized one shown taking off, in case ya notice the differences. Also, this is interesting - virtually no major heating because orbital velocity is so low and the atmosphere is so "soft" (large scale height) - makes me wonder if a heat shield is even necessary or why the Huygens needed one. I'll have to read up on that.)

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To get this to work, the engines are LANLARS: Lox Augmented Nuclear Liquid Annular Reactor Systems. It's a custom config for the NTR that is a mix of LANTR - Lox Augmented Nuclear Thermal Rocket - and LARS - Liquid Annular Reactor System. The performance for those two engines are from NASA studies. To get the LANLARS, I took Nerva NTR's, and used the ratios that various Lox augmentations changed its performance, and applied those to the LARS. For example, a 3 to 1 LOX/LH2 mix in LANTR has 71% of the ISP, and 273% of the thrust. So a 3 to 1 LOX/LH2 config of the LARS has 71% of the ISP and 273% of the thrust of a LARS.

Oh, and the hugely enormous stacks of tanks help, too

And nicely enough, shouldn't pose much of a framerate issue, 'cause I just config-hacked them into enormous clusters so the game wouldn't have to load all their physics. If I didn't, it'd be Kraken-bait.

Also tweaked their stats a little. Their volume/mass isn't as good as an Atlas' tank, but is much better than a Titan's tank segment.

I'm tired of solving endless problems with this thing, though, and the framerate is just a new one. What I may do, though, is try using procedural tanks to simulate the docked crafts, then use Hyperedit to port in the crafts when it comes time to fly them - and so then that just leaves the mothership itself, which shouldn't have any framerate issues. Yeah, actually, I think I'll do that after I run some numerical solutions for this craft's trajectories (unfortunately, when it's not a Hohmann, there's no simple algebra to solve it, heh).

Also, a much simpler little fun thing I've run on the side: An all-up Apollo mission. When I complete it I'll post in the appropriate forum, but for now just enjoy the pretty little all-up lander:

I'm really looking forward to some relatively simple Constellation Program missions after I complete this Grand Tour, though. Even rendevouzing with an asteroid is simple in contrast to this Plus I kinda have a soft spot for those cool lander designs, as overly heavy as they may be.

EDIT; and yes, btw, Voyage to the Planets was a huge inspiration. Pegasus was a real beauty, though I think she used Gas Core NTR

My craft is using LANLARS instead, though, 'cause I kinda felt like making this with 70's-type tech (note I have an empty Saturn IVB tank right under the heatshield to simulate a lightweight version of Skylab - lots of living space for a very long mission. Which reminds me that I need to add a centrifuge...). Gas Core is way past that, though, and requires hydrodynamics and modern simulation tech way beyond that era. LARS wasn't too far off, though.

Edited December 10, 2014 by Comet Tail

[Hattivat]

I think this is by far the largest ship I've ever seen used in RSS, great stuff.

[Comet Tail]

I think this is by far the largest ship I've ever seen used in RSS, great stuff.

I had to do another config hack to get a heatshield large enough - 10 m didn't cut it, so I made a 20 m heatshield. But that didn't cut it either, so I made a 30 m heatshield. And I still don't know if it's going to be large enough - comparing it to the Pegasus would seem to indicate "no"...

The ship is kinda set into 6 segments, each could've been launched separately then assembled in orbit, then fully fueled with later "Tanker" flights. Also like Pegasus: Imagine if for the past 30 years we'd been building a massive craft like this instead of the ISS (though I think this would take a lot less launches to build than the ISS, if we don't loft up a 109 tons of orbiter for every 20 tons of payload). The biggest difficulty, though, is probably getting the heatshield up, though I suppose IRL it could be divided into segments and assembled on-orbit so you don't need a ~100' diameter fairing...

I must admit, though, I really just wanted to see what it'd look like... The VAB was too small to see the whole thing XD . So I just hyperedited it up into orbit.

[Hattivat]

You could use the Extraplanetary Launchpads mod to create the heatshield on a space station, though that would make the part count problems even more severe. As for whether or not the heatshield would work, in my experience the most important part in interplanetary aerobreaking is having your CoM right, size is secondary. Anyway, hyperedited or not, it is quite a ship

[NathanKell]

That is...impressive is not a large enough word!

[Comet Tail]

You could use the Extraplanetary Launchpads mod to create the heatshield on a space station, though that would make the part count problems even more severe. As for whether or not the heatshield would work, in my experience the most important part in interplanetary aerobreaking is having your CoM right, size is secondary. Anyway, hyperedited or not, it is quite a ship

Oh dear... That's somewhat a problem, seeing as it has three different crafts docked around it. I have them docked empty to reduce stress on the docking ports, but... Still, balancing the CoM will be very, very tricky...

Heh. I'll need some really heavy duty RCS... Not sure how to do that.

But thanks.

That is...impressive is not a large enough word!

Adding rep would get the point across nicely XP

Anyways, might be a bit before I update on that project again, but seeing this really motivates me to not just leave it for too long.

I'll probably mod in some massively oversized RCS units, heh. And see what I can do to cut framerate issues by consolidating more parts. Heck, I'm considering consolidating the entire tankage assembly into a single, absolutely enormous part. That and using dummy landers as I mentioned earlier should do it for framerate issues, I hope...

But who knew, KSP with a dozen plus mods with RO and RSS doesn't like a 234 part ship XD (that's before adding RCS, communications, and electrical systems).

///

I finally got around to putting RO on my updated KSP... Ironically enough, the x32 version runs not only a lot less buggy (many modders do not like x64?), but also a lot smoother. I may try copying the designs over to this other version?...

In the meantime, though, I want to make ChakaMonkey's Orion work in RO. Ever since I went to see EFT-1 launch in person, I've fallen strangely in love with Orion, despite knowing full well it's terribly heavy for its mission and SpaceX will probably do better :q

Edited December 11, 2014 by Comet Tail

[Redrobin]

Launch of my probe to Europa to search for signs of life and other sciency things like that

[Fenisse]

Anyone needs a (more or less) realistic Atlas A?

Actually not that realistic. But it looks nice.

Unluckly the ""warhead"" isn't really re-entry proof, it just spins to the wrong side!

[LaydeeDem]

Took long enough!

[LaydeeDem]

We have to use the fuel in the lander to get home, but damn it, I made it!

[Comet Tail]

Nice. Solar arrays on a CSM?

[LaydeeDem]

Nice. Solar arrays on a CSM?

Yeah. Last time I attempted the mission the Electric Charge and LS ran out. That and I think it adds to ~coolness~ points.

It was a fun mission, they actually survived re-entry with the SM still attached! (Damn latch...)

The lag is real...

Falling at safe speeds now, the SM is just on fire.

Then we splashed down and the Kraken ate them.

May we never forget Bill, Bob, and Jeb; forever lost to NaN-space.

[Jackvony]

What mod did you use for the parts?

[LaydeeDem]

What mod did you use for the parts?

FASA/OLDD + NearFuture for the solar panels.

[zekes]

I've been told this works in RSS. Has about 11 km/s D/V Without payload.

CIRA VI

Designer: Zekes

Status: COMPLETED

Cost: $3,189,410.00

The largest Zokesian Lifter yet, the Cira-VI has a massive 40 engines in the first stage, and is capable of putting over 800 tonnes of pure cargo into LKO.

Simply stage to fly. I recommend making the launchpad indestructible, or it probably will blow it up on launch.

Download: https://www./?8j35l61x6gy726c

[Comet Tail]

I've been told this works in RSS. Has about 11 km/s D/V Without payload.

CIRA VI

Designer: Zekes

Status: COMPLETED

Cost: $3,189,410.00

The largest Zokesian Lifter yet, the Cira-VI has a massive 40 engines in the first stage, and is capable of putting over 800 tonnes of pure cargo into LKO.

Simply stage to fly. I recommend making the launchpad indestructible, or it probably will blow it up on launch.

Download: https://www./?8j35l61x6gy726c

http://i.imgur.com/2SpFjn6.png

...

Cost: $3,189,410.00

The largest Zokesian Lifter yet, the Cira-VI has a massive 40 engines in the first stage, and is capable of putting over 800 tonnes of pure cargo into LKO.

Simply stage to fly. I recommend making the launchpad indestructible, or it probably will blow it up on launch.

...

Cost: $3,189,410.00 ... 800 tonnes of pure cargo into LKO.

... I recommend making the launchpad indestructible, or it probably will blow it up on launch.

...

...it probably will blow it up on launch.

Yep. I'm not playing stock again. It's been beat.

Also, it looks kinda cheaty-though: the final stage has parts clipping into eachother.

FASA/OLDD + NearFuture for the solar panels.

Huh... I don't remember FASA having unique internals. I guess I need to check out the latest version!

[Comet Tail]

Yeah. Last time I attempted the mission the Electric Charge and LS ran out. That and I think it adds to ~coolness~ points.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/56154768/KSP/RSS/screenshot271.png

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/56154768/KSP/RSS/screenshot275.png

It was a fun mission, they actually survived re-entry with the SM still attached! (Damn latch...)

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/56154768/KSP/RSS/screenshot326.png

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/56154768/KSP/RSS/screenshot328.png

The lag is real...

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/56154768/KSP/RSS/screenshot329.png

Falling at safe speeds now, the SM is just on fire.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/56154768/KSP/RSS/screenshot365.png

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/56154768/KSP/RSS/screenshot372.png

Then we splashed down and the Kraken ate them.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/56154768/KSP/RSS/screenshot381.png

May we never forget Bill, Bob, and Jeb; forever lost to NaN-space.

http://puu.sh/dsj1n/29cc52cc51.jpg

Oooooh, so THAT'S "The Kraken"? I always thought people were just talking about any mission-ending glitch?

But yeah, that's gotta be my favorite. They're just in this non-existent plane of infinite darkness with no direction, all panicked and screaming into the "Howling Abyss"...

Glitches have never been so epic. Except maybe in Skate 3.

[Fenisse]

Yeah Zekes, if you use FAR you can pretty much orbit anything that has ~9.5km/s Dv, but it depends on the rocket shape and such. In theory it'll work.

[Sparker]

I've been having a KSP-break for a few months but finally i've got some time to make another air-launched rocket. This time it's a Pegasus launch vehicle, although not an exact copy of it.

Please skip to 2:10 not to watch the boring part:

[Redrobin]

Moon mission. This is only the lander and the transfer vehicle.

[Discovery173]

My first successful RSS launcher, called Vex-1a in honor of the first prototype of an Argentinian satellite launcher. Capable of lifting 5t to LEO using a combination of LOX-Kerosene engines: RD-191 in the first stage and RD-0124 in the upper stage. Hopefully, the first member of a new family of launchers, the Tronador series.

I hate you, RSS! Now stock KSP is just too small!

[Redrobin]

Perfecting my stock RSS shuttle