Is it possible to launch a Kerbal out of the atmoshphere without taking launcher too?

[Kerbonautical]

Edit: Apologies for the poorly worded title, I ran out of space and clearly did a bad job of editing it down.

So this is something I have been toying around with for a while and was actually considering creating a challenge out of, I'm just not sure I could effectively write a rule set that would provide a fair ground for everyone to work from and I also have no semi-working contribution of my own so far let alone even know if it is possible or not, but I have been toying with ways to attempt to launch a Kerbal as far as possible on a transport-free journey out of the atmosphere.

Initially I had hoped to perhaps make a rocket with such high thrust that I could EVA the Kerbal at a low altitude and he could complete the journey alone, however deadly re-entry is tearing everything apart and I haven't had a chance to retry without the mod yet, but is it theoretically possible to create a device to launch a Kerbal that far? I had also considered some sort of launcher using many pistons set to extreme speeds but IR is still currently not working on 23.5 so that is also on the shelf currently. Any ideas anyone or should I abandon my senseless objective?

I should clarify I don't expect to achieve orbit, just a reasonably high altitude. Target would be above 35k but leaving the highly dense atmosphere that dwells below 10k would be an achievement in itself too, I don't expect to reach 70k but I would certainly like to try and find a way if it's at all possible.

[Rakaydos]

A spaceplane should be able to achieve a 35km orbit, raise it's apoapse to 69km, then dump the kerbal to EVA the rest of the way into space, I'd think.

[Kerbonautical]

A spaceplane should be able to achieve a 35km orbit, raise it's apoapse to 69km, then dump the kerbal to EVA the rest of the way into space, I'd think.

That sounds like it may be the most feasible way to do it. I've been toying with dropping the Kerbal off as low as possible but I'm not sure they can even survive the speeds required in an atmosphere :/ I need a heat shield for my EVA suits

[SkyRender]

I think you need to better define what you mean. If you mean a Kerbal managing to complete attaining orbit from being launched upwards, you'd have to get up absurdly high (we're talking almost to the Mun) before his RCS pack would be sufficient. If you mean just getting to space by jetpacking upwards (and not staying there), it should be pretty doable as long as you start from a reasonably high point. Kerbals have around 600dV or so on their own.

[Kerbonautical]

I think you need to better define what you mean. If you mean a Kerbal managing to complete attaining orbit from being launched upwards, you'd have to get up absurdly high (we're talking almost to the Mun) before his RCS pack would be sufficient. If you mean just getting to space by jetpacking upwards (and not staying there), it should be pretty doable as long as you start from a reasonably high point. Kerbals have around 600dV or so on their own.

Yeah this is why I didn't make a challenge of it, I'm finding it pretty hard to explain the intention of the idea. I guess the aim would be to EVA the Kerbal away from the vessel while inside of the atmosphere but maintaining a velocity high enough to leave the atmosphere. so for instance try and hit a target speed of say 1500 m/s as fast as possible then EVA while hopefully not too far up in the atmosphere leaving the velocity to take the Kerbal to a considerable height. My initial target was to create something that could launch one from the ground but I can't see any way to make that possible without IR and some possible tweaking.

[SkyRender]

Yeah this is why I didn't make a challenge of it, I'm finding it pretty hard to explain the intention of the idea. I guess the aim would be to EVA the Kerbal away from the vessel while inside of the atmosphere but maintaining a velocity high enough to leave the atmosphere. so for instance try and hit a target speed of say 1500 m/s as fast as possible then EVA while hopefully not too far up in the atmosphere leaving the velocity to take the Kerbal to a considerable height. My initial target was to create something that could launch one from the ground but I can't see any way to make that possible without IR and some possible tweaking.

As long as your horizontal velocity is sufficient already, it should be doable. But it would have to be from very high in the atmosphere, especially with Deadly Re-Entry on. Again, it's far less complicated if you just want to get up into space and not worry about attaining orbit.

[Kerbonautical]

As long as your horizontal velocity is sufficient already, it should be doable. But it would have to be from very high in the atmosphere, especially with Deadly Re-Entry on. Again, it's far less complicated if you just want to get up into space and not worry about attaining orbit.

Fantastic! I'm not actually looking to attain an orbit at all, the main aim is to get a shot of a Kerbal taking a journey in his EVA suit at an unexpected height and speed, having came from the direction of the planet. Just generally a silly looking shot that will hopefully go in a trailer I may eventually finish of all the more bizarre things I've done on KSP. To do it though the Kerbal only needs to attain that height without a vehicle, there's no need for him to survive.

The only reason actually that the transport needs to be ditched in the atmosphere is so that the Kerbal is alone in the shot, and the difference in drag should separate their distance well before the area the shot would be taken.

Edited April 18, 2014 by Kerbonautical

[Javster]

That sounds like it may be the most feasible way to do it. I've been toying with dropping the Kerbal off as low as possible but I'm not sure they can even survive the speeds required in an atmosphere :/ I need a heat shield for my EVA suits

MOOSE, perhaps...

[katateochi]

If you take the space plane approach and your goal is to have a shot of the Kerbal without the plane in view, then you could use RemoteTech's flight computer to setup a maneuver and burn on the plane with a 10-20second time delay. That way you could input the instructions, then EVA your guy and shortly after the plane would follow fly itself off out of the shot.

[Kerbonautical]

If you take the space plane approach and your goal is to have a shot of the Kerbal without the plane in view, then you could use RemoteTech's flight computer to setup a maneuver and burn on the plane with a 10-20second time delay. That way you could input the instructions, then EVA your guy and shortly after the plane would follow fly itself off out of the shot.

ah that's a really good idea, it would certainly make getting the shot right a lot easier. Also, I just remembered I haven't checked out your videos in ages. The constellation mission you did last year was probably the video that got me into the modding side of KSP and completely changed the game for me

Edit: and then I discover you've built a transformer in KSP. Your designs continue to amaze me

Edited April 18, 2014 by Kerbonautical

[katateochi]

ah that's a really good idea, it would certainly make getting the shot right a lot easier. Also, I just remembered I haven't checked out your videos in ages. The constellation mission you did last year was probably the video that got me into the modding side of KSP and completely changed the game for me

Edit: and then I discover you've built a transformer in KSP. Your designs continue to amaze me

Thanks man! Glad you enjoyed my vids. RL's been getting in the way of me doing big missions recently, and I got a bit side tracked by an obsession with SSTO's and planes! But I hope to do some more vids soon. Good luck with your vid plans!

[Brun]

So, not sure if you've seen this:

I've been unable to reproduce that since he made the video. It could be that Squad fixed or otherwise made this undoable in subsequent versions of KSP, or that my computer just doesn't handle these things properly (my Kerbals mysteriously disappear when I launch).

EDIT: Note that's not me in the video, just one I found .

Edited April 19, 2014 by Brun

[Kerbonautical]

Thanks man! Glad you enjoyed my vids. RL's been getting in the way of me doing big missions recently, and I got a bit side tracked by an obsession with SSTO's and planes! But I hope to do some more vids soon. Good luck with your vid plans!

Cheers! It will be my first of most likely only very few videos but hopefully each will be filled with various unusual designs. Looking forward to whatever you upload in the future! I also used the constellation mission to sell a copy to my buddy who's now adicted to KSP just a few days ago actually

So, not sure if you've seen this:

I've been unable to reproduce that since he made the video. It could be that Squad fixed or otherwise made this undoable in subsequent versions of KSP, or that my computer just doesn't handle these things properly (my Kerbals mysteriously disappear when I launch).

EDIT: Note that's not me in the video, just one I found .

Now that is the sort of idea I was initially toying with. Hmmmm, perhaps using timewarp I could replicate the clipping effect to cause the bug to occur again. I'm going to have to give it a shot tomorrow since I'm out of reach of my main computer now, but unless they adjusted the physics behavior when below the surface I can't see a reason why it wouldn't work. Danny seems to be using similar bugs with decouplers as recently as .23 so here's to hoping!

[Brun]

Now that is the sort of idea I was initially toying with. Hmmmm, perhaps using timewarp I could replicate the clipping effect to cause the bug to occur again. I'm going to have to give it a shot tomorrow since I'm out of reach of my main computer now, but unless they adjusted the physics behavior when below the surface I can't see a reason why it wouldn't work. Danny seems to be using similar bugs with decouplers as recently as .23 so here's to hoping!

You won't need to use timewarp to get the decouplers to clip. They'll happily clip each other in the VAB, no devcheats necessary. The real issue is getting enough of them slapped together without melting your CPU.

[Kerbonautical]

You won't need to use timewarp to get the decouplers to clip. They'll happily clip each other in the VAB, no devcheats necessary. The real issue is getting enough of them slapped together without melting your CPU.

True, but I may be able to use timewarp to force them to clip under the launch pad and hopefully simulate that same thrust. Not actually sure what my part limit is yet on my PC, but with an i7 2600k I should be within a shot I hope. Otherwise we're talking supercomputer processors.

My main hope is if it does incur serious FPS problems then the shot should be positioned ready and the Kerbal will be far enough for the debris to not be calculated while recording the shot. I still have the challenge of positioning a ship in an almost perfect geostationary orbit above the launch pad with this method unless there is some other camera control mods I'm currently unaware of

[Brun]

True, but I may be able to use timewarp to force them to clip under the launch pad and hopefully simulate that same thrust. Not actually sure what my part limit is yet on my PC, but with an i7 2600k I should be within a shot I hope. Otherwise we're talking supercomputer processors.

My main hope is if it does incur serious FPS problems then the shot should be positioned ready and the Kerbal will be far enough for the debris to not be calculated while recording the shot. I still have the challenge of positioning a ship in an almost perfect geostationary orbit above the launch pad with this method unless there is some other camera control mods om currently unaware of

I think that by the time you're able to get a Kerbal out of the atmosphere with this technique he'll already be on a interplanetary or even interstellar escape trajectory. In my the tests that didn't result in vanishing debris/Kerbals, the decouplers would accelerate the debris to tens of thousands of m/s (found by viewing the flight status page) but it would very rapidly decay in Kerbin's atmosphere, so they'd really only be going that fast for a fraction of a second. His trick was to get the debris/Kerbal going so fast that the travel distance during that fraction of a second would place it outside of Kerbin's atmosphere.

[Kerbonautical]

I think that by the time you're able to get a Kerbal out of the atmosphere with this technique he'll already be on a interplanetary or even interstellar escape trajectory. In my the tests that didn't result in vanishing debris/Kerbals, the decouplers would accelerate the debris to tens of thousands of m/s (found by viewing the flight status page) but it would very rapidly decay in Kerbin's atmosphere, so they'd really only be going that fast for a fraction of a second. His trick was to get the debris/Kerbal going so fast that the travel distance during that fraction of a second would place it outside of Kerbin's atmosphere.

That definitely complicates things then, for it to work exactly as I hope this way the Kerbal would have to leave the atmosphere at a fairly specific point, retaining the needed velocity, but not too much or to little. I can imagine it would be like finding a needle in a haystack in terms of getting the perfect velocity. Annoyingly, this would also provide the optimal shot though, since the Kerbal would be directly leaving the planet.

I'm going to have to see what happen's but it definitely is looking like a hard target to hit.

Edited April 19, 2014 by Kerbonautical

[Brun]

That definitely complicates things then, for it to work exactly as I hope this way the Kerbal would have to leave the atmosphere at a fairly specific point, retaining the needed velocity, but not too much or to little. I can imagine it would be like finding a needle in a haystack in terms of getting the perfect velocity. Annoyingly, this would also prive the optimal shot though, since the Kerbal would be directly leaving the planet.

I'm going to have to see what happen's but it definitely is looking like a hard target to hit.

Indeed, I imagine that there's a very narrow sweet spot you'd have to hit, which might not be possible with the stock decoupler forces, even if you mix and match different decouplers to fine tune your force at launch.