Claw

That's a good thread but can be difficult to impliment for complex ships. Also that method doesn't always work with some of the docking bugs in 0.23.5. If you give that fix a try and it's not working, here is my docking fix thread updated for 0.23.5. http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/78863-FIX-Dock-Undocking-Bug-in-0-23-5 Let me know if you run into any questions or problems.

For that small of a ship, you won't need two claws. It will be difficult to latch onto because it's so small and mostly round. You'll have to approach it almost exactly from the side to get the claw to grab. By the way, you DON'T need docking ports on the small ship in order to grab on with the claw... Also know that if you do manage to claw it with both at the same time, one of the claws will experience a bug which will cause the claw end graphics to flip over. I think that bug is fairly harmless, but it will look bad. Your docking ports look okay. It is a bit unclear to me in your pictures, but are you trying to connect them face to face? Or face to edge? I know you said you wanted a "T". The ports still have to touch each other flat. If you haven't docked two vessels that large together before, it can sometimes take a long time for the ports to slide together all the way because the tanks are so big. (It takes a while for the ports to move the ships around.) And sometimes they aren't strong enough to do it. I will also echo my first post. You should check out the docking port's state in your save file. My thread is pretty detailed about where to look for the port's state. If it doesn't make sense, let me know. Try this post specifically: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/78863-FIX-Dock-Undocking-Bug-in-0-23-5?p=1145499&viewfull=1#post1145499

Pictures (or a craft file) would definitely help in troubleshooting. Pictures are usually preferred, especially if you have any mods. However, when putting a rover on top of a rocket, it's pretty common for it to be out of balance. While the rover was built in the SPH with symmetry, it will still generally be asymmetric in the up/down direction. When you then strap it on top of a rocket, it can cause problems. The other thing is that if you put all that mass on top of a rocket, it will sometimes cause it to want to flip over. What you really need is for the Center of Thrust (the pink marker) to be directly in line with the Center of Mass (the yellow marker). Also, I know you said you have reaction wheels and RCS, but you may want to consider adding fins to the bottom. If it wants to flip over due to the rover's weight, fins will help and they're fairly light.

Some parts allow what you are asking, but it just depends on the part. If you post a picture of exactly what you're trying to do, people might have techniques to overcome your problem.

Ohh, if this is a stock game please post a copy of your save file! I would recommend keeping a copy of your quicksave and/or persistence files while you try to figure out a workaround. Your craft may become corrupted at some point, and there won't be a recover from that. One thing you could try is after your probe is destroyed, exit back to the space center first. Then get back to your main ship through the tracking center. If that doesn't work, try exiting out of the game completely after your probe's death (maybe throw in a quicksave after). Then restart KSP and go back to your main ship. Also, I would recommend opening up the debug log (ALT+F12, then click on the debug tab. Scroll to the bottom.) You can watch here as you separate the probe and do the science/crash and see if any errors pop up. You can also post your ksp_log.txt or any other crash logs to a site like pastebin, then post the link here for people to look through.

You may need to upload your pictures to a site like imgur.com or photobucket. Then you can share the link here with the img tags. Place your image link between the tags. (Your other picture isn't showing up because you pasted your image file directly into the post.) If you have docked successfully in the past, then you may just have some docking ports that need to be manually reset. That information is all in the link I posted earlier, but those pictures you're trying to upload will help a lot for us to pin down the problem.

This thread will hopefully help with the docking problem. For what you are describing, you probably need to change the docking port state to "state = ready". But I would recommend checking this thread to make sure you are picking the correct fix. (Assuming you have matching docking ports, andy they are oriented correctly with nothing in the way.) http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/78863-FIX-Dock-Undocking-Bug-in-0-23-5 As for the claw, I'm not sure off hand. A picture would probably help. But make sure you are in control of the ship with the claw as they make contact. Also, if what you are grabbing is very round or is an oddly shaped part, try changing the approach angle or grab another part.

In any case, the way to fix it is to open the persistence file and look for the since module "Part" section. Find the line that says "crew = ##". The ## will be the crew member's number (you won't see a name). Move that crew line to the cockpit modules and you should be able to get your guys back out. Probably not the best fix for your situation (because I assume you're trying to use the lab), but at least it allows you to "rescue" the vehicle.

Yeah, there seems to be some random hatch blockings and missing EVA buttons. It's unclear what's causing this, but it seems to only be effecting the hitchhiker and lab modules. Perhaps because those two require you to click on the hatch, hence people only notice the problem on those modules.

I don't know how the mod piece stores the crew, but I assume it's the same. You're looking for the line that says "crew = ##" in the hitchhiker cans "Part" section. The ## will be the crew member's number. So you won't see a name, just the number. Moving that crew line to the other part's section should move the kerbal.

Dock another module to that open Sr port and transfer them with that Crew Manifest mod. (Or move them in the persistence file.) I've seen this a couple times and I don't know what causes it. Is there anything on the back hatch? Not that it should matter, but just wondering if it's causing a problem for both hatches.

If you want a quick-look for rough times, you can use many of the delta V maps like this one. You might have to look for one that uses your preferred time scale (Kerbin or Earth days).

If you read the rest of the thread you'll see why.

Thanks for this Northstar. In fact, RCS MUST be placed away from the CoM to be effective. If you could somehow place it exactly on the CoM, it would result in nothing but translation (and no rotation). Of course, it's hard in practice to place it on the infinitely small CoM point. Reaction wheels, on the other hand, could be placed exactly on the CoM or at the very ends. If the object is completely rigid and the CoM position unchanged, rotation due to a reaction wheel is the same regardless of reaction wheel position. Unfortunately, it's easy to throw around terms like Torque and SAS, but it's a bit trickier to intuitively understand what's actually happening. Since torque also results from forces (like RCS) being applied over a distance (as you pointed out). Thanks. And yes, quantity reigns over location because location has no bearing at all (when talking about reaction wheel's effectiveness). Spacing them out is generally the best option though because it reduces bending and reduces the likelihood of a craft tearing itself apart.

Reverse what specifically? If you mean "reverse the craft that was deleted outside of physics range," then unfortunately the answer is no (sorry). Unless you happen to have a quicksave available. If it just happened, you can also ALT-F4 out of the game and it won't save the persistence. But then you are at the mercy of whenever it last auto-saved. I'm guessing this isn't an option since your post is almost 2 hours old.

I think this thread is for open source techniques. So by definition, people post here to share ideas free for the taking.

I think I found my first rocket that I landed on the Mun. (Or at least very close to it.) I threw MechJeb on to show the stats, but the rest is pulled directly from my demo copy. Turns out the rocket itself is overkill, but it provided a huge margin for error. Really I think the big thing that helped me though is the second picture. That's a close up picture of the lander portion. I used fins because they have a much higher crash tolerance than the landing gear. This was pretty helpful when my first landings were not so gentle. The last stage before the lander itself was used to bring the lander within around 3-5km of the surface. The small lander piece did the remainder portion of the landing itself and had plenty of fuel to make it back to Kerbin. The decouplers on the fins were to make sure they were low enough to keep the engine off the ground, but they also allowed the fins to be jettisoned after leaving the Mun. The whole thing is pretty messy and not optimum, but I left it all as I had it when I played the demo.

Thanks for posting this. So as to not hijack the other thread... I mentioned the bug tracker in the other thread because it can also be used to suggest features. I think this has come up through enough discussions that it's probably worth of "feature" type consideration or at least as a gameplay issue. Anyway, thanks again for starting this thread.

Has this been formally suggested? I know we talk about it, but I don't know if it's in the bug tracker.

Your top toroid tanks actually don't look cross connected to me. They do clip into each other quite a bit even when connected correctly (as you can see in Taki's pictures). The level of clipping ends up looking nice (in my opinion) when you're working with very small craft. It makes them look a little tighter. Although I agree with you. You have to get really fancy with the camera angles to get them connected correctly. I will usually drift the mouse back and forth (or up and down) a bit to make sure I'm connected to the correct node.

Yeah, sorry. I misused the phrase "on rails" there. I really meant to say "out of physics range" since you are right, craft under warp are placed on rails. So it's really a matter of "in physics range" or not, but has nothing to do with "in focus" or "on rails." Yep, like Kasuha says. The "with some strange effects" probably has to do with the fact that the charge rates and the discharge rates do not time scale the same during time warp. I think charging gains more benefit from time warp than discharging. So if you have a craft that's discharging electricity and can't produce enough to quite keep up, you can time warp the recharge rate will increase more than the discharge rate. (At least this is true for some things.) I think you can also lock out a battery on a probe, and even if it runs out of other available electricity you can still "wake it up" by turning the battery back on.

Yeah, this part is really common because of how similar both sides look. It's not really with the Sr ports themselves, but my suspicion is that whatever actually causes the problems is more common with the larger builds that typically use Sr ports. So it's not the port itself, but what it typically gets used on.

In my experience, you are correct. Putting a craft "on rails" results in no electricity consumption. If it is within physics range (whether the focus ship or not), electricity will be consumed. I agree that it's a bit unrealistic, but that's just the state of the game right now. I'm sure there is a mod out there for this, but I don't know of one off hand. I don't know if RT has an option to adjust power or not.

Okay, one more try... You can revive them. (http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/75586-Master-Thread-Unresponsive-Kerbals-in-EVA) Unless you've deleted them completely, then they are gone. Otherwise you can reset their idx = 0, and change the word "Debris" to "EVA". Seriously, two lines of code to change.

Then you'll have to dig through the VESSEL structure and see if you can figure out which ports are the ones you're after. Hopefully you don't have too many ports on your ship. Try to find the right starting spot by searching for your ship's name. If you do have a lot of ports, you can try to narrow it down by decoupling everything else from your ship that's broken. (Keep a copy of the original save.) Then with the correct UIDs, you can fix your original save and decouple the ship. Also, if you're using KSP v0.23.5, I recommend trying the thread link directly above your post. There is some other unusual docking behavior in 0.23.5.