Signo

Did not really know where to attach so many of them (I never really managed to have a good stable launch with less than 32 with such a heavy design, not to mention the broken launchpads), so I tried once just to see if it could be "kerbal stuff". I do not really know how or even IF it works but it seems to help my launchpad to stay there.

Hi Ziv, below you can see my Amerìgo project I would like to use for the challenge. Is there anything you can see that needs a redesign to fit the rules? It is stock apart from MJ and some "improvement" mods like KAC and EVE. If there is anything you want to have a closer look at just let me know. Thank you.

About the wings lift/drag ratio, as far as I am aware about the current version, there are some of them with an incorrect drag calculation. So at the moment the "old" swept wings, the wing strakes and the structural "type D" (I think) can give you a little extra edge.

If you are looking for the best efficiency I think you should have a look at this thread. http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/101426-Slashy-s-quick-and-easy-recipe-for-an-SSTO-spaceplane-%28for-25%29?highlight=goslash27 Slashy did a lot of research on this stuff and his tips definitely work.

I think that (like OhioBob said) TWR is the key while designing a succesful Eve lander. If I may give a hint based on my experience, I made it just when I abandoned the idea of using aerospikes.

The option shows up in the autolanding UI, but you can edit it to show up wherever you want. Moreover, you do not need to switch on the autopilot for it to show up the nodes. You can then eyeball the correct Ap you want to obtain. The D/v you can read from the navball is the speed you will leave in the aerobrake.

You could try to give a go to the MechJeb "show aerobrake nodes" option. I used it with NEAR and it works properly so it should be good for FAR too.

The album refers to my K prize entry, there you can find the whole mission report too. It was not supposed to be a science gathering mission but just a capability demonstration flight so there isn't any scientific instrument actually installed. I used a rover of the same model in my Eve Rocks entry too (the Lvl 2 achievement mission - collecting an ocean sample).

Hi all, I will not enter the contest cause I am playing other games ATM, but usually for this kind of mission profile I use the hybrid design you can see below. It is "Duna capable" (and beyond) if you add a couple of radial chutes to the rover or if u use a para/tug rcs add on you can snap in the cargo bay.

Happened to me too. http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/97677-Tallest-VAB-ever The only weird thing about that is that I was running the same KSP instance for more than 24h and I left it idle for a while before the "event".

A large part of the "core" solutions are inspired by a Jool 5 ship I've seen many moons ago (I think it was Ziv's made, the one with the small 3fold landing chair on top). I just enlarged it using 3.75 parts and moar engines. I tried at first with a 90° oriented gear but during the testing stage I ended up with several broken engines, collapsing legs and funky take offs. They simply did not hold. 5° was enough to solve the problem. The small circle on top of the rover is indeed a jr. docking port. It is exactly on top of the CoM so it can be used with skycranes or with some other "modules" I designed to fit in a big cargo bay (extra tanks, science jr. and goo, chutes and whatever you may need). It serves also the "control from here" purpose during powered VTOL. It is on top of a FLT800 tank that serves as the main body of the rover and that is connected to the rear wheels. Then you have the batteries and RTGs you thought about, a couple of small SAS and the room for the scientific stuff. The bay can hold 50 m/s hits, so it serves as the "armor" too. And, usually it does not happen so often, but if you find yourself down under you can just open the bay and flip back on your wheels. Below a couple of pics of the rover with its "orbital wing".

It is. I did it for aestetichs cause I did not like the look of the first re entry module I used that you can see in my first mission pictures. If you want I can just put it on the "outside" like the nukes I put on the core. It does not affect performances and I've got the room to do it cause it fits in the same place the first one fitted before.

@hazard-ish That should work for sure, I've seen one before. http://i.imgur.com/egcMilM.jpg http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/49425-The-Eve-return-mission-is-too-tedious/page3

Hi all, my beta mission is finally over. I think I reached lvl 2 this time, with a small plus for visiting Gilly too. Ship data: 881 parts - 2459.020t - 1.541.345 funds (rover still operational on Eve's surface - mothership still in Eve's orbit with a lot of fuel left - small satellite in Gilly's orbit - 3 kerbs onboard - 1 landed @Eve) As usual this is just a sample of the pics, I have a whole set of all the steps if there is anything u need to have a closer look at. Laie asked me some more hints about the asymmetric mothership. Well, the concept comes from the souposphere itself. It behaves like a dense fluid so why not exploiting it with a "boat"? A sailing ship is the best example of unbiased asimmetry I can recall. So here I have a kind of "keel" (the reentry module - that I CAN redesign if you can not really stand that lonely clipped nuke) that needs a ballast on the other side. A slightly lighter and longer one (leverage ftw). So here you are with your beautiful command bridge. You just need to remember you must keep your ship with the correct attitude. It behaves like a kind of foil ship during aerobrakes. The lift provided by the crew cabin on the tail, even if really small compared to the total overall mass, keeps it en route w/o tailspinning. Moreover you can always count on the 200+ available torque force. Obviously it does not work properly if you snap on it really unbalanced loads, but I managed affordable configs with differences in the order of +/- 5t. I have tons of footage on it, just ask for anything you could be curious about. I designed a small 7t ion SSTO that can fit in the cargoes too cause I'll go to bother Ziv with my Jool 5 soon. [Edit] Now I just miss a good recon of the landing site before the main landing. Next time I will add some small recon rovers to fill in the gap, I have both the room and the boom. I will not bother you with that mission report too cause I do not think I will redesign the lander to reach Lvl 3 or higher. So that's it. Thank you for reading and enjoy the pics. [/Edit] Ascent (SAME LANDER AS FIRST MISSION)

Hi all, my beta mission is almost done. Just a few steps left. ATM I need to collect the ocean sample and I am omw with the rover. Here are a few pics. I did not drop the rover on Gilly cause it could be a) boring useless c) you might go to orbit with an easy jump. The ion lander performed as expected, it will be left in Eve's orbit with the mothership core (kinda like an escape boat for the unlucky one who will crew the refuelling station). The new descent module I used for the main lander (D-Block/LK inspired) performed really well, however there is still room for improvements. I tried a new landing spot around 2600m. I had an issue with the rover (flat tyre @ landing), tbh my landing speed was 5.9 m/s, I do not think this should happen. The ocean is +/- 80 Km eastbound I plan to find the time to finish the mission in a couple of days. Of course if you have any question just ask. I will not bother you with 40000000000 slides, so if there is anything you want to have a closer look at just let me know. I've got all that 4000000000 slides.

Did you try to "trick" the VAB simmetry while building this? I mean: did you build first one of the nacelles, adding engine legs and whatever using a dual simmetry, and just after that when it was ready you made it 3fold? (do not really know if this is clear but I experienced similar problems while building the legs of my Eve lander).

TBH I do not like shock cones. They are supposed to do the job twice as better compared to RAMs but I never had the same performances I was trying to match. Structural intakes OTOH work for me exactly how they are supposed to do like in the case below. (1 turbojet, 8 structural intakes and more or less the same performances you can have with 4 RAMs)

Hi, it seems to me that your approach is mainly correct. There are a few tricks you could use to squeeze out something more from jets (e.g. while building in the VAB putting first one single engine then all the intakes related to that single engine and so on). Usually to airhog my way to a 100Km Ap I need 4 ram intakes for each turbojet, the plane you can see in the pic below weights around 50t at take off. You could experiment with lift too. There are some wings that are simply better than others (wing strakes, old swept wings, structural type D). It seems to me that you want to ferry up some 2.5m tanks, you might want to wait till 0.90 to have (afaik) a bigger cargo bay that could hold that kind of component. I have seen many SSTOs that can bring up that kind of tanks but I never built one myself, you can look for some of them in the K-prize thread. Hope this can help.

Hi all, my mission is progressing toward the final "career" release. Now I am adding gadgets to the ship to maximize the amount of science I can get from the trip. Here you have a few pics of the new upgrades you can find listed below. - Command bridge - New main lander descent stage (doubled range and TWR) - VTOL manned rover (will of course stay on Eve and not be recovered, but not before paying a visit to Gilly too. This should be enough to gather the ocean sample) - Secondary pod ion lander (really oversize for Gilly but I use this design pretty often in my space program) - 5 crew re entry/living module - mothership pilons redesigned to act as an orbital refuelling station core after mission use - RCS tugs that will help recovering and docking the lander and the rover (one of them will be left in Gilly's orbit to act as a permanent "transmit science" sat cheat) Enjoy the pics and thank you for reading.

Ex alto Fulgur

Congrats to all the submission in this thread (and of course to MabDeno big time congrats). I tried myself (without submitting cause I was still far from anything good enough) so I know how hard it can be.

I never managed to pull out an aerospike design of matching size with the same Eve TWR of the skipper design I used for this challenge.

Hi, this is my entry. I do not really know all the sub categories I could fit in. The mission is a rover ride on Mun. The craft is full stock. Mods installed are MJ, KAC and EVE. The plane can carry in its bay several "extras" to dock with the lander/rover and the rover itself can have extra tanks that I omitted here due to the K prize rules. Any internal fuel transfer in this mission was CoM related and not intended to extend the real autonomy of the plane. About the mission profile, I went for a common SSTO ascent (45° till 15000m then building my speed up till 30000 or so, 45° again till a decent Ap and so on). Then after circularizing, the transfer burn to Mun. After a couple of parking maneuvers I dropped the rover on the surface and went for a good ride (Tatanka rovers fear nothing, they are a very fun ride). Got back to orbit, RV, docking and home. To discharge some fuel I went for a rocket braking instead of an aero one. Landing was difficult, the rover was wobbling with SAS on, but I did it. I need to rework something or concede and download KAS. Now enjoy the pics and thank you for reading. The plane - The mission -

We need MOAR pad.

Hi all, I did it. It is not classy nor flashy but it worked very well all the way and I even had a good margin. The lander can not do it from the sea level, but I landed @ around 4500m. The ship is completely stock. I run just a few visual or technical improvement mods (MJ, KAC, EVE). I would like to apologise in advance cause I completely forgot about the resource panel stuff. I still have all the quicksave files for the most meaningful moments so I can just have small remakes if needed. Version is 0.25. The pricetag of the mission is 1,371,958 Part count is 627 on ramp (133 struts, 3 MJs) Weight - 2299.458t On lift off at Eve: 225 parts (36 struts, 1 MJ) Weight - 123.616t (around 20t being legs and chutes jettisoned soon after take off) The mission profile was quite simple: take off, transfer, a small correction to have the right aerobraking, the aerobrake itself. The trickiest part was maybe the "landing injection". The descent module was the only really disappointing part of the thing cause it is too small and not really suited for what it needs to do. Next time I think I will design a bigger one that will include the legs and the chutes too. This time, to overcome the problem I made a large part of the deorbit burn with the mothership engines (that was still plenty of fuel and that eventually I left in LKO with some fuel left), then I dropped the lander on the correct way. Landing was easy to be honest. Just a few legs went OOO and their job was done anyway. The ascent was easier than I thought. I had a very good TWR all the way and I had some fuel left to RV with the mothership. A small EVA to get back to the return ship. At this point the mothership was supposed to be spent and left here. The module I brought has got around 4700 D/v so it should be enough to get back home by itself, but the mothership still had fuel, so I decided to bring it back home with me. It was not really intended to do it so I simply left it in LKO after the aerobrake. After undocking the reentry module I simply made my deorbit burn and I missed KSC by a few miles. The ship concept is a little bit on the "recycled" side: the lander was formerly a low tech Mun rocket and the mothership was made for a Jool 5 mission (that's why it is so full of useless crap). Now let's go with the pics. If you have any question feel free to ask and thank you for reading. ship data take off (yes, I know, too many) transfer, aerobrake Landing take off from Eve way back and Landing