cantab

In terms of the power of the new engines, sure, but I know they're superior to many older ones anyway.In terms of how easy or hard it makes the mission, no. You don't specify all the steps (which is fair enough), but I assume you had to wait for a launch window, set up the right ejection burn, do an aerocapture without either flying past or if you use Jool crashing, ensure an encounter with Laythe at some point, ensure none of Jool's other moons mess things up or compensate if they try to, and probably other things I've missed. Staging or not staging the launcher doesn't really matter in comparison. In short, I don't regard being able to use a single stage to get to any given place beyond LKO as making things too easy, because you've always got the greater challenges of interplanetary transfers and/or of making a powered landing.

I'm not sure what you're asking here. In terms of construction, if you want to dock two stacks parallel then this diagram shows what you need to accomplish: crude_diagram by cantab314, on Flickr There are two ways to do this. Simplest and most flexible would be to place the HubMax six-way connectors in the stacks. For a more streamlined option, take a fuel tank (or any stack that will be common between the core and all your likely boosters), attach docking ports radially near the top and bottom, and save it as a subassembly. Then always use that subassembly when you want the docking ports. For the actual docking, it's a bit trickier than normal docking since you need to match orientation so that both docking ports connect at the same time. (If one connects first, the other will not dock even if it comes close.) But it's entirely doable.

I don't know how it will affect the rosters, but you could stick them all in one ship, then go into the persistence file and change the ship type to Debris. Assuming you don't have unlimited persistent debris, they'll be "cleaned up" sooner or later.

The inferior Isp, flexibility, and maximum thrust compared to a cluster of 2-4 LV-T30's or T45's (And worse TWR than LV-T30's into the bargain.) I will grant that strutting the clusters is a nuisance though.I think the Skipper might be one of the few rocket engines I've never, or almost never, used actually. The others being the radial ant (I've looked, but just not found a ship that warrants it) and the new LFB (not got round to using it, and I find it kinda ugly).

Agreed. I'm left wondering why on Kerbin Squad made them massless in .23.5. They weren't in .23. I just threw together the same basic design: an OKTO2, the biggest RCS tank, and as many place-anywheres as I could fit on the bottom and 4-ways on the side without clipping. In .23 it got off the ground and climbed slowly and steadily, exhausting its fuel at around 1000 m. In .23.5 it went like a bat out of hell and reached over 25 km apoapsis.

Maybe, maybe not. I stubbornly insisted on using it on my Tycho launcher, and had a job making it work. I didn't use it on my Brunel launcher. It's not the LFB I see as killing the Mainsail though, but the KR-2L. It's better in pretty much every way except dimensions, and can be used in upper stages which is where the LFB falls down. And it looks gorgeous, whereas I find the LFB a bit nondescript.

Rocket SSTO to orbit has been simple enough for ages. I did it in the demo, and with a lousy ascent profile to boot. The ARM parts do increase the payload fractions and practical total payloads, but they don't make the basic concept any easier than it was.

I finally set up for the first part of the Smith 2's mission, the Mun flyby, but have discovered some oddities in the science transmission. Two 1x6 solar panels aren't enough to run the antenna at full power, so the transmission starts and stops. That's to be expected. If I do the transmission normally, I get messages about the data coming in dribs and drabs, fractions of a science point at a time turning to 0.0 science points at a time. If, however, I timewarp (not physics warp) right after hitting transmit, I still see the warnings about lack of power, but I just get one data message at the end. Importantly to this challenge, I get significantly more science by using the timewarp in this way. Something like twice as much with the gravity detector. The value with timewarp is the "intended value", the one I'd get without timewarping if I had enough power; I confirmed this by making a copy of my quicksave and hacking it to have more electricity. However, the lost science due to slow transmission may be intentional, or if not may be seen as deserved. Is it permissible for the challenge to use the timewarp to get the full science yield from the experiments?

Looks cracking, really nice design. And I think it's better with the panels, massless batteries seem a bit cheaty even if it is just how they are in the game. Out of interest, which batteries aren't massless? So I can pick them to make my ion craft if I do any "honest".

If you do want to track a load of asteroids, remember you can disable showing their orbits in the tracking station and map view, so you don't have so much clutter. Until you want to visit one, at least. And regarding impacts, well the only way to actually see it right to the ground is to send a ship to it and be flying that ship it as it enters the atmosphere. If you aren't flying something within 2.5 km of the asteroid, it will simply be destroyed "off-screen" when it gets below 20km or so just like any vessel - whether it's untracked, tracked, or even got your ship clawed to it with Jeb on board.

Closest thing would be my Smith 2, done for a cheap science challenge. Tiny little probe, stuck it on top of an S1 SRB, and wanted to avoid needing a reaction wheel. Tipped the booster over 5 degrees, and it just worked, flying by itself to a nice apoapsis.

If you were using FAR, it's not really valid with the stock aero. FAR makes it possible to reach LKO with less delta-V.

Jets use the same liquid fuel that rockets do, so you may as well stick with the regular tanks, especially considering one orange tank carries over ten times the fuel of any spaceplane fuselage, and because the fuselages are heavy a regular tank drained of oxidiser still offers better tankage than the Mk 1 fuselage and not far off the others.

Impressive work! I expected a few people to try ramming the asteroids, good to see someone's pulled it off.For my part, I spent literally hours last night and this evening planning one planetary transfer. I needed to leave LKO, pass the Mun, then reach Eve at exactly the right point on its orbit to use its gravity to match inclinations with Moho. Even with Precise Node and Alexmoon's planner, it was a tall order. And I still don't think I've got it quite right after all the effort.

The KR-2L is superior to the Mainsail in all respects but size. It's better than the /Skipper/ in many reasonable designs. The other new liquid engines do have the drawback that they can't have stuff below them, at least not without horrible kludges.

Perhaps less too strong and more not stiff enough.

And that's why science from Kerbin was banned :-P

This, so much this.I've also managed to remember the parachutes - just not enough of them. I've not yet deliberately left them off. Even on a ship like my Tycho 1 that I planned on not returning to Kerbin, I still need the chutes in case of an aborted launch.

Nice charts. I was thinking about this the other day actually. That 48-7S is everywhere, as is the Sepratron for low delta-V. Of course we have new engines, and also much bigger payloads in the form of E-class asteroids. I wonder if it would be worth making some sort of charts that take part count into consideration. Either just put a cap, or something like ">90% of optimal performance, minimum part count".

I believe asteroids have already been suggested. Other than that, full fuel tanks, at least at launch?

Well here's an arrangement I quickly knocked up. It's rough around the edges but worked. 37.5 MN of thrust under an 11.25 m wide rocket. The engine bases clip but not the bells, which I feel makes it less cheaty, and the engines don't overheat - one gets halfway, the others don't show any overheat bar. Looks-wise, of course, it's more akin to the Russian N-1. I think if you want Saturn V looks and Saturn V performance you'll have to turn to mod engines.

My asteroid tug is already lagging my PC, and its mission is just to deflect a class C a bit so it gets the right gravity assist. I fear if I want to do anything to an E class with any control I'll need a faster computer.

Just installed this after again experiencing the issue with being unable to set up nodes at most points on hyperbolic orbits. Excellent mod, set up my node just so, and more precisely than even the stock .23.5 editor could. Now to chase down that asteroid

We can already turn off fuel usage, and I believe part destruction on crashes. Things like life support would be reasonable extension. On the other hand, I feel that in a game like KSP the basic physics should not be player-selectable (aside from mods). If the stock aerodynamics get improved, I don't think there should be a button that says "use old aerodynamics". (There could, though, fairly be an option for NO aerodynamics, like we have an option for no gravity.)

I'd still need two docking ports on the drop tank, or else a claw on the tug. (I had the claw available for this actually, but started out doing the docking without it and decided to stubbornly persist.)