FREEFALL1984

Fortunately (or unfortunately) for me I don't have to worry about debris because my computer is so slow I have to periodically purge the debris every few days to keep it all running smoothly kinda sucks though because when building big stations I have some terrible framerate issues, for instance I had to build a vessel in orbit at a mighty 3fps.... needless to say it took a long long time

When I did minmus using the same drop pod technique, I dumped almost all the drop pods more or less on the equator and drove out to the different biomes, then brought the science back to the nearest mini lifter for return to kerbin which wasn't really necessary since my mini lifters where grossly overpowered lol Also I worked against the rotation of minmus to maximize daylight hours and due to the fact that minmus is only tiny I farmed it for science in about 3 maybe 4 days and hit every biome. But when I sent replacement mini lifters to the mun for the mun phase of the mission however I placed them in the correct biomes and used them as waypoints since the mun is so much bigger (plus I couldn't be bothered to drive from equator to biome to equator again then back to biome repeatedly and old jeb was beginning to look a little homesick and more space crazy than usual)

Yeah its more a personal mission of mine in preparation and experimentation for future game updates when hopefully duna Eve and the other planets will have biomes added, I did use it on minmus and the mun in a single mission (hence my big heavy rover has 1km/s dV) as an experiment and I managed to get a whole bunch of science in one fell swoop although rather than docking my mini lifters to the main ship I just sent them straight back to kerbin individually.

I want to be able to take soil samples from all dunan biomes and return them to kerbin which wouldn't be possible with a single return pod, since each pod can only carry IIRC one of each experiment. Hence the need for a multitude of empty command pods. Also my rover will be manned but operatable by remote, and Jeb will be riding in my main lifter, meaning he can only perform science near the lifter until the rover comes to collect him, I don't fancy driving 5000km to collect jeb then turning around and driving off to find science. Also with regards to parachutes I have about a dozen radials and 3 XLs on my main lifter which weighs in at 15ton, and while my 10ton rover does have 4 xl chutes, it also has 4 rocket engines with about 1000dv and a kerbin TW of 1.5 and it flies like a dream so it can happily touch down unassisted if needs be My plan is to land my unmanned mini lifters at strategic locations around duna, which I can travel to in my rover and store experiments from the surrounding area, the mini lifters then return to orbit and either, refuel ready for their return trips or redock with a hub attachement on my tug and get dragged back to kerbin. each mini lifter will have command pod a materials bay, a goo tank, a thermometer and a barometer, and enough fuel to reach orbit and rendezvous with the main ship.

I am currently using MJ but in my current career, I haven't unlocked the accent/descent path guidance modules, So imma have to wing it, that said I recon once I get a feeling for the atmosphere I could kinda best guess the landing site. Also because I fully intend to get my ships back into orbit and like a nice margin of error, I think a dead stop is a little risky

I find them incredibly useful, for a big interplanetary mission here is my normal course of actions, first I launch an empty orange tank with RCS, and a command pod on the top, and a few docking ports. I get this thing into a stable and predictable orbit, and I launch my first mission ship, which has only empty fuel tanks (dropping the weight and reducing lifter requirements) I then dock this (and the core of the lifter with about half an orange of fuel remaining) and empty all the fuel into the "fuel station" then I deorbit the spare orange tanks reducing part count by a large margin. Then I launch the next ship, also empty, and repeat the process, then when the mission window comes near I simply transfer all the spare fuel which I have accumulated into the fuel station into the ships and assemble the ship ready for launch. This means I'm only lifting empty ships into orbit. So for instance if I need to launch a nuclear tug, which would normally weigh about 40t, I only have to lift 15tons and the fuel is transported up over 3 or 4 launches. which happens naturally due to my unnecessarily large margin of error lol

While its possible to have a figure of 8 shaped shaped free return trajectory it is really tough, this is because KSP works on a sphere of influence based system rather that true n-body physics which would take into account the moons influence even if you're simply in a parking orbit above the earth (wherever that place is) so as soon as you even begin to approach the moon the moons gravity starts to pull the orbit towards it allowing a nice gradual curve and a perfect figure of 8 shaped trajectory, the only way to do it now is to have the moons SOI effectively throw you around the back side of the mun, which means a very slow approach to the muns soi and a low pass across its surface (less than 10km) basically meaning you're actually treating it as two separate highly elliptical orbits. Hope that helped

So here's the situation, I have recently designed a craft to reap the sciencey benefits of a dunan landing on my currrent career, Its comprised of a nuclear tug, with about 8k DV unloaded, a 15 ton lander/lifter combination, and a 10 ton rover. my Dunan lifter has about 3k dV total and my rover is retrofitted with rockets for an assisted landing with a total of about 1050m/s dV, All these components are currently in orbit over kerbin waiting to be assembled. So here is my issues Firstly I have too many kerbals aboard my station, I have 1 in my rover, which I didn't even realize was aboard when I launched. I have 3 in my MK1-2 command pod, and I have Jeb in my dunan lander lifter waiting for the duna transfer window. My intention is to just send Jeb to duna, should I perhaps allow one of the kerbals to reenter kerbin with his EVA pack, or should I rescue him. Also I have since decided that I need more science. My rover has all the basic sci junior and goo, thermometer and barometer, same as my lander. problem is I only have a single pod with which to store the science gathered on my roving missions. as my rover itself will remain on the surface So I ask, how can I best retrieve science from Duna. and when I say retrieve, I mean for return to kerbin. My original thoughts where a fleet of unmanned mini rockets with enough DV to leave dunan sands and fly back to kerbin at every launch window Also can anyone suggest a good way to get my landing sites within a few KM of each other as I'm not looking forward to the drive lol

To the OP I dont want to sound harsh but I'm amazed you made it into an orbit to begin with. anyway, remember these rules. 1- low is fast, to catch up on a target, fly lower than it. 2- High is slow, to allow something to catch up on you, fly higher than it. 3- if you match the targets orbit, then you match the speed. 4- if you match the targets speed then you match its orbit. 5- Every time you burn the engines or RCS, you change your orbit, your ship traveling towards something is the result of the orbit passing the targets orbit, 6- moving around in space doesn't work in straight lines, everything is always bendy. 7- Never burn "towards" something, unless you're on a close approach to a target in which case use small RCS burns and don't loose track of your relative velocity. Also as mentioned before, just forget everything you ever saw on TV about travelling through space,

In my opinion the most efficient method would be to launch, perform a perfect gravity turn and keep burning horizontally to kerbin until your perfectly timed intercept. That would be the most time efficient (time in space, not time in waiting on the pad for the correct launch time) but it wouldn't be any more fuel efficient than entering a parking orbit and waiting for the right window.

I frequently slingshot out of kerbin SOI, with some precise node execution and some good timing, (making sure the moon will be traveling prograde or retrograde to kerbins orbit more or less when you hit the interplanetary launch window) can allow for the bulk of interplanetary transfer Dv to be saved and just requires a much larger corrective burn when in interplanetary space which if you master it, it will still only be a fraction of the DV required to perform a standard transfer,

Don't forget at any time during flight you can restage items in the staging bar, and/or activate components. It's how I created a perfect geosync satellite system.

I often make rovers from rolling command pods, since they tend to have far better power and traction than rover wheels although a little care is needed to not break the joints between components, the only minor issue with this idea is getting adequate power to the thing, especially since it'll be operating in the shadow of the asteroid. Also I'm not sure what you mean by "make it mainsail" since having any engines on it at all would prevent it from turning. Alternatively, if you have the inclination, attach two MK1-2 pods together with an FL-T800 tank between them and then attach lots of radially mounted liquid fueled engines in such a way that when throttled up, spin is generated forcing the "roller" under the roid. Although I feel that using a fuel tank with engines attached as a roller to lift and move a none uniform 100t roid is a little, risky and will likely result in a fiery death. Another out of the box suggestion would be to make an unmanned hydraulic lifter comprised of a small tank with about 12 heavy duty lander legs attached to both the top and bottom and some micro rover wheels attached to the bottom. the lifter then rolls underneath the lowest point of the roid and the gear deploys, this should give you about 4m of lift with enough power to start the ball rolling so to speak. if the roid is too heavy, simply lock up the suspension and it should either move, or destroy the lifter. Finally you could try creating a long bar of girders with a vast number of legs attached to the top along the front edge, then several dozen standard wheels on the bottom. the idea being that the suspension in the legs would prevent the weight of the whole roid being applied to a single component and would instead spread it across the weight of the pusher, which will prevent structural failure, then the large number of wheels would simply force the roid along the ground without even rolling it.

Could call it the lagmonster staging system - now with only 2 frames per second.

I'm assuming the journey between roid and base is mostly flat, if so you could make a rollers. This would consist of about a dozen MK1-2 command modules (for their high torque weight and impact resistance) connected together with ASAS units in between each one to form a long roller. Then at each end several dozen solar panels are attached to XL girders to provide power. You could also create a secondary slave roller from fuselage parts and sit it under the other side of the roid. now the powered roller simply slides under the far side of the roid and using its huge mass 54 tonnes + power supplies and its 364kn of torque it simply rolls the roid to wherever you want it.

I dont, I avoid SRBs at all costs since I find it makes my rockets borderline uncontrollable. Instead I use a single standard Jet engine attached to an FL-T200 tank with its oxidizer and most of the fuel removed and a single radial intake all attached to my rocket with a radial decoupler. About 12 of these will lift 180 tonnes up to 12km without any assistance from the engines at a leisurely 50m/s and when you jettison them they always fly outwards due to the drag caused by the intake. That makes it so that you're essentially lifting your launchpad up to 12km, so its almost like taking off from laythe

Since they have Ion engines why not try and get them on a kerbol escape. might have to leave it for a few hours but with a few lucky gravity assists its definitely possible

So I noticed that in Scott Manley's interstellar series even on the new videos, he is able to spam science on small probes which I believe is no longer possible without a crewed ship with a MSL on goo tanks or science jnrs, so I must conclude that he's either using an outdated version (I only started playing after the release of 0.23) or he's using a mod which allows the transmission and then repeated reuse of these apparatus. Can anyone advise?

Yeah, at first I thought we where comparing an orbital decent to a vertical descent, both with an applied suicide burn.

Yes, I suppose when you phrase it like that it does make sense to apply it to landings, but of course the effect would be minimal almost negligible on a very short, powerful burn.

But if you freefall to the surface and suicide burn until you land, is that not in fact a landing?

A 20m radius asteroid would weigh roughly 90000ton assuming a it was made from solid rock-like composition, unless it was made from packing foam or bubbles in which case it wouldn't survive the rigors of space. I personally think they should be given a zero gravity. by that I mean have ships and eva kerbals behave as though they where on a surface which includes the camera orientation dynamics, That way you would need to use RCS to stay on the "ground"

I use that technique on all small orbital bodies with low gravity and no atmo, if not for a more efficient landing then for a safe and more easily targeted one

Gravity drag isn't a force, of course gravity is, but gravity drag is simply a measurement of the reduction of net performance of a vessel from having to hold its own weight in a gravitational field. on a vessel which is in freefall there is no need for it to hold its own weight so the measurement which would be considered as gravity drag on a typical vertical accent is simply the increase in negative vertical speed due to gravity during a descent.

purely mathematically the Hohmann transfer to 0 alt then killing all velocity does make for the most efficient landing, (such as a horizontal landing on minmus ice and using wheel breaks and RCS downforce thrusters to stop) but then as everyone has mentioned, that's a very difficult thing to achieve. So often the best course of action is the easiest, even if it is a little more costly on fuel. In fact I'm gonna a horizontal landing on minmus as soon as I can, because it sounds really fun