TrooperCooper

The experiment pods arrived at the Prometheus II in Minmus orbit. I had to realize that I need a 2nd cyclotron to run the excentric quark experiment, so an additional module had to be brought as well... Later on, I designed and launched an improved Karbonite Karvester with a much higher capacity than my previous one. After arriving at Minmus, it gathered 100k units of fuel from the surface and lifted it up to the Prometheus II... Then the science ship left the small moon, heading back to Kerbin to be decommissioned... A small passenger ship with four empty seats was launched... Which picked up the crew of the Prometheus after its arrival in LKO... and returned them together with the scientific data...

The Prometheus accelerated out of Kerbins low orbit... ...and arrived at Minmus one day later. Jeb went on EVA to board the lander-craft... ...and leave the mothership. Descending towards the surface... ...to plant the 2nd Minmus-flag during this career. A few hours later, Jeb met up with the mothership again. Docking the lander requires some precision... But for Jeb, thats not really a challenge... Afterwards, he had to tie the lander with struts into a fixed position... And then get back aboard the huge Prometheus ship... ...which was refueled later on by the Karvester... Next up will be the delivery of the science pods for station science at Minmus...

Death to all Goons!

Launched the TCI Prometheus II... The 2 million Kredit ship is designed as a long-term exploration and science vessel, featuring all kinds of experiments and station science laboratories and equipment. Once fueled up, it has a range of more than 6k dV and its TAC Life Support systems can keep the standard crew of four Kerbals alive for eleven years before it needs to be resupplied. At the tail end, between the four Kerbodyne main engines, the Prometheus has its own landing craft mounted up. The lander has 5k dV by itself and should be able to land on any orbital body except for Tylo and Eve. Laythe might be possible, but would have to be tested. The lander also has life support to keep the piloting Kerbal alive for two years... The Prometheus is now preparing for a first test-run to Minmus, where it will also be fueled up and run the first set of station science experiments...

Not sure if its your sepratrons firing into the tank and blowing it up (might want to try repositioning them so their exhaust doesnt hit the tank) or if it is a collision problem... The Kerbodine liquid booster engine you are using in the center is actually a little wider than 2.5 meters iirc. I havent used it for a while, but when I did, I had similar problems. A few things to avoid those collisions... 1.) Make sure you are going straight up when decoupling the SRBs. Else you will clip into the SRBs which are not accelerated into the same direction as your craft anymore. Sepratrons can help with this, but even with them in effect, tilting increases the chance of a collision, since the distance between the SRB and the sticking out engine is very narrow. 2.) Using the TT-70 Radial Decoupler, which mounts the SRB further away from your craft can reduce the problem as well, but I see you are using those already. 3.) Ultimately, what I considered as mandatory when using that main engine plus radial SRBs was to mount the boosters higher up. By making sure the bottom end of your SRB is about half a tank length away from the top end of the engine, it gives the sepratrons more time to accelerate the booster radially away while it is travelling downwards relative to your craft at the same time before it passes the engine. I usually just had a small tank between engine and bottom end of SRBs. See the two pics below...

Yeah... higher time warp and a cryo-sleep chamber for the Kerbals... or a multi-generation setup.

TBH, I am somewhat glad to be amongst one of the last generations that can still drink, listen to music, smoke and enjoy trans-gender intercourse.... Then again, I might think differently when I get older. And of course I also wouldnt mind a few robotic slaves.

Refueled my Duna XPress ship in LKO. When the transfer window came up, Jebediah launched from the KSC in a small rocket... Just 13 minutes after take off, he had his rendezvousz with the Duna XPress and went on board... Leaving Kerbin for the first manned interplanetary mission in this campaign... Two month later: arriving at the red planet. Everything worked well so far... Jebediah collecting scientific data from the external instruments and experiments in a low orbit. As I began with the preparations for a landing, I had to realize that the central decoupler did not work. Wether it was due to a bug or an accidental clipping during designing the ship remained unclear. But it dawned on me, that my whole mission concept was flawed. I now had the choice between either aborting and heading home without a landing... or to land the whole ship including the travel-stage and then maybe send a rescue mission. After checking the upcoming transfer-windows and calculating the life support consumption untill help could arrive, I transferred fuel from the lander-stage to the travel-stage and decided to risk it. The large ship decended towards the surface while I hoped the atmosphere wouldnt rip it apart and I would have enough control authority and TWR to get down in one piece... Shortly before touch-down... After the successfull landing, Jebediah kissed the ground in relief... ...and rightfully planted the first flag on the surface. Whether or not he would get back home alive was to be seen... A rescue-ship was designed and launched from the KSC... The automated ship arriving at Duna and coming in for an aero-brake maneuver... After a few aero-brake passes, the upper stage approached the landing-site and released the actual lander and return-ship... ...which was put down about 300 meters from Jebs vessel... Close enough for him to jetpack-hop over to it. Just in case further unforseen problems would arrise, he stored all gathered samples and scientific data in the return-ship already, since that was automated and could return on its own in case Jeb would pass away before the next transfer-window... Then Jeb crawled back into his malfunctioned ship, relying on its life support ammounts (the rescue ship only has enough for the return trip). And he is now waiting for the next celestial constellation that would hopefully allow him to get back home alive... In the meantime, the LKO-science station ran out of supplies and so I had to send a pre-designed freighter there... Fresh burgers incoming for all the scientists...

Yup, that fixed it. 1.25 nodes are there now. Thanks.

I play with to many mods to give balance-sensitive advice. But... something tells me that when you say you are "high in the tech tree" and are unable to make a profit from orbital and sub-orbital contracts, your designs must be seriously flawed. Maybe post some pictures with profit-orientated designs for part-testing contracts, including dV stats and staging (Kerbal Engineer ftw) so others can take a look.

What happens when your passenger submarine hits a whale under water at supersonic speed?

Signed!

Not just today, but over the last few days... Started running experiments at my LKO science station... Launched a long range probe to explore the sun of the Kerbol-System... It got really hot. Waste heat bar was filled pretty quick. But for some reason that did not have a negative effect on the craft... Next up I launched an orbital IR-telescope for deep space observations. Then Bill launched in his funny shaped rocket... ...to land on Minmus. Which he did. Followed by multiple hops into several biomes... The Minmus mission gave me enough science to unlock the parts neccessary to experiment with the Karbonite stuff. So I launched my first orbital harvester and refinery into space. Deployed in a very low orbit, it will slowly generate the fuel needed in upcoming operations... Next up I started to prepare for a Duna mission again. Launched the package into orbit. Though not crewed yet, as I wasnt sure it would work and the transfer window is also a bit further down the road still... Disembarking from the lifter and circularizing into orbit on Poodle engines... Now waiting for a refuel tanker and the crew...

I been playing with this for a while now. And it makes progression quite intresting. However, I am wondering if this is working as intended... some (just a few) nodes appear to be empty. A few others had parts in them but costed me zero science to unlock. Bug? Or did I mess something up during installation? Also, despite beeing fairly advanced in the tree now, I am still missing some 1.25 meters tank in a long version. I only have the shorts. Not a big issue, but it makes me wonder if I am missing some other parts in the tree as well maybe...

Completed my science station in LKO.

Needs more struts.

Woot! Thanks so much, cybutek!

[ and ] hotkeys to cycle through the active "ships" (including Kerbals) within control range.

Here is some free HARM for you! EDIT: sniped

This looks nice. Going to try it today. If my comp and my brain can handle all the mods.

You enter the atmosphere, you got to deal with drag. It slows you down, which is why your Periapsis decreased. At the same time, depending on aerodynamics of your craft, the atmospheric stream generates lift, which carries you upwards and raises your apoapsis. Happens to me regularly when aerobraking, especially in spaceplanes for obvious reason. Though, I use FAR and I m not sure how much this experience can be transfered to stock aerodynamics... It can even be observed during the ascend into LKO with a plane, AFTER switching off all engines and just gliding upwards... apoapsis rises, periapsis decreases...