Norcalplanner

My vote is to ban them, but it needs to be done smartly. We need to be able to allow things like GPP, RO, MKS, and similar well-planned mods which include dependencies and optional extras (with the permission of the authors of the bundled mods) while preventing the sort of mod packs which create a lot of headaches for everyone.

I've never done anything nautical. No ships, no submarines, not even any float planes.

@Snark I totally agree. I didn't see where it was talking about Duna as a destination. One thing I would add is that lower orbits can result in greater steering losses unless the craft's TWR is high enough to complete the burn within an arc of 60 degrees or so. You can get around this by splitting the burn into multiple periapsis kicks, but that isn't everyone's cup of tea.

250 to 300 km is a great orbit for stations. High quality textures for Kerbin are unloaded around 165 km, more time warp options open up above 240 km, and 300 km is the ideal "gate orbit" altitude for beginning a trip to Jool.

Gotta go with the P-51, although the F-6F was a close second. Range of the P-51, combined with the high altitude combat capability, was game changing. Peace through superior aerodynamics and fuel economy FTW.

I actually did some runs with FAR installed, if you read through all of the posts in the thread I linked. For FAR, the only things I did differently were add some fins, and then with certain initial TWRs altering the ascent profile for a slightly more vertical launch (such as waiting for 10 m/s additional velocity before making the tip, or tipping one degree less).

Thanks for the clarification. I've changed the previous post.

I wanted to share that @JadeOfMaar suggested that installing the IntakeAtm config from the Mk2 Expansion mod might solve my problem with Karbonite and Kerbal R&D not playing nicely. I'm happy to report that it works! Many kudos!

What a difference one little patch makes. THANK YOU!!! With this change, I strongly suspect we'll be going to Tellumo sooner rather than later.

@JadeOfMaar Turns out I did try it, and it didn't work. Here's a screenshot of a new craft I just built with three regular air intakes. It's as if the IntakeAtm resource doesn't exist on Gael in my install.

Huh. I could have sworn that I tried that and it didn't work. I'll try it again.

I'd love to be able to do that, but unfortunately I can't get the scoops to provide any useable IntakeAtm for the Karbonite-powered jet or turbofans. I think it's a conflict with Kerbal R&D, but I haven't had any success so far in tracking down exactly what's happening. Right now, Kerbal R&D is worth far more to my exploration efforts, so it's staying in the mix.

I never got to Hale in OPM, but I did "land" on both Phobos and Deimos in RSS. The size of the calculated SOI for each of these moons was smaller than the orbital rounding errors for KSP at the time, so I'd have an intersection, then lose it, then have it again, then lose it for good. I learned to keep everything on rails until I was within a thousand kilometers or so, where it would finally hold an intercept. With Lili, it's all about minimizing the cost of orbital plane changes, which means I'm nearly always approaching it moving directly through the rings for a long period of time.

I'm not treating them as a navigation hazard. Lili is hard enough to get to already.

Here's the biggest one I have in my current save. Designated Vanguard Station, it's in LGO (low Gael orbit) in my GPP 3.2x career. Follow the link in my sig for more on this and the other stations I have going.

Looks like a good time to trot this out again: Gravity losses are an order of magnitude greater than aero losses for a properly streamlined rocket. Ignore the flames, but pay attention to the thermometer bars.

I too am having this problem, where none of the Karbonite engines which use IntakeAtm will work. I've been playing around with blacklisting different modules, but no dice so far. And unfortunately the old Karbonite thread was a casualty earlier this year.

Back when I ran a similar challenge in 1.0.5, it was a major accomplishment to get below 700 funds/ton, and only a few got below 600 funds/ton. It might be a good idea to take a look at those previous entries for design ideas.

So, just to make sure I'm understanding you correctly, would these sort of photos work for Thalia?

Chapter 18 - Niven Bound It's time for our intrepid adventurers to land on a planet which isn't trying quite as hard to kill them. With a Niven transfer window only three months away, the next target for manned interplanetary exploration beckons. But first, it's time to revisit some lander probes. The Hermes IV lander probe casts off from the probe mothership, and heads down to Thalia. The plan is to do a bit of biome hopping, collect some science, and see what sort of resources Thalia can offer. This upgraded lander probe features four of the small thermal control systems. Just about down. While thermal issues are taken care of, with this design, navigation left a bit to be desired. After hitting Thalia's Abyss, the probe was directed to another biome. Halfway through the maneuver, mission control realized that the probe could very well run out of fuel if it completed the hop, so the second biome was bypassed and the probe burned straight to orbit instead. The probe made it back with around 500 m/s to spare, and redocked with the mothership. Part of the problem is that the mothership is in a high orbit (approx. 700 km) to avoid being cooked by Thalia's radiation. Buoyed by the (somewhat limited) success of the probe landing on Thalia, the Hermes IIIf lander probe is sent down to a new biome on Icarus. The two small TCS parts seem adequate for this size of craft. The lander probe touches down in Icarus' Pearlescence, in the far northern latitudes, and grabs a lot of science. With a lot of fuel left, the probe is sent over to the Yellow Coral biome. [foreshadow mode on] Gee, I sure hope that big mountain over there right next to our projected landing site doesn't cause any problems. [foreshadow mode off] The lander touches down in the Yellow Coral, and gathers requisite science. Determined to make an efficient rendezvous with the mothership, mission control has MechJeb's SmartASS function lock in an intersecting bearing, at 30 degrees above the horizon. Determined to put the Ap at the An, mission control is focused on the map view during the ascent. Oops. The probe plows into the mountainside next to the landing area. No science for you. It didn't even have a chance to transmit copies of the science experiments so that orbital stations could chew on the data. Dangit. It's a good thing that KABOOM is rolling in dough. The Hermes V is quickly whipped up and sent skyward with a replacement lander. Because we have a contract for a rally including Ceti, Iota, and Icarus, the Hermes V is sent by Gael's moons, including a refueling stop at Sustainer Station, before departing Gael's environs. I'd also like to note the new skybox, courtesy of Galileo. Finally heading for Icarus. With the Niven window approaching, it's time to finalize the mission architecture. KABOOM's engineers spent a lot of time on this craft, but ultimately it was deemed too large and complicated. The final design chosen was a variant of the Tortuga Station, dubbed Gibraltar Station. It includes some arms to make docking a bit easier while the Karbonite collectors are deployed, as well as increase the station crew capacity to meet a contract requirement. Gibraltar Station was put into a 1,500 km orbit, in part to ensure better accuracy from the low-TWR transfer burn. The high orbit was also chosen to use up the remaining LFO in the upper stage so it could be discarded, thereby exposing the 2.5m docking port on the bottom of the station. A modified Bluebird is launched with the crew bound for Niven. This version of the Bluebird, fitted with landing legs and science gear, will serve as the lander for the Niven expedition. The Bluebird is also carrying a KPBS framework with two greenhouse modules and a bunch of fertilizer. Here it is approaching the station. Here it is in the final mated configuration. Not terribly elegant, but it should work. With Bob in overall command, the craft is sent off to Niven. KABOOM's administrators are feeling confident, and choose the Niven Program strategy. This dovetails nicely with other contracts to plant a flag on Niven, to build a space station around Niven, and to return to Gael after conducting a spacewalk in Niven orbit. At the tail end of the transfer window, KABOOM administration has second thoughts, and decides to send another craft to supplement Gibraltar Station. The Trey III is sent unmanned to help out Bob and crew. We'll cover this craft more in a future chapter. For now, let's just look at the pretty lighting and skybox. All throughout this time of exploration, KABOOM has had to shift its focus every 50 days or so back to the stations around Gael, Iota, and Ceti, as they churn away on science. It's ultimately deemed too distracting to run three stations simultaneously, so the decision is made to only keep Thunderer going in orbit around Ceti. However, it's getting low on supplies. The humorously-named Chuck Wagon is sent up to keep Thunderer humming along for the next few years. The portly supply craft approaches Thunderer and docks. The crew should be good for six more years, maybe more - it's hard to tell with the recyclers in play. Conqueror will be abandoned when it runs out of food in a few more months... in the next chapter.

Zuthal, I'm not sure anyone ever responded to this, so I'll take a crack at it. My rule of thumb is around 0.25 or 0.3 lever for 3.2x, and 0.5 or 0.6 for 6.4x. Your proposed 0.56 lever for 64K seems right on the money to me.

Glad you're enjoying it, comrade! Information is our friend.

I'm also going to throw in the mod angle - if you're running mods that are constantly throwing NREs, then your fps is going to tank HARD.

Chapter 17 - Our Heroes Return All of Gael is excited for the upcoming return of Jeb and Bill, fresh from their journey to the surface of Eta and (briefly) Thalia. Meanwhile, craft design for future missions is occupying a larger portion of KABOOM's engineering efforts. Jeb and Bill each take turns spacewalking in high Thalia orbit before departing. Bill finds himself asking the question "What would Bob do?" as he retrieves all the science results from the experiments attached to the Bacchus Packus. It was decided to leave the fuel tank portion of the BP attached to Tortuga Station to provide additional flexibility for future visits to Thalia's environs. The transfer window arrives, and Jeb cracks open the throttles again for a high energy transfer back to Gael. Here we see the Trey making its orbital insertion burn back at Gael. Since there are no parachutes or other dedicated landing gear on this craft, it has to wait in orbit briefly. A specialized ship launches to rendezvous with them. An empty Bluebird is launched into an orbit which is roughly coplanar with the Trey's orbit (about 35 degrees inclination). This carries a special cargo, in the form of an airbrake/parachute module to dock to the front of the Trey. Hopefully it will be enough - the engineers took a WAG (Wild A$$ Guess) at how many brakes and chutes would be needed. Rendezvous and docking went smoothly. The Bluebird heads over to Vanguard Station for safekeeping, and the Trey heads down, after shifting around some fuel to lower the center of gravity on the craft. Reentry and landing were by the book, and capped off a fairly successful mission. The upgraded heat tolerance of most parts (to face the wrath of Thalia) combined with burning a lot of fuel during reentry meant that all the parts survived just fine. Three airbrakes, three drogue chutes, and six radial chutes were enough to slow the Trey down to 7 m/s, and a short burst of the engines brought the final descent down to less than 2 m/s. Many colorful ribbons are awarded, courtesy of Final Frontier. Lots of firsts for this crew. A parade occurred in some unnamed city located somewhere on the planet. Maybe we'll see it someday after somebody finishes city lighting in the next release. After a short respite, Jeb and Bill are thrown back into the mix, helping refine craft designs for upcoming Niven and Tellumo missions. Test pilot Burwell Kerman and the rest of the engineering staff had been doing their best, but the results were, shall we say, mixed at best. This spaceplane design featured three 1.25m cores, with one Rapier and two LV-Ns. Piloted by Burwell, the craft did OK (not great) on the ascent, but then became totally uncontrollable during reentry. After multiple failures and near-death experiences, Bill and Jeb's return to the program was quite welcome. After Bill made the decision to increase the center core to 2.5m, everything got much better. Here's the unimaginatively named Tellumo Flyer 4 heading back to KSC after a single orbit. The design now has two Rapiers. The Flyer overshot KSC, and had to turn around to approach the runway from the east. Heavy cloud cover near KSC made the approach a bit exciting, especially given the presence of the volcano nearby - the top of the volcano has a bad habit of hiding in the clouds. After landing roughly and careening off the side of the runway, the plane comes to rest facing east-ish. Now the spaceplane design shows its party trick: the atmospheric scoops are opened and set to collect Karbonite; the 2.5m Karbelectric generator fires up to provide copious power; and the 2.5m Karbonite converter switches on to refill all the LF and LFO storage on board. Karbonite harvesting is shut down so that the Karbonite tank is empty (or nearly so) for takeoff. As soon as it's airborne, the Karbonite filters are activated again, and the Karbonite converter changes Karbonite to LF on the fly (ba-dum) during the ascent. The Flyer takes off again and makes another orbit before returning to KSC. It spent a bit of fuel burning normal and anti-normal before reentry to lighten the load somewhat. The design currently achieves orbit with around 7 km/s left in the tank, which makes me cautiously optimistic that the design will work at Tellumo (which requires 11 km/s for an ascent in 3.2x). It's a nice view of the Flyer rounding the volcano and heading for KSC, as sunset approaches. On final. Hopefully we'll stay on the runway this time. Jeb poses on top of the Flyer, landed in the middle of the runway, in the dying light of the day. Good landing, Jeb. Bill also tasked his team with figuring out how best to use the Karborundum that would be arriving back at Gael soon. Here's one of their concepts about to be lofted by a single SpaceY SRB. The payload is a self-contained engine module capable of docking to the back of any ship with a docking port on the rear centerline. Early calculations indicate that one of these modules would more than double the thrust of a ship like the Trey, while adding more than 10 km/s of additional delta V. We'll see if this ends up being the final design... in a future chapter.

It can also be helpful to have satellites in LGO which are coplanar with Ceti and Iota. I use the "plane" icon for those two satellites - it's a bit of an orbital mechanics pun.