purpleivan

Unhooking the AGU to allow the tanker to go fill up the fuel transfer vehicle before sending it into orbit caused the Minmus mining teams all kinds of problems.

Ah yes... a random asteroid now. A shame really as I was looking forward to chasing down this thing by eyeballing it from the surface then just launching at it.

Part 3 "Nothing like a run under the stars to get your mind working overtime" - Erlin Kerman - 06 Seeing red - 1st trip to Duna With the Mun and now Minmus under their belt, and a growing space station in Kerbin orbit the KSP felt it was time to be ambitious... a lot more ambitious. So the decision was made to launch their first true interplanetary mission, with an expedition to Duna. Duna had long taunted their green/blue world with its vivid redness, a factor almost as great in choosing it as their first interplanetary target as the fact that it was the easiest to get to. The Duna Explorer lander and transfer vehicles were dispatched to the KOS (Kerbin Orbital Station) on separate launchers and rendezvoused there to be filled with fuel then docked together, before embarking taking a new pilot Herman Kerman and Bob Kerman on an even longer trip than the recent excursion to Minmus. After a journey of 270 days the Duna Explorer arrived at the red planet, only to discover that "some bozo" (Bob's words) had only calculated the fuel required for the outward trip, so the pair arrived their with almost empty tanks. To fix this another transfer vehicle was dispatched to Duna, which would provide sufficient fuel for both the landing and the trip home. Some condiderable thumb twiddling later, the new transfer vehicle arrived at Duna and after undocking from the first, now empty, transfer vehicle, the lander Duna XL rendezvoused with its replacement. This new vehicle being was fat with precious fuel (plus a topping up supply of snacks) was a welcome sight for Jeb and Bob . Once refueled, Duna XL undocked and headed for the surface. After a parachute assisted landing and the dust clearing from a quick burst of the engines just prior to landing, the crew of Duna XL looked out over the surface of this strange red world through the navigation window of their Mk2 Lander Can. Once all systems had been checked and made safe in case of the need for an emergency lift off, the crew exited the lander and descended to the surface, where they planted the space program's flag in the ochre coloured dust of Duna. Once Bob had completed his scientific observations and collected samples of the surface dust and rocks. Herman and Bob returned to the Duna XL and made a rapid ascent to rejoin its transfer vehicle in orbit. Once docked, the crew hunkered down waiting for the launch window back to Kerbin, for them to light up the engines of the transfer vehicle. After the burn was complete, the crew took their last pictures from the navigation window, of the red world they were leaving behind. Its work complete, the Duna XL detached from its transfer vehicle before making its insertion burn, eventually rendezvousing again with KOS after its long journey. Later they returned to the surface to reunite with friends, colleagues and family, not forgetting that "bozo" from the fuel management team that the pair wanted to have a quiet word with in a darkened part of the KSC. 08: Open to the public Kerbin orbit was rapidly becoming a busy place, with the expansion work taking place on the KOS as well as more flights being made to the Mun and Minmus. This drove an expansion of the fuel storage capability of the KOS, which gave the management of the KSP the bright idea of getting into the space tourism business. With such fervent interest in their activities and a large number of well heeled potential clients chomping at the bit to get into space, it wasn't long before their first paying passenger was being launched to the KOS for a short stay in LKO. Jeb was at first stridently opposed to this venture, stating that "space is for kerbonauts, not a bunch of frappuccino drinking CEO's" but after being reminded that as a founder member of the program, he was due a cut of those "sweet, sweet, space tourism funds" he soon changed his tune, followed shortly after by his car house and wardrobe. In addition to the improvement in his own finances, Jeb was pleased to hear that all that tourism cash would help to fund flights to the more distant parts of the solar system. 09 Everybody loves Dres For their next mission, the KSP set its sights on Dres; a rather dreary looking little world could be seen through Kerbin's telescopes, but it was chosen nevertheless. A daytime launch from KSC in glorious sunshine was the perfect start to what was to become a chaotic mission, due to its use of the new AGU grabber unit as the core of the program's new transfer vehicle configuration; Propulsion Utilising Linear Linkage (PULL). This placed the transfer vehicle in front of the lander, which was dragged to its destination. This was found it to be a seriously flawed design and after a troublesome burn for Dres was abandoned before leaving Kerbin SOI, in favour of launching a supply vessel to meet with the lander and refuel it, before its descent to the surface. After arriving in Duna orbit and refueling the lander was completed. the crew of Bill, Erlin and Henmal Kerman made their way down to the surface in a mostly uneventful journey, except for a brief moment of panic when it appeared that it was approaching the surface at too high a speed, however the engines at full thrust averted disaster at the last second. Once on the surface the crew left their vehicle to examine the surface and take samples for further analysis. Erlin, a keen runner, also tested it's potential as the location of an extreme marathon race. He believed its grey solitude would be the perfect place for the more philosophical runner to consider there place in the universe. However the low gravity and dusty surface, made for poor running conditions, so the idea was quietly shelved, along with his flight status for a few months. With science and fun and games over with, the lander made its way back into orbit, for a reunion with the supply ship to top up with fuel before the trip back to Kerbin. On its return the capsule streaked across the the dawn skies of Kerbin's the southern oceans, before drifting gently to a touchdown on land.

"All the better to see you with"

The Ike mining team sent one of the tugs that was sitting in orbit, waiting for the launch window back to Kerbin, to the North pole to check the skies for signs of a possible return of the Magic Boulder. So far nothing to report.

Cheers for the quick info on that. Looking forward to more IVA fun in 0.27.0

I used RPM for the first time yesterday (launch, docking with a target vehicle and return to Kerbin) and came across an issue that I assume is due to a mistake I made, rather than a bug and thought I'd ask here if anyone has experienced anything similar and had a solution for it. The issue was that that after undocking (I had to exit IVA at to do this to use the right click menu on the docking port) I found that all the readouts of orbital parameters, current altitude etc. even the information on the docking camera screen were showing information as if I had not undocked. As I moved away from the target vehicle and went through the re-entry, the altitude readout for example stuck stubbornly to the 250km orbit of the target vehicle rather than decreasing as I descended. If anyone knows what I might have done wrong, or alternately if this might be a known issue (I've read a few recent references to RPM having some issues post undocking) a nudge in the right direction would be much appreciated. Here's a couple of images to help illustrate what I experienced. In orbit after undocking. During re-entry This only affected the numerical readouts and not the navball, which functioned normally.

Flew my first IVA mission with launch, docking with a target vehicle and re-entry. Almost two years of playing KSP and it's the first time I've thought to do this, but I think there'll be more of this for me in the future, especially for docking.

Slamming big vehicles into an atmosphere can be a lot of fun and a challenge too. Something of mine from back in the days when you could throw anything at re-entry and it would survive, no heat shields required.

I blew up stuff (in a good cause). All credit to Xaiier's "Time Control" plugin.

Time for weapons grade fireworks. From Bill's photographic series Day of Destruction

Ermmm.... something arty about... er... contrast and his place in the universe. Who can tell

It is a little known fact that Bill has an artistic side, specifically photography. With an unexpected end of budget surplus burning a hole in their pockets, the people at the KSC decided to spend all of it on supporting Bill in his artistic pursuits. With this financing he was able to achieve his long held dream of creating photographic composition series titled.. Day of Destruction The Beginning Clouds of Thunder Man on Fire Sunshine Battlefield Home Inspiration Cloaked in Darkness Tanks for the Memory Clearing Skies Fragments Dawn of the New Age

Part 2 "For a moment I thought he had bought it" - Bill Kerman - 04 A roving we will go Having made a it successfully to the Mun and back on their first attempt, the KSP decided on an all round upgrade to the package that they would send to there next. The first change was to use a single vehicle to travel from Kerbin to the Mun and back, as Jeb had been complaining that docking was "sooo booorrring". The seconds was to equip the it with a rover, so that the kerbonauts could travel further from their landing site. Having made it to Mun orbit, the only thing left to do was to land. As Jeb had come close to depleting the descent stage of the lander on his previous trip to Mun, he decided to leave kill a lot of his speed very late in the descent, something which caused Bob to get more than a little anxious. However he needn't have worried, as Jeb brought the vehicle down to a smooth touchdown, not far from the 1st landing site. As Jeb had encountered difficulties with the flag (he claimed it had been packed backwards) he decided not bother placing one this trip, also he was eager to get his hands on his new toy, the Mun rover. With the little four wheeled vehicle disconnected from their spacecraft, the two of them set out across the dusty surface, a big plume of which was kicked up as Jeb floored it pulling away from their landing site. Bob started to get the jitters and told Jeb that just because he was a pilot, didn't mean that he had to get airborne, something that was highly likely with the combination of rough terrain and low gravity. Jeb's response was to aim the rover for the nearest hump in the ground, to send it a good metre or so into the air. After a short but bumpy ride they arrived at Jeb's previous landing site. Bob had given Bill instructions to Bob to retrieve some parts from the descent stage that had been left there, to see how extended exposure to Mun conditions had affected them. While he did this, Jeb went over to the flag he had placed a few weeks earlier. To his suprise he found that the Kerbal Space Program logo was now the right way round. He then quickly darted his gaze from horizon to horizon, looking for someone how might have switched it round and muttered something about aliens. The parts collected from the lander, the pair set off back to their own vehicle, with Jeb avoiding more of the bumps than on the outward leg of their journey, much to Bil's appreciation. On arrival back at their own landing site, Bill hopped off the rover, while Jeb parked it a short distance from their spacecraft before joining his crewmate in ascending the ladder to their Mk2 Lander Can. A short time later Jeb fired the three Terrier engines to bring them up into Mun orbit, then an orbit later back to Kerbin. 05 Early station building Before their 1st expedition to the Mun, the KSP had started construction of an orbital outpost, some 80km above the surface of Kerbin, high enough to avoid its upper atmosphere, but close enough to minimse the effort to launch modules to it. The first few visiting crews were launched with an obscene amount of monopropellant, due to the difficulties their pilots were having in docking with the station. This was later reduced, as the pilots became more experienced in art of docking. Originally the station was nothing more than a single habitation module, plus a small fairly small fuel storage tank, included as a precaution against visiting crews being stranded by using all their fuel on the way to it. Later the expansion of the station was mostly in the form of even more fuel, much more, several bright orange Rockomax Jumbo-64's being lofted to it over several flights. Some complaints were made in the press about all that fuel being hoisted up there and no use being made of it. The KSP did have plans for it, but was keeping its cards close to it's chest with these. So to assuage the press they sent up the new PPD-12 Cupola module, that gave a great view from the station, much more so than the little portholes on the habitation module. This allowed them to get some great photos to hand to the press as something shiny to splash on their front pages, although there was some embarrasment later, when it was found that some of the photos included post-it-notes that kerbonauts were in the habit of leaving in their modules, some of which didn't show the KSP and its crews, to be the slick organised outfit they presented themselves as. 06 A trip to the big cheese Having conquered the Mun (if two landings counts as conquering) the KSP set their sights on its little brother Minmus. For this trip a new vehicle configuration was put together, that made use of the trusty "Terrier" engines attached to a vehicle that serve as both lander and a return vehicle to Kerbin. However instead of using these engines as the means to propel the spacecraft to Minmus, a large fuel stage with a suitable large "Skipper" engine attached to it (previously only used in launcher stages to Kerbin orbit) was used instead. As the vehicle arrived in Minmus orbit with a large part of the transit stages' fuel remaining, it was decided to use that big engine for most of the descent to the surface, to preserve as much fuel as possible on the lander for the return to orbit and later back to Kerbin. Jeb, accompanied this time once more by Bob, used that big engine to ease the vehicle down towards the surface. With so much fuel thrust at his disposal, Jeb was tempted to "gun it for the horizon and see what happened", but thankfully he decided to follow the mission plan and continue the descent towards the pale green surface. With less than 100m to go before arriving on the surface, the Skipper stage was detached and the four engines of the lander brought to life, to slow the vehicles for the final part of the descent. The detached stage drifted down towards the surface, to be greeted not by firery explosive death, but a dull thud (if one could be heard) much to Jeb's annoyance, who had been looking forward to a good fireworks display. With landing achieved, the only thing left to do was to head out the hatch and check out what this little green world had to offer. In short, it offered massive jumps. Both Jeb and Bill entertained themselves for far more time than the controllers back at KSC were happy with, bouncing up and down in the very low gravity of the strange green moon. Given the low gravity that they encountered here, Jeb decided to use his jetpack to propel himself a couple of kilometres west to a large flat area of terrain that they had spotted on the way down to the surface, unfortunately for him, he uncharacteristically misjudged the speed he was moving at across the surface when he came back in contact with it, following his 2km hop. The result was a long and painfull roll across the green terrain, before coming to rest just before reaching the flat area that had been his goal. Bob set off after him, also using his jetpack, but making sure to check his speed before dropping back onto the surface a short distance from his stricken crewmate. At first Bob for horrified to see the tangled mess that his buddy was lying in, but when Jeb muttered something unprintable about punching the jetpack's designer in a sensitve spot, he realsied that the crumpled heap on the floor was alive at least. A moment later Jeb sprang back to his feet as if nothing had happened and asked "Ok, what's next". Bob was a little surprised at Jeb's miraculous powers of recovery and stuttered something about "well, we could look at that I guess", pointing at the rich green flat area ahead of them. After staring out at the flat area for a while, the two ventured down to it, to check if it was solid or liquid. After a few tentative steps, followed by some less tentative jumping around, it was decided that the flat area was in fact solid. This valuable scientific nugget now in their possession, the pair jet packed back to the lander before returning to orbit. In a break with previous missions, instead of bring the craft directly back to a re-entry into Kerbin's atmosphere, Jeb piloted it to a rendezvous with the space station, officially titled KOS (Kerbin Orbital Station) but known as "the pit stop" to the crew that used it. This would allow the lander to be refueled ready for a future crew to make use of. After a short break on the station after journey, the two crew returned to Kerbin using another vehicle that was equipped for re-entry.

Here's a quick cinematic that I put together as an e-card for my nephew's birthday. All credit to Xaiier's "Time Control" plugin.

Part 1: Mun Orbit - Testing the Mun machines - Mun landing for real this time Part 2: A roving we will go - Early station building - A trip to the big cheese Part 3: Seeing Red - Open to the public - Everybody loves Dres Part 4: What's that burning - Far flung Eeloo - Learning the base hics Part 5: Anomalous readings Part 6: Bridge to nowhere Part 7: Monalitha Part 1 "I was never worried, not for one moment" - Jeb Kerman - 01 Mun Orbit This was the first manned flight beyond beyond LKO and carried Jeb Bob and Bill on a single orbit around the Mun before returning to Kerbin. Although there were no hitches reported with the mission, there are few images from this early flight. 02 Testing the Mun machines Immediately following the Mun orbital mission, a command module with lander configuration, was launched, in order to test out approach and docking in the relative safety of low Kerbin orbit. Making good use of their newly acquired docking skills (as in this was the first time they'd tried to do it) an age was spent approaching one vehicle with the other and eventually docking, only to the undock and do the whole thing again, while with the other vehicle being the target. After a few successful (if long winded) cycles of approach and docking, the crew transferred from the lander by EvA'ing (this was in the days before a more high tech solution was developed for this) to the command module before re-entry and a return to the clear blue skies of Kerbin. 03 Mun landing for real this time After the practice missions in Kerbin and Mun orbit, it was finally time to take a crack at a manned landing on the Mun. After an uneventful trip to Mun orbit, the next step was to get the crew over to the lander. Again it was time for a little space walking, for the the intrepid pair of Jeb and Bob. With that done it was time to detach the lander and head for the surface. As this was the first attempt at this, it wasn't known how much fuel this was going to use, so the plan was head was a landing and if the descent stage ran out on the way down, to detach it and head back to orbit (hopefully) using the ascent stage. Fortunately this abort measure back to orbit wasn't necessary, although the descent stage only had about 5% fuel remaining on touchdown. Following the nerve wracking first landing on a body other than Kerbin, Jeb took to the ladder of the lander to descend to the surface, pausing momentarily at the foot of it, to think of something momentous to say when stepping onto the surface. However with nothing coming to mind (he's a do'er rather than a talker) he leapt of the ladder and planted the first pair of Kerbal boots on the Mun. Shortly after Bob joined him on the surface and Jeb erected the flag, only to find that some idiot had packed the flag backwards. After experimenting with moving around in the low gravity of the Mun (ok... havng fun jumping around) Jeb and Bob returned to the lander, Bob grabbing a few rocks to make a few bucks... er, for scientific study before he did so. With the pair safely inside, the ascent stage engine was fired to carry them back into orbit, for a rendezvous with Bill in the command module. With docking made, the lander's engine was fired up to start the burn back Kerbin and when the fuel in that was depleted, the docked vehicles were swung around to complete the burn with the command module engine. It was later noted that detaching the lander before firing up the command module engine would have been a lot more efficient, but the guys in mission control were too busy partying, so didn't get around to giving the crew the instruction to detach. Finally after many hours traveling back to Kerbin, the capsule was detached from the rest of the vehicle before re-entry was made, followed by a splash down in the seas of Kerbin, some distance east of the KSC.

I've only had to get out and push once, when returning from the Mun in an entry for a challenge "Mun Landing Endeavor". Fortunately I had a lot of kerbals to choose from.

Here's its big brother.

Sent my mining fleet (mining base, orbital fuel station, transfer vehicle and a probe) off to Ike, after refueling the bigger vehicles at Minmus (probe sent directly from Kerbin).

A good documentary I saw recently was "Last Man on the Moon" which centers around Gene Cernan's experiences in the Gemini and Apollo programs. Additionally I'd recommend "For All Mankind" about the Apollo program and "To Mars By A Bomb" that reveals a lot of interesting information about the abandoned Project Orion. Another one that is pretty good is "Red Star in Orbit" about the soviet space program, based on James Oberg's book.

Or alternatively bring them down in style.

A science station headed for Kerbin orbit. Science station with recently added re-entry pod cluster. "Really! They filled all the snack lockers with silly string and shaving foam. Come up and take a look"

I think the most satisfying things I've done have been the techniques/fixes/lucky breaks that I've used to save missions from failure. A good example was yesterday when I was sending up a cluster of re-entry pods to a station in Kerbin orbit, only to realise that I'd forgotten to put solar panels onto it, so had to hang on the last launcher stage (the engine of which generated electricity), rather than dumping it once it was almost empty to use the much smaller final stage to rendezvous with the station. A whole bunch of little burns and counter burns later, to generate power, I was ready to throw my pod cluster towards the station (I was using a grabber instead of a docking port for simplicity), but with only a few units of electricity left, that were soon gobbled up by the the probe core and the reaction wheel, I had to move and turn the station (thankfully a small one) to get it into position for the approaching, out of power, pod cluster to hit it and grab on. Fun times.

I've returned kerbals from the surface of all bodies in the system (excluding Jool of course), skimmed by the surface of the sun at 94km/s, completed the Jool 5 challenge and visited all the anomalies (the ones that can still be visited anyway). I gave RSS a quick try and did a trip to the moon and back, but didn't take that any further. Playing through 1.1 in career mode, the various outpost and orbital station contracts are making me think about setting up a bunch of these in sandbox, making use of ISRU. But at some point I need to finish off the various bits of fan art that I have planned... never enough time.

Tamney Kerman shortly before her return to Kerbin after the dramatic rescue and recovery of her cockpit, from Minmus.