purpleivan

I now have an entry in the "For the person who is nuts:" part of the challenge, with an ion flight to Dres. The cost of the whole vehicle in the VAB was 239,116 for a return flight to Dres. Now for the piccies. Next step will be a trip to Moho .

Yup... HotRockets it is. I added a bunch of stuff from Astronomers Visual Pack a couple of days ago to spruce up my KSP experience, which is making things a little more fun to look at. However I thought that the clouds in the BoulderCo Environmental Visual Enhancements pack were a bit too bright to look at all the time, so I replaced the clouds texture for Kerbin with another I found, that had a lot less cloud in it. - - - Updated - - - One thing I'm a bit unsure about with this challenge is at what point does the vehicle needs to be all ion powered to qualify for it. With my Mun landing I used a liquid fueled launcher to get my ion powered vehicle into an orbit of a few hundred km of Kerbin, then did the TMI burn onwards on ion drive. So I'm assuming that for an attempt at the other planets that I'll need to be all ion powered for the escape from Kerbin orbit onwards, until finally splashing down again on Kerbin after visiting a planet/planets. Is that correct?

Ok... spent this morning rebuilding the Electric Flyer and taking her to Mun and back. The cost of the whole vehicle was 65,634, although as it turned out I over did it a bit with the solar panels this time (I had more of the 1x6 arrays than my previous vessel), which meant that I never dropped below about 50% of electrical reserves. I kerbal'd the arrays a bit, as I forgot to turn on symmetry for a couple of them, so the panels are a bit lop sided. Javascript is disabled. View full album' alt='script>'>

Errr... carefully I remember that I landed when the sun was fairly low in the sky, so that I had good exposure of panels on the side of the ship (where most of them were located). The main issue was making sure that I didn't run out of electric power at important times in the decent, especially the landing. Unfortunately I can't find the vehicle in the VAB (must have deleted it), but I think I'll recreate it and do the SRB launch for reduced cost... also no need for me to have the separate capsule in Mun obit this time, so more cost reduction.

This isn't an entry for the challenge, just something I tried out as an experiment when working on my "Mün challenge" entries. If I was going low cost (something I didn't think about at the time as I was playing Sandbox) instead of low mass, then I would have gone SRBs for the launcher instead of jets. However the vehicle did have a separate CM, as that was a requirement of that challenge. Javascript is disabled. View full album' alt='script>'>

Watching coverage with chatterer audio in the background for that extra KSP feel

Well here's entry #3 The naysayers said it couldn't be done, the sane said it shouldn't be done, but by golly... they went and did it anyway. The journey of the KSS Points Pirate. One admission is that I forgot to snapshot the mass of the lander after the landing on Mun, so I had to take one in the VAB with tanks drained to their landed amounts, which was the two large side tanks and the descent stage tanks at the base emptied, which is very close to the the state of the vehicle on landing. I had a little fuel in the descent stage tank (far too little for comfort) when I touched down, but thought I should leave them empty for the calculations. I'd do the flight part again to show an actual landed mass on the Mun, but the framerate was so slow on the pad, that it took me almost 1/2 hour to load the 8 kerbals into the command seats. Actually the hardest parts of the mission, were loading the kerbals before launch and then switching between them, and the rovers. debris, previous flights debris and flags at the landing site. Other than that it was fairly straight forward a flight. Ok... here's what I believe my points tally is. Mass Parameter Rocket Mass = 84,018 Lander Mass = 10,646 (10,646/84,018)*100 = 12.67 Kerbals Parameter 12 Kerbals (3 +(9*0.25)) = 5.25 Equipment Parameter 34 Satellites = 34 8 Rovers (driveable) = 16 10 Antenna = 2 28 Sensors = 7 Total = 59 Additional Mission Parameter Landing near easter egg = 2 Flag at landing site = 1 Docking in Mun orbit = 3 Total = 6 Grand Total 12.67 * 5.25 * 59 * 6 = 23547 I think that the key to a good score are satellites that score 1 point each and have a low mass and can be dropped off in Kerbin orbit and rovers which can be pretty low mass and if drive-able score 2 points each. However I am intrigued by the idea of some kind of mad satellite launcher with a lander, the surface of which is painted is completely covered in sensors BTW... those little rovers look like fun go-karts, but they were a pain to drive as their center of gravity was so high, which is why I didn't go for any of the "drive a distance, raise a flag" additional missions.

Well the latest ship the "KSS Points Pirate" is now safely parked in Mun orbit, with a descent to the surface scheduled for tomorrow evening. Some pundits are describing this as a serious scientific and engineering endeavour, while others are saying that it's a crazy stunt, that belongs in a circus. Of course, only time will tell...

Yep... I don't know why with my first vehicle I thought that the mass of the lander at launch had any relevance at all. As you've said, it's the mass that you get to the surface of the Mun that's important. Talking of me making errors, I think I made one with the calculation of the points for my last entry, in that I forgot to include the extra point in the equipment section for a rover "if it can be driven by kerbals". I guess as I just drove it around the lander a little I didn't think about adding. Ah well... I better not forget that in my next entry, as it has a lot of rovers

Hi TheBigFish I've taken a look at the numbers that you used to come to the 76,032 or 86,400 score and I think there might have seen a flaw or two with your calculations. The first is that the numbers you've used for the Mass Parameter seem confused, in that this is basically a description of the vehicles' efficiency (i.e. what mass X at launch was required to get mass Y to the surface of the Mun). However your equation doesn't seem to show that, as 376,208/246,892 suggests that the lander mass was 376,208 but the mass of the whole stack including the lander was 246,892. I believe that the calculation for the Mass Parameter for a successful mission (i.e. if the LKO rescue had not been needed) would have been 28,181/537,536 = 5.24 Additionally I come to a different number for the Equipment Parameter which you have as 25, including the two items you weren't certain about. I think that the scoring for these should be as follows. 7 sensors x 0.25 points = 1.75 10 antenna x 0.2 points = 2 12 satellites x 1 point = 12 2 rovers x 1 point = 2 2 drive-able bonus x 2 points = 4 Total = 21.75 Using these figures, the total score for a successful mission I believe comes to (5.24 * 3 * 21.75 * 9) = 3077.19 I don't know how the cost of the rescue mission should be calculated, but my guess would have been to add the mass at launch of the rescue vehicle to that of the original vehicle at launch, as this was the additional mass at the time of its launch required to complete the mission. This would give a launch rocket mass of (537,536+107,254) = 644,790 and a resulting Mass Parameter of 28,181/644,790 = 4.37 Plugging all of that into the total points calculation would give a result of 4.37 * 3 * 17.75 * 9 = 2094 After posting this I really hope I got my figures right

Here the details my 2nd entry that I posted a few images of last night. The Mass Parameter was a full rocket stack mass of 29.219t (including the Hitchhiker Storage Containers that were left on the pad) and a lander mass of 2.92t which gives a score for this of ((2.92/29.219)*100) = 9.99 The Kerbal Parameter was 9 kerbals, so the score for this was (3+(6*0.25)) = 4.5 The Equipment Parameter was 5 sensors, 5 antenna, 13 satellites and 1 rover, which gives a score of (5*0.25)+(5*0.2)+(13*1)+(1*1) = 16.25 The Additional Missions Parameter includes landing near an Easter egg and docking with a CM in orbit of the Mun, which gives a score of 2+3 = 5 So I believe my total is 9.99 * 4.5 * 16.25 * 5 = 3652 The mission ended up being so fuel critical that after burning off all my liquid and RCS propellant, the periapsis was about 30km, so a little too high comfort, requiring a kerbal had to get out and push to bring it down some more. Sending that many kerbals isn't actually very point efficient, but it was just to fun not to do In the end I didn't have time to do the driving/flag planting element of the challenge, plus I had a new vehicle in mind anyway. One issue with my previous entry is that the mass for the lander I used in my calculation of it's points tally, was that in the VAB. Of course I assume now that it should have been the mass on landing on Mun, as that would make the Mass Parameter the percentage of the total rocket stack that is landed there. I don't have the landed mass of that vehicle, so probably you should removed it from the scoreboard... the new one has a better score anyway BTW... a more heavily points tuned vehicle is already under construction, so watch this space.

As I was busy with work stuff earlier in the evening, I won't have time to document my latest endeavour (I'll do that tomorrow), but here are a few pics as a taster. I don't know if this quite in the Apollo spirit, but I think it's 100% Kerbal BTW... it's not quite the points monster I had been planning, as I didn't do one thing I'd been planning on to maximise points and I didn't have time to take the 10km drive, although I did take a rover.

Nice... that beats the 2260 of my last attempt. I think I'll have to see if I can trim some more mass and have another crack at this challenge

Here's my entry for an Apollo like, although not Apollo looking vehicle. I think that my point tally adds up like this. Mass (rocket = 22276 and lander 3508) = score of 15.74 Equipment (1x rover, 5x sensors on surface, 5x antenna on surface, 3x satellites deployed) = 7.25 Additional missions (moving 10km from landing site, landing near Easter egg, docking module in orbit) = 10 Total (15.74 x 2 x 7.25 x 10) = 2282.75 One thing that made this mission a little more eventful than planned was that it was forgotten that the Mk1 Lander Can only has one seat, so Gregbert Kerman had to ride down to the Mun surface in a seat on the rover and then hang on the the ladder when returning to orbit. As Gregbert has rather weak fingers it was decided that it was best to drop him off once a circular orbit was established and for James to take the Lander to rendezvous with the other lander can than had been left in orbit, to then take the docked pair of them to pick up Gregbert. This challenge was a fun one, so I'm thinking of taking another crack at it with a vehicle that's more tuned to the points system than this one was, plus I'll remember to plant some flags as well

Here's another entry in the all rockets category, as I knew that I had some spare mass in the vehicle with my last attempt. https://www.dropbox.com/s/ihdlztain8bjroy/Mun%20Light%205.craft?dl=0 The mass of the vehicle is 26.009t My bonus point tally is as follows. 150 mission points for using stock parts 100 mission points for not using autopilot 40 mission points for using RCS 50 mission points for landing in range of 1km to the Easter egg Here's the pics of James Kerman's lightweight adventure.

I've just completed the Duna challenge and here's the details on my entry. First of all the craft file. https://www.dropbox.com/s/3ic1j5me8wca6x2/Duna%20Challenger.craft?dl=0 Now the details of my trip. Total funds = 15,678 Bonus amounts were as follows. No Xenon Gas -5,000 No Solid Fuel -10,000 Enter a stable orbit around Duna before landing there -10,000 No parachutes -7,500 I think that comes to a total score of -16822 if I've understood the rules correctly. By the time I landed I still had most of my mono propellant remaining on my last stage, so I could have trimmed the vehicle down a bit. Before flying this vehicle to Duna I also did the challenge with a very different version that used a chute for the landing, but I realised when I did this that a non-chutes landing wouldn't be that hard, so put together this vehicle to go for a better score. And... the piccies:)

This isn't an entry for the challenge (although it started out as one) as I... A) forgot to give the lander detachable legs and... forgot to land at the Easter Egg site so sacrificing a bunch of points, but I thought I'd post some images of it anyway. Javascript is disabled. View full album' alt='script>'>

Here's my entry to the Mün challenge. https://www.dropbox.com/s/833krkvx7pta0zy/Mun%20Light%204.craft?dl=0 It weighs in at 30.643t and made the trip quite comfortably. The record of Jenbas Kerman's flight in it can be seen at the bottom of this post. As for my point tally I think it's as follows. 3064 Mass point. -100 points for not using autopilot. -40 points for using RCS. -50 points for landing within 1km of the easter egg. Total = 2874 That score looks pretty high (fat) now, but I think it's come top in the "all rocket" category... which I chose to make up. I actually made the trip in this ship twice, as on my first attempt I forgot to detach the legs on take-off from the Mün, so had to do it all over again, hence the two flags at the landing site.

659 hours according to Steam. I bought the game on July 25th 2014.

Jeb testing the huge descent ladder on an ill fated, early version of an Eve return lander. The lander with transfer vehicle in Kerbin orbit. The business end of another failed Eve lander in Kerbin orbit. Malzor Kerman carrying out some routine maintenance on Space Station 1 before his epic return trip to Eve. After launch Malzor's 1st Eve vehicle was found to have a serious fault, so a fresh, fixed (and snacks laden) ship was sent up to dock with it. Swapping ships with James. View from inside Malzor's lander can of James' ship about to head home. Malzor's ship about to enter Eve orbit. Malzor on Eve.

This is the largest launcher I've ever made which was for the "Eve Party Boat", my four kerbal Eve return lander.

Ooops... I've found the cause of the problem. The folder which I extracted the Scansat folder into must have had an existing folder with the prior version in it. so although I did a clean copy to Gamedata, what I was copying over was flawed. SCANsat now working again I can continue my anomaly hunting. Many thanks.

When you say that I need to delete the old installation, does that involve anything other than deleting the GameData\SCANsat folder and copying over the new one. I've done that, I even did it again a few minutes ago to make sure, but the problem is still there. This is the first time I've tried updating a plugin in KSP, so I'm not aware if there's more to it than delete then copy the folder across. Thanks for the quick feedback.

I'm having an issue with SCANsat since the 0.25 update, in that the two vehicles that I'd been Mun anomaly hunting with, that I had parts on prior to the 0.25 update (which worked fine prior to it), plus any parts attached to newly created vehicles, no longer function. The parts themselves are rendered and new ones can be attached (and stats shown) in the VAB, but neither the SCANsat icon nor the right click menus for attached parts appear in-game. I'm running the 8.0 build of SCANsat and have tried starting KSP with no other plugins to rule out conflicts, but this didn't help. Does anyone have any ideas (I'm probably missing something obvious). Adding a link to my KSP.log file. http://www.dropbox.com/s/kqxv4289nun91up/KSP.log?dl=0

Thanks for that Claw... it worked a treat. Now I can go rescue my Eeloo ship from a high elliptical orbit.