Kesa

Assuming you can target something, during your final approch, chase your retrograde vector to stay on top of the target away vector, you can land litterally land on top of your target, as shown in the video linked earlier in this thread.

SSTO means single stage to orbit, and indicates nothing about how it flies. There are rocket SSTOs, spaceplane SSTOs, and potentially railgunned SSTO, Sky hooked SSTO, Rotary rockets SSTO, Balloon-Rocket SSTO. I guess you meant "as a spaceplane", and yes, at 0.8 TWR, a rocket won't lift up the ground (though it may make a lot of sense to have low TWR on the later stages of a multistage rocket), and plane might. It will need more wings than a more powerfull spaceplane or than a shuttle. Also, it does not need to be single stage. You can have a plane carrying a smaller plane or a rocket. On small moon with low orbital velocity, it is also possible to ascend with a TWR lower than 1 if you find a flat place (ground resistaance on your wheels replaces lift). It can still be usefull on not so small moons and with TWR a bit over 1.

You can't optimize time and Dv simultaneously, and if you want to go back home, there is no point in minimizing Dv. The more Dv you spend, the sooner you'll arrive, and spared Dv is useless if your destination is home. The question you should ask yourself is "how soon can I go home using no more than X Dv, and how?" where X is your total Dv available. And likely, you'll burn all your remaining fuel minus margin. Maybe try using this tool https://alexmoon.github.io/ksp/ to figure out when and how to leave (I would try with manoeuver nodes alone first though). Using this tool and assuming some informations, I found that if you have about 2000 m/s (instead of the minimal 650) you can leave right away and save 170 days. If you have about 1000 m/s Dv, you can wait about (a bit more) the same time you would have waited for an ideal transfer, but take a route 60 days shorter.

Problem is, such a protocol is not possible for a Mars mission. The Moon is only a few days away, the "abort protocol" was barely different than "proceed as planned". Moon landing can be cancelled because a stage malfunction would lead to the crew being stranded, but the overall time to return is barely shortened, but is not an issue because it is already short in the first place. In real life, I don't know if there's even any meaningful treatement to severe irradiation. The most we can do, be it down on Earth or millions of miles into deep space, is prevent it. So probably kerbalism allows crew to be automatically healed upon recovery, but realistically, the crew is already doomed, even if rapid recovery were possible. And if rapid recovery was possible, I think the abort plan shoud have been triggerd from the first or second coronal blast (evaluating their frequency and your resistance to it probably could have indicated they would not make it). I think our (RL) take on this will be to test each subsystem extensively before heading to Mars, precisely because there is no abort plan. Before your second mission to Mars, I advise you to do the same, and send your Mars vessel say, on a mission over an extended period of time around the Moon, where an abort is possible. Also pointing the engines toward the Sun (assuming crew compartiment are at the other end) should reduce radiation, if kerbalism is well coded, and this strategy is what spaceX intends to do IRL. As for as salvaging your current mission, well if your kerbals can attempt to go home any faster than following the mission plan, it may be worth trying. If you have a very powerfull rescue craft, you don't necessarrily have to plan for a braking plan, any Earth flyby is good and the rescue craft can do most of the work (it would need a rescue craft with as much or maybe more Dv than the Mars mission itself, but due to the length of the mission, mass can probably be save on life support and Mars playload). Personnally, I think I would carry the mission as far as possible. The kerbals on board were aware it was a dangerous mission. If you got remote control system, the craft can be put in orbit around Mars and be used for its materials by future missions. Without remote control system, you should be able to put the craft in a resonant orbit to possibly retrieve it later, sending a small probe to hack the control system and using the fuel onboard, assuming it won't disappear.

What you describe amounts to computing the result of the rocket equation doing a step by step integral, while doing calculus, you got it in closed form and can compute it efficiently. Anyway, the rocket equation is easily googlable, and litterally one line long. I highly doubt no one in squad knows what a logarithm is, I agree math is definitely not the issue.

Yes, they can be more than spacewalk tether, they can link any object to the part holding the tether (not sure tether is the name used in the mod, but that's basically a retractable tether). What functionality a spacewalk tether has that KAS tether has not?

Welcome aboard! Some general things you should be automatically thinking of when failing to launch an unstable playload : Where is the fairing? Where is it? Use ailerons. They are barely visible. If the craft is not stable, use bigger ailerons Use engines with vectoring abilities. Skipper has a decent gimballing for stable rockets, but for unstable rocket, you probably want to complement it with thud or vector engines. Check the torque. It's good that you checked it, but thrust offset is usually the smallest issue. I see you still got some thrust offset in the tens of Nm but I think it should be well within skipper gimballing capacity. Some advanced tips to launch stuff into space Empty the fuel tanks of your playload. You got way too much Dv, 4,000 m/s should be more than enough to go to LKO. You can half the weight of your playload by just emptying the three LF tanks and the big monoprop one. You don't seem to even use the Nerva as our upper stage, which would increase the playload mass but reduce the overall weight of the craft. Think BFR. Refueling the empty playload/the station with an aerodynamic tankers should be a trivial task, especially compared to launching a heavy unstable playload. If all else fails you can launch a very unstable playload between two rocket rather than on top of one. TL;DR use fairing, empty fuel tanks which do not contribute to orbit.

Welcome to the forum. KAS has thethers, but to be honest, I expect thether+ladders to be fun but much harder than EVA jetpack, on both piloting skill and designing skills.

As you can see in the caveman tech SSTO link given by ManEatingApe, LVT-45 and LVT-30 can both singlehadledy launch a crewed capsule in a single stage rocket. I remember once trying to do a spaceplan SSTO using a single LVT-30. It had no wings, only two pairs of winglets.It was heavier than its rocket counter part, much harder to fly and land, very long to design, and not more useful. So if you go rocket engine only, save probably for the aero spike, you're better off with a rocket SSTO than with a spaceplan SSTO. If you want to use the basic jet engines (juno ad wheasle), I think they changed a lot. You used to be able to go up to 10 km and still have decent performance. I think they start to flame out at 10km now. Now with them you want to accelerate as most as you can barely above sea level before pitching up (going fast also increase air intake and make them flameout later).

Well, they started as such, so it should not be too hard to make someone that paranoid believe they still are dangerous. Especially considering this is what you get when you google "indie games" : http://prntscr.com/jxau2g

You should be able to custumize KER display, and have the 2 numbers interesting you right next to each other.

Does your brother know Minecraft and KSP are Indie games?

It's sure you won't heard of runge kutta and whatnot in fancy videos, but I would not dismiss using neural network so easily. The numerical integration methods are only accurate relative to the model you use, not necessarilly to reality. If we don't know precisely the gravitational field of Earth, including its anomalies, or the effect of Sun pressure over a small poorly identified debris, the integration will only make accurate prediction relative to an innacurate model. Neural network can be a way automatically fill our ignorances about small and hardly predictible factors which weight heavily over time. (I would expect the most efficient solution to be asking NN to predict deviations from current prediction rather than asking them for the whole prediction though)

1.4.3 I think.

As the contract is worded, only the probe itself should be unmanned IMO, so in addition to making a suggestion, I would also report the current behaviour as a bug, in the technical support subsection. I'm curious, does docking only help with the "new" part, or also with the "unmanned one"?

Polar orbit are not Dv expensive, save for Kerbin polar orbit (by 100-200m/s), or more generally polar orbits achieved from the ground (and even then, it's much easier and somewhat cheaper than matching any orbit which does not go above site). If you achieve polar orbit, by achieving equatorial orbit then doing a plan change, you are wasting a lot of fuel indeed (much worse if you achieve a low equatorial orbit). But the right way of achieveing polar orbit is by refining the encounter with the body you want to orbit, usually with a midcourse manoueuver (<10m/s than what you'd need otherwise) so that when you enter the SOI, you are already in a polar hyperbola. Then the cirularization burn cost pretty much the same as one for an equatorial orbit. And you can land anywhere on the body if you're patient enough. Polar orbit are impractical for station though, as it is easy to achieve polar orbit, but it requires timing and patience to match one in particular (whereas there is only one equatorial plan).

It sounds very strange to me, I've heard of people reusing old probes to complete contracts by just docking and undocking them. It's an exploit, but it would tend to suggest it should be working properly for decoupled satellites. I'd suggest you do some testing at the launch pad (or in LKO) to try to satisfy "Build a new unmanned probe that has a antenna and can generate power" : - with a completely unmanned vehicle, to make sure it is the "unmanned" part which is not fullfilled. - with docking ports instead of decouplers Also, "Build a new unmanned probe that has a antenna and can generate power" really should be several conditions instead of 1 : the craft has to be new. it has to be unmanned (I think it means not having manned modules, even empty) it has to have an antenna it has to be able to generate power The new part should be statisfied even by an old craft via docking. If you use any modded probe core, antenna or power generator, or mods that change the behaviour of stock ones (like remote tech for antennas), make sure it's not the cause of your problem by making a quick launchpad test with the probe without launcher. If the issue persists, I'd say it's worth reporting as a bug under "technical support".

Direct transfer are simpler and probably the place to start for going interplanetary, but with simpler physics manoeuver nodes, you don't need NASA level tricks, experts and computers. In KSP, the same engine is used for the prediction of flight and the flight itself, that's a big difference with RL. With manoeuver nodes, you can even plot both the regular transfer and one with an assist and compare, only wasting time.

Under patched conics, there are an infinity of points of equilibrium in the rotating Kerbin Mun referential : match the Mun Orbit while staying out of its SOI. Under 3-body dynamics, there are only 5 such points. Matching Mun orbit while remaining out of its SOI does result in an unstable decaying orbit under 3-body, unless done at L4 and L5. Atmospheric drag is the most common cause of decay, but not the only one, and under N-body dynamics, gravity is a cause of decay. IMO, it feels nonsensical to add 2 stability points from a model supposed to be more unstable, a bit like asking to be able to aerobrake between 70km and 250km but without experiencing atmospheric drag induced decay at these altitudes (all that while aerobraking at 50-70km already provide anything you need).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrangian_point These are equilibrium points in the three-body_problem. As you may or may not know, spacecraft, planets and moon in Kerbin are only ever influenced by one massive body at a time. A trajectory around a body is called a conic which stands conic_section and as you change of sphere of influence, you get patched_conics. If you want to have a probe which does not move relative to the Mun (which is in equilibirum in the Kerbin-Mun referential, which is centered at Kerbin and rotate with the Mun), it's easy : match the orbit of the Mun while staying outside of it's SOI (eg a little bit ahead, diametrally opposed...). If they could be influenced by two, or more bodies at a time, for our example Kerin and the Mun, everything would be much less stable, and only 5 points in space allow you to stand still relative to the Mun. These are the Lagrangian points. It happens that only 3 of these points are equilibrium under patched conics. Some people are asking for the two missing ones, without realising asking for them without removing the infinity available under patched conics is asking for folklore in a very unelegant way. Some other people ask for something already present under patched conics. (arguably, L4 and L5 points are stable equilibrium, while under patched conic, 1:1 resonant orbit including L4 and L5 are neutral equilibrium, arguably instable on the very long run if the orbital period is disturbed, but in practice, they can remain stable for centuries before needing adjustement of less than 1m/s, unlike the 3 unstable Lagragian point which require frequent monitoring for spacecraft wanting to stay there).

L3; L4 and L5 already happen to be stable with patched conics. I find it a bit strange to ask for L1 and L2 without asking for N-body dynamics. L1 and L2 are not even stable, and their main point is cheap transfer. IRL, L1 and L2 are used only because of N-body dynamics, either because it makes flight cheaper, or because they are the only nearby parking place relative to Earth and the Sun (or to a pair of bodies). By comparison, in patched conics, you can park in any 1:1 resonant orbit, including close ones. You can have all the advantages of L1 and L2 by parking in the same orbit as the lighter body, right after and right before it. Patched conics do not lack Lagrange points, patched conics has an infinity of stable Lagrange points, where N-body dynamics only has 5 of them, 3 of them being unstable, and the 2 it has exclusively are not especially worth of notice outside of N-body dynamics.

To be honest, after following the in game tutorial about manoeuver node, you should know what periapsis, apoapsis, inclination and ascending/descending node mean. Even moreso if you watched a yt tutorial. If you know what longitude means, and most layman do, longitude of ascending node shoud be self explanatory (not the exact meaning, but what it corresponds to). And by the time you wonder about the missing parameter to characterize an orbit, you should be able to infer what argument of periapsis is. And at each step, in case of doubt, google these terms, these are simple rocket science, well explained in wikipedia. I spent hours playing without bothering about that thing called "Isp", and I really think it is of no use for complete beginner. Is it a reason to hide it in game? In my opinion, certainly not. One day, I wondered if there was something in game indicating the efficiency of an engine, figured something akin to exhaust velocity, and looked for it in game. I figured I could divide thrust by consumption, but Isp being the only thing I did not understood at that time, I gave it a look and learnt what it was. The same thing could be said about wheels and leg spring and dampening, about chute deployement altitude, or the many details given by the navball. One of the key lesson I learnt in KSP is that, although rocket science can be broken into simple intuitive bits, it is huge, you can't expect to know everything at once. And it great since you don't have to. SO the mindset should not be trying to decipher every single bit of information thrown at you, but rather wondering : "what piece of information do I need to do X?" and only then "where is this info in game and how is it worded?". You're much more likely to understand a piece of information you've needed, looked for and thought about than a random one. So for superfluous information, "don't know don't care". Players trying to do direct insertion or to calculate Dv manually will seek information like the orbital parameter given in the fine prints of contract, so these are not useless for everybody. In any case, you should always follow the shiny graphic stuff thrown at you first (eg the orbit in the map view rather than orbital parameter, the way point in the asame map view rather than using latitude and longitude...).

Here you go : https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1aJqOQ6EknlOIW76JqZrH9661G7KHZv9bQQ_YICAa31E/edit?usp=sharing The answer depends a lot on the destination. For Moho and Dress, the gateway orbit (the one minimizing the Dv of the interplanetary transfer) seems to be around 600 km, and there is no noticeable difference between 100 km and 2.5k km, which both are less than 5% worse than the gateway orbit. For Jool and Eloo, LKO is 100 and 150m/s better than 2.5k km, respectively. For Eve and Duna, the difference is massive, nearly 400 m/s in favor of the 2.5k km one, and the gateway orbit seems around the Mun altitude. That's assuming you perform a single ejection burn. For planet other than Duna and Eve, from a 2.5k km, you should first drop your Pe to do your ejection burn there. Going the dive route, the higher the better basically. 2.5k km becomes 200 m/s better than LKO for planet other than Eve and Duna. Pushing that route to the extreme, you should actually refuel on the edge of Kerbin SOI, dive down to 70 km and fire your engines there. A Minmus like orbit further saves 500 m/s across all bodies compared to the 2.5k km one. To make justice to LKO though, if you count Dv from the launch, LKO beats 2.5k km by a large 660 m/s (duna) up to a 820 m/s (Mhoh Eloo), meaning that without refuel, or refueling with fuel from Kerbin, it is largely beneficial to refuel low (for ejection burn 120km is still near optimal, at 240km, losses start to be noticeable). Even when refueling, it is more relevant than it seems : this hundreds of m/s of Dv are not just "logistic losses". For the most part, you lose them when climbing from Kerbin to your station, meaning you'll need a higher launch mass. I tried to make a model simple enough for single refuel that encompasses the fact that lower transfer burn let you build a lighter ship, that could exhibit which orbit minimizes launch mass. Even plugin numbers that seems pretty unfair to LKO, it got a clear lead. (the model direguard cost, in particular of more engines vs more fuel, and it assumes single refuel, no complexe highly modular stuff). A nice way to put it : LKO is the best place to refuel if you intend to minimize the use of Kerbin's ressources, and conversely maximize the use of free/cheap deep space ressources. I'm not sure I follow you here. If you need to make round trips, or reutilize the interplanetary stage/mother ship, yeah, you should park it in a rather high orbit. But when launching stuff from Kerbin, the only things that matter from the upper stage to your orbit are the energy of the target orbit and the amout of mass you bring there. Bringing it bits by bits may make it easier for rendez vous and assembly, but it does not save fuel (it may even cost a bit more if your shuttle don't have the efficient engines you mothership has). Summary : Pros of refueling low (< 250 km) : - Lowest launch mass (you can launch empty vessels) - Most efficient trajectory without refueling means it's also the best strategy if the tanks you refuel from are from Kerbin as well. - Aerobraking helps refueling the station Cons : - Slightly bigger transfer stage mass - short burn windows Pros of refueling medium (below Mun) : - Convenient burn window, which come often and are long - Gateway orbit : lowest transfer single burn for distant bodies con : - don't have the big pros of others Pros of refueling High (Mun and Minmus) : - lowest transfer single burn for Duna and Eve (for the Mun, and Mimus is decent) - lowest transfer burn if you're readdy for a dive (lowest transfer mass) - proximity with the mining site Con : - impractical timing - Requires interplanetary abilities and fuel to even get to the refueling post in the first place It's possible to get the best of both world by refueling twice, though likely overkill.

Yes, even more so, although I would assume you knew what you are talking about. I know that and I don't see it being useful for future reference since distances are given in meters and multiple in KSP. No. He is most likely assuming m denotes miles and is talking about a 115 000 meters orbit. He is talking about "the lowest possible orbit". And 185074.56km is well beyond Kerbin's SOI, not lower than Minmus. Good for you. The OP is asking about vessel with TWR around 1 though. For ion probes, high altitude make sense. A gateway orbit (600km) should give 10-20 min to perform a burn, and a 3 000 km one (about keostationary) should give one hour. Even disregarding the Dv gain, a 3 000 km orbit offer a lot more flexibility in departure time than transmunian one. If I were dedicated enough to make crafts requiring burns longer than one hour (and not easily wrapable), I would probably bother kicking periapsis too, and make two or more burns from a 3000km orbit rather than one from a higher one.

Good point, refuelling (or staging) should not even be needed for a single non landing mission in Kerbin SOI, save maybe once in LKO if you launch empty ships.