n.b.z.

(made for Kuzzter's thread - Album here)

Thanks. I am humbled, as my success was not so much a result of my craftsmanship, but merely a choice of the right tool: the superb golden toroid. Its noble shine scares the kraken and is a delight to all spacefarers south of the north pole. (You might also say that I built a rocket driven pineapple.)

I shamelessly hyperedited to Minmus orbit, but from there I journeyed using exclusively the exceptional ROUND-8 tank. You won't get a view like that with any other tank.

As the only lander presented here that "carries its fuel in ten to fifteen golden donuts" seems to be mine, I should maybe clarify that it's part of a fully expendable, apolloesque Mun mission stack that returns only the 3-place capsule to Kerbin. The lander is never refuelled. (That docking port carries a payload not seen in the image, and can be used to supply monoprop. to the rover.) And it admittedly does not make a very convincing case for the ROUND-8. For a more reasonable and practical example see ddenis' post on the previous page. The point I wanted to make is that the Round-8, especially in combination with the Oscar, allows for very creative use of limited space, and can sometimes be a fix for a craft that just needs a little bit more fuel. This actually WAS the case with my lander, the bottom 4 tanks were added later after two missions almost failed due to running out of descent fuel, and it would have been difficult to add that amount anywhere else without a major rework of the lander and/or its fairing.

Lenfrid: You know, Joevan, I think I might be losing my faith. Joevan: What? Why? Lenfrid: I had always thought that The Creator Of Our Universe was infallible, but now that The Voices have said that He is removing the ROUND-8, I'm not so sure anymore. Joevan: Oh come on, you can't just give up your beliefs over some orange donut thingy. Lenfrid: Donut thingy? That form factor is perfect! I mean, just look at how far the Oscar tanks can be moved into the space the ROUND-8 offers with no clipping! There are battery packs behind the Oscars, too. How would Kerman&Kerman have designed the ascent stage this compact without the ROUND-8? Joevan: Hmmm. Lenfrid: The Voices say that we're supposed to be able to replace the ROUND-8 with the Oscar... but I just don't get it when I look at this machine. Joevan: Well, if K&K didn't have the ROUND-8, they would have come up with a different ascent module design. Lenfrid: Sure, but it would have either had a longer center tank, which would have made the entire thing higher, or they would have used a full diameter tank, meaning that the batteries and monopropellant and stuff would have to move somewhere else. Joevan: They would have found some way, I guess. Lenfrid: Maybe... but what about the descent stage? The K2 guys ran out of fuel 15m above the surface, and K4 lithobraked half their descent stage to pieces before the bottom four ROUND-8 tanks were added! And now, Mr. engineer, tell me how 40 units of fuel could have been added to that stage with any other tank? Imagine Oscars down there... there would be no clearance at all! And there's no other free space that isn't used by payload. Wasn't it already difficult enough to wiggle the rover out of there? Joevan: Hmmmm. Lenfrid: They would have been forced to make the entire lander bigger, which in turn would have made the third stage fairing bigger and heavier... maybe they would have needed to change the entire Sarnus-5 just because of not having ROUND-8s !! Joevan: Hmmmmm.

I don't use the Round-8 often, but when I do, it is because there is no alternative and it is absolutely needed. I fail to see how it is "redundant with the Oscar-Tank, except in terms of design". Other than being a fuel tank, it has nothing in common with the Oscar. Sure, both hold only a "small" amount of fuel when you consider the entire range of existing tanks. But when you are building something small, it makes a huge difference that one of these tanks holds almost twice the fuel than the other, and has a completely different form factor. Both tanks are needed and complement each other just fine. I am not disputing that a larger xenon tank would be nice, but pretty please don't take the Round-8 away. I will try to illustrate my point in The ROUND-8 Memorial Thread later today.

I recommend trying the turbo. Slashy seemed to be able to improve his speed by switching to the turbo. I used them from the start out of habit. Also, that's quite a big intake you have there.

That's cool, norup and Van Disaster. It seems I'm out, as I officially don't understand how this stuff works. I had assumed that the solution for this problem is to feed the largest amount of engines from the smallest amount of fuel, so that the fuel would last barely long enough to accelerate to the vehicle's max speed. I have not tried to get 1 or 2 more m/s out of my contraption, as I don't think I'll get to 365. Instead, I tried bolting a ridiculous 9 engines to the poor FL-T100, but the resulting craft is "terribly slow"... around 320 m/s, despite still reaching a point where it almost stops accelerating. Also, my 361-m/s-vehicle has 5 engines (which is not visible in my shot unless you look at the staging corner). Norup built a very similar machine using one less, which beat mine. That's interesting. I guess I'm now a bit tired of building contraptions mainly designed to rapidly catapult themselves into the ocean, so you guys have one less competitor now. However, don't assume victory right now... Slashy sounds like he isn't done yet...

That means your vehicle is not yet useless enough, and probably contains too many parts that would make sense if you were doing something reasonable.

I'm actually not sure what you mean with "what I did there", so I will probably be out of ideas when you beat my 361. Looking forward to it.

Is it a requirement to fly with a Kerbal? Since you had Dunwise on board, I'm guessing he will not be amused if others just decide that he was obsolete on that flight...

Thank you. But I should have tried harder before posting... now at 361 m/s. Maybe this contraption can go 1 or 2 m/s faster when flying closer to the 500m limit, but after I removed the larger reaction wheel, this thing is hard to fly more precise. At these speeds, slight changes in pitch act on your vertical speed like a catapult...

That depends on your definition of "while"... 355 m/s, stock.

The upside of this is that we all finally get to see a lander on Eve that looks good. It does not look as if large petrochemical refineries were attached to it using 8-symmetry - something which seems to be a necessity to get away from that scary place.

Thanks, that is a very generous offer. But I will not carry the badge, rules are essential to challenges and should be kept up. I could have asked to clarify this if it was that important for me. I did have a great time, and agree that this is what matters. Also, I saw other people's vehicles, which gave me ideas. Klesh, that is definitely the summit I was on. (The same exact sloping can be seen in my album shot of the extended antennas.)

I would not be disappointed or annoyed if my entry weren't admitted, as I (A) had a lot of fun, and ( now have the basis for a nice new space plane, if I just clip those immense wings a bit. It already has a docking port and RCS, and can probably reach orbit if the rocket fuel weren't burned for the VTOL engines but only in the rear-facing LV-909s. I just haven't tried yet. Also, there's a rear equipment bay that for this challenge, was filled up almost entirely with reaction wheels. I might move those to the outer pods, and get even more cargo/equipment space. I'm also considering the Minmus speed challenge, but obviously not with that craft... I'd need to build something new.

I'm not sure if my entry qualifies: I used a VTOL plane, but it uses rocket engines for hovering. But using these went wrong anyways and chutes were deployed to save the day. Also, I didn't manage to grab a screenshot during landing, as I was too busy trying not to crash. _____ KSC Management decided to send Dereny and Aldrigh to the top of Mt. Keverest, in order to test a new high altitude VTOL cargo delivery plane and to set up a small relay station on the summit. This was successfully positioned at an elevation of 6767m. The mission went well despite planning errors (night fell shortly after arriving on the summit), a botched landing attempt that was saved only by emergency chutes, and navigational ineptitude of the highest order: if you go "a bit right of north" to a destination near the pole, your way back isn't going to be "a bit right of south". After wasting fuel on a return ascent that was about 90° off, the remaining fuel ran out on the corrected return leg. Thankfully, with both rocket and jet fuel exhausted and the craft designed for extreme altitudes, it made for a fantasitic glider that was deadsticked from around 15000m with less than 5 units of liquid fuel left, arriving at the KSC with several thousand meters to spare, which were used up for some victory acrobatics before smoothly landing. The engine was briefly relit on the remaining fumes for taxying a bit faster. Dereny and Aldrigh were lucky: Their craft landed directly at 6764m elevation, which was previously thought to be the summit height. After driving around with their rover, they found a peak in walking distance that is at 6767m. They may have discovered a different summit than previous explorers. The 6767m one falls off quite steeply on one side. In fact, the slope is so dangerous, it starts pulling rovers towards the abyss way before they have reached the edge! But not much was learned about Keverest and its mysteries, as the plane had only two seats, and the mission required a pilot for flying and an engineer for possible chute repacking and rover repairs. EDIT: sorry hoioh, I had not noticed that you found the 6767m summit first.

A few days ago, I tried to do my first challenge ("What can YOU build in half an hour?"). I didn't even bother to post in that thread, because I failed SO miserably: not only did I exceed the time limit, which was the whole point, but my contraption wasn't even able to leave the vicinity of the KSC, so I wasn't going to space that day. Two days ago I saw this thread, and this time I'm posting something, because I feel I have something relevant to contribute. The main point of this challenge seems to be to fit something large (well spaced docking ports) into a package that's convenient for launching. Since I'm "afraid" that the new aero for 1.0 will make it impractical to launch wide-ass industrial structures sideways through the air, I have been working on a technique to assemble said structures in orbit - especially around remote bodies - without the need for manually docking a dozen bits together, or requiring multiple flights. Using stock parts only. I wanted this not only because it looks nice, but because I was actually concerned with the spacing of docking ports on stations that are supposed to be the orbital home for every vehicle deployed to a body. I came up with a solution that will become the cornerstone of my station building from now on. It is based on the idea that in zero gravity, even tiny forces are sufficient to move heavy things around with accuracy. The station I now built has too many parts, but could in principle be made lighter. I just wanted to make it nice and big to explore (and now demonstrate here) the technique behind it. Then, I got carried away, as I saw beauty emerge. Damn, this is the most kerbal thing I ever made. The Southern Cross Orbital Habitat CREW CAPACITY: 24 (4 in core module, 5 in each of four satellite compartments) In addition, one cupola module for the view PROPULSION / CONTROL: OMS: - 120 kN (6 x Rockomax 24-77, no access to station supply) - LF: 270 - OX: 330 Remote controllable Full attitude control (even when fully deployed) No translation, no RCS SUPPLY: LF: 1890 (excluding OMS fuel) OX: 2310 (excluding OMS fuel) MP: 1950 XE: 8400 (that must be a different unit!...) DOCKING PORTS: Large: 1 Medium: 8 Small: 28 In addition, one small docking port for each of the five crew compartments Spacing: sufficient SPECIFICATIONS: 100% STOCK PARTS 93.33 t in orbit, fully supplied 919 parts in orbit (ouch!) (don't ask about specs on the pad, I forgot to look) Automatic self assembly through staging only A few technical points regarding this challenge and the flight performed to place the station in orbit: The giant fairing is actually a structural element, designed to hold the insanely fragile and complex contraption together during the stresses of launch. I jettisoned it before circularizing, which left the stack prone to wobbling and requiring great care on the trottle. The torque is not too impressive while the lifter stage is still attached. (To say it in much nicer vocabulary than what I used while trying to line up for the circ burn.) The orbit is not precisely 100 km. Instead, it is currently 100.947 x 99.911 km. I overshot by 14 km on the ascent, and was too lazy to perfectly tune it yet. While the development of the station required countless hyperedits into orbit to test The Mechanism, the lifter was quickly slapped together for this challenge with the main goal of looking sufficiently cool for its payload. It worked flawlessly on the first attempt and after correcting the 14 km overshooting on ascent, had just enough juice left to deorbit itself. Ladies and gentlemen - it is now showtime. It seems that any time I really want to do something big, I start out by destroying the pad. Bad sandbox habits... Getting rid of that huge fairing before circularization, to prevent orbital debris. The nose cone was already fragmented and jettisoned. At the circ burn, I will thankfully leave behind 80 parts or so. After arriving at the destination orbit and deorbiting the lifter, the unfolding process starts. This works using only staging - and an insane level of careful sepatron charge tuning. The first construction stage separates the satellite crew compartments. These are attached to really long, hinged beams. Four sepatrons at the station's center blow the beams outward. On each beam, this is supported by a short, strong sepatron burst outward, while another sepatron fires a weak, but sustained retro burn, which gradually slows the crew compartments again to a very slow speed until they have unfolded about three quarters of the way. Shortly before snapping into position, the docking ports will forcefully accelerate the beams again. To prevent too high stresses, the beams run against a suspension. You are looking at hinges made from cubic octagonal struts - both the axis and the bearings. On this beam type, the docking port is on the same axis as the beam. However, the hinge center is offset from the beam. The second construction stage: unfolding the docking port array. These beams are lighter and shorter than the cabin beams. They are only driven out by four sepatrons in the station center, and move at constant speed until they snap into their mounts. Again, a suspension is used. On this beam type, the hinge is centered on the beam, but the docking port is offset. A hinge axis is made of two cubic octagonal struts inside each other, one of them rotated by 45°. Both types of beams keep oscillating for a while at their respective frequencies. For the next construction stage we need this movement to have stopped, otherwise the third and last construction stage may literally be derailed. While waiting for the movement to subside, the communications devices and solar arrays have been deployed. The third and last construction stage: radial telescopic extension of the docking port beams. For the third time, the station splits itself into 5 pieces, accelerates four of them towards their intended position, and assembles itself back together. This time, the outer part of each beam slides radially away from the station center, driven by a pair of weak sepatrons. These fire much longer than required for a regular transition, in case one of the beam parts gets slowed or bounces back due to remaining oscillations. Passing over the KSC for the first time, all debris has already deorbited and the station is fully assembled and ready for its first inhabitants, before it ever managed to complete a full orbit. There, PuddlesRex, have your assortment of docking ports. All of this was assembled by pressing space a few times. It should now be obvious how to quickly put together a large space station in some place more remote than a 100 km Kerbin orbit. This station is not designed to fold itself back up again. But using liquid fuel engines instead of sepatrons, there is no reason why a hinged mechanism couldn't retract itself again. It should be easy to fold beams out of, and back into, cargo bays. The possibilities seem endless. Full Album:

Installed the demo around noon on a saturday. Didn't read a tutorial, never loaded a stock vehicle. Stopped eating, sleeping etc. until on sunday evening, Jeb safely returned to Kerbin from the first successful Mun landing. Well, sort of successful, as this historic feat of kerbalkind will forever be remembered for its anticlimax: Jeb: Keuwston, I have a problem Kapcom: Say again Jeb Jeb: I'm trying to get out, but there's no ladder. Was I supposed to bring a rope or something? Kapcom: Errrmm... standby So the first Kerbal to land on another world only got to admire the view out the window. Later, an investigation uncovered that the designer of Jeb's spacesuit had been denied a job as spacecraft designer, and to take revenge, he designed the suit to be a little spacecraft in itself, with rocket thrusters and all. Neither Kapcom nor Jeb knew at the time that the suit would have gotten around the problem of the missing ladder.

Another aspect in which this community is awesome is the way information and help is shared in the form of good advice in posts, tutorials, videos etc. I recently started to learn building spaceplanes. Without this community, I probably would not have achieved Kerbin orbit yet. But with all this great knowledge sharing here, I was already able to build several orbit-capable craft, and actually do a Mun landing and return in a single stage vehicle. So thanks for the help, everyone!

A while ago, I had shown my Tylo landing - 3 Kerbals plus two rovers, stock sandbox, after playing KSP for only 2 months - in the You-know-you-play-too-much-KSP thread. Back then, the Kerbonauts were still there and had not come back to Kerbin. I took them back a week or so after the landing. Only now did I get to finish Part 2 of the image gallery, as there's always getting something in the way of my plans - such as a sudden urge to learn building space planes, or the release of 0.90, etc... My mission was mainly characterized by profound newbie-ism. Ineffective trajectories, a desire to always carry a large margin of delta-V to make up for bad flying and large blunders, and a weird refusal to install any mods (including engineering mods) led to the most straightforward way a relative beginner could pull off Tylo with this payload: by throwing an almost whackjobian mountain of hardware against the problem. No less than 100 Mainsails were running at liftoff of the large stack, and I still needed another launch to get everything on the way. It was the biggest, most time-consuming single effort I have undertaken so far, and it taught me a lot of new stuff. It was also the most satisfying one, as I "needed" to solve Tylo, so it would not always remain the place where everyone died (like on the first, very naive attempt). This time, the landing worked on the first attempt without resorting to one of the many quicksaves, while taking screenshots like a tourist. And it was the first destination where I saw no way around having to learn docking. Duna, Vall etc. worked with a multi-stage lander large enough for the last stage to reach Kerbin. I will probably - hopefully - not build such a part count monstrosity ever again. My KSP skill isn't at a level where I should be handing out advice; but for anyone relatively new to KSP, my tip for Tylo would be that you probably want to have an engineering mod. Tylo isn't a friendly place when you haven't the faintest clue about the capabilities of your hardware, and without some delta-V numbers at hand you will probably end up building something as silly as i did. My understanding of this thread is to be a Tylo showcase thing; I had already shown the first part elsewhere, but now that the gallery is complete, it is repeated here for completeness. Three Kerbals on Tylo - Part 1 Three Kerbals on Tylo - Part 2

My largest lifter is the Tylo-100A. Named after its first destination (3 Kerbals and 2 Rovers are currently on Tylo) and the amount of Mainsails that run at liftoff. I did not look at numbers during the flight, so I don't actually know how much weight this ...thing lifts to LKO. On the pad, the total weight of the lifter + Tylo hardware ist 7977,36t. I'm not going to launch the stack again just to get a reading on the LKO lift capability, and the reason is another number - part count: 1576. Ouch!!

Thank you, I had never clicked on that. (I'll post a weight reading of my Tylo stack in the "Largest Rocket you've ever built"-thread, as that seems to fit the topic better.)

I have so far not used any mods besides a radial decoupler fix, and don't know a single numerical value of what I did there. I wanted to get a feeling for the game in its stock state first, and learn the basic functions before modding. Needless to say, I didn't just put that stuff together to see it working on the first attempt. This is the sixth iteration of my Tylo hardware, this took some effort (see also "Best Explosions"). Rule-of-thumb estimates for the lander and ascent stage performance were obtained by flying the stuff on Kerbin. But actually flying Kerbonauts there I did only twice: the first time I killed them, and then I started building Tylo-specific hardware. I got very far with the beginner approach of gradually making my standart rocket/lander stuff bigger for each new destination, before Tylo I never left anything in orbit but returned with part of the stuff that landed. Mun, Minmus, Duna, Pol, even Vall worked this way, and up to this point I had always brought my Kerbals back. This changed on Tylo, were three Kerbonauts impacted at a scary speed. So I had to solve Tylo, it would suck to see it whenever going to Jool and feel defeated. But doing Tylo without knowing what the stuff I was putting together could actually deliver is STUPID. I have just found this out. Besides, the guys haven't even returned yet. So I guess I will soon go for an engineering mod to no longer be stupid. First thing after installing will be looking at this stack!