Hotel26

"Pilot error." It's always listed as "pilot error", no matter what happened. (Welcome to the forum! Here's your toga...)

Question and Answer Time: In which I (from time to time) answer PMs from my letterbox... From 'Q1Anon': Q: I had no idea you could fly in IMC in KSP! I still don't think you can because e.g. there are no clouds in KSP!! Why would anyone even want to??? A: It has been famously said that "flying is 99% boredom, punctuated by 1% terror". Well, flying IFR is a kind of intensive admixture of both at the same time, but more importantly: it is engrossing and stimulating (in an admittedly unpleasant sense), but the final result (if successful) always presents an exhilarating moment! As well as being something completely different (kind of boredom), there is not much scenery at night, so a reasonable protocol for challenge is to simply self-enforce IFR at night. From 'Q2Anon': Q: Why use stock for this when there are presumably any number of flashy mods out there? A: Well, I actually agree with this! It's a question of which mod will suit you best and knowing what you want; in addition, getting some basic IFR knowledge, sufficient to know what you want to use it for. In particular, for one reason or another, it seems that no one mod yet covers the whole gamut of possibilities (but I could be wrong about this). They will universally do very little to instruct you in the Way of the Instruments. So here follows my own scanty knowledge of what is available, what it can do and what the limitations might be: NavUtilities: provides ILS approaches and permits user-definition of airports. Don't know what else. Being pop-up rather than IVA, it is light-weight (a good thing). RPM-based (Raster Prop Monitor, a base mod for numerous super-mods, providing hifi cockpit instrumentation): MAS: an authentic cockpit environment that will be as fiddly as the real-life cockpit (ergonomics for turbulence!); this mod I understand is now considered obsolete. ASET: I understand this is now the "go to" model for RPM-based cockpit IVA simulation. as I recall, it is difficult to define one's own navaids (I did succeed and do have notes) but I found that the OBS instrument did not appear to track user-defined VORs. nothing much known about enroute navigation with respect to supporting jet routes. I am certainly going to be exploring more in this area and upgrading my own mod status -- and it has always been an intention in this thread to introduce information/discussion about such mods (despite the provocative thread title, "...for stock KSP". From 'Q3Anon': Q: Do you realize Hotel26 [please call me 'h6'] that you appear to be heading miserē with this thread in that you are now setting a record for the most number of consecutive posts without any intervening response from anybody else? A: Yes, but of course! I did say up front that very few pilots find "flying blind" (and no, we never use that term!) a fun thing to do. If you want to know the whole truth: Q: "I have a follow-up question... There's a rumor making the rounds that you are simply using this thread to build your own micro-website to host your personal list of approaches (similar to what you tried with 'Truman'...). Any comment?" A: Not at this time.

SPACE NEWS GAZETTE Today, just over 6 years since inception of my Orbit world (January, 2018), the first kerbal boots landed this day on the surface of Eve. [click + arrows => slide show] I have been refueling/recycling spent Zephyr boosters from LKO to LEO for some years and they provide a low-tech method to deorbit almost any 2.5m payload (with chutes). In this case, a Milkrun occupied by the valiant Cergel Kerman. In the third shot, Cergel had baled out for a stretch and a soothing back massage (occasionally looking over his shoulder to see how close Eve was approaching!), and then para-sailed to the wreck of the Zephyr (4th shot). (Still containing fuel!) The landed Millkrun can be seen poking up over the rise in the background; a short return stroll.

VLB Approach KSC VAB Helipad: MEA (Minimum Enroute Altitude) is 2000m. You may descend to 1000m within 10km DME. Tune the V-KSC9 VOR (IAF) and navigate to it. Enter an RH Holding Pattern on holding course 093 and descend to 1000m, Depart the IAF at 1000m on course 093, descending at the standard 1:10 ratio, going no lower than 280m. Reaching 7.0 km DME from V-KSC9, switch to L-KSCVH. Descend and maintain 280m. Transition to vertical thrust and begin reducing speed. Note that your sink rate can be observed from the yellow Prograde marker above/below the horizontal on the navball; this is an aid to finding thrust for approximate TWR:1. When the L-KSCVH target marker declines to -45 degrees on the navball, switch to Vertical control reference and reduce forward speed to 5 m/s or so. Establish a small sink rate , maintaining it between 0.5-3 m/s so that the pink navball Anti-Target appears. Yaw, as desired, to keep it ahead of you. W/S on the ("standard") helo joystick will advance/retard the yellow Retrograde Anti-Target ahead and behind. A/D will send the yellow Retrograde marker in the opposite direction. Push the yellow navball marker in the direction of the pink Anti-Target marker but restrain airspeed to make gradual progress only. Use the airspeed indication to cancel horizontal motion over the beacon. Once in guided descent toward the +175m MSL heliroof target, use Airspeed to control thrust and keep the sink rate less than 3 m/s until ready for touch-down. Missed Approach: full procedure entails a return and repeat from V-KSC9. But if not pear-shaped, establish the hover returning to 250 MSL. Return to Horizontal control reference. Yaw the craft until L-KSCVH is once again directly ahead. Move toward it maintaining 250m. Restart the descent. "Good luck with this: it is sweaty work but well worth it once the gear is safely chocked!" -- Jeb Notes about Orc:

At this point, I would like to introduce a new type of (highly fictional) navaid: the Vertical Landing Beacon or VLB. (See also "NDB and VOR navaids" before, which described NDB, VOR and DME navaids.) It is quite a strange Kerbish invention as it does look like a flat (and inert) plate, somewhat resembling an "M-1x1 Structural Panel", if you can imagine that. This one is labeled: "L-KSCVH 0/76.4SW +180 KSC VAB Helipad"[1] and it was Alt-F12 Set Positioned with coordinates -0.096706 -74.618806 alt:105 If you examine the second photo (and you yourself also get lucky, as I did) you may get yours positioned just under the helipad roof, where it is not at all an obstruction. Nevertheless, it if does reappear on the VAB roof after a scene switch, it's not likely to obstruct operations since it is really just a big, flat, robust, printed-circuit board, quite impervious to aircraft tires. To use similes from RL, a VLB is like a vertically-oriented ILS, projecting a conical "descent slope" vertically upward. In addition, it has a low-power NDB side-transmitter with a range of 5km. The upshot is that the instrument pilot will make a 3-phase approach to a vertical landing in zero visibility. The phases are: navigate to a separate IAF (Initial Approach Fix), e.g. a nearby VOR; fly outbound to intercept the VLB (within its 5km horizontal range) and thence to the VLB, transitioning into hover flight; when the VLB marker on the navball declines to the 45-degree depression, switch to VERT-ref mode and commence a controlled descent to land on the marker In my next post, I will publish the VLB Approach KSC VAB Helipad. I guess that any airworthy machine capable of hover flight can be used for the VAB roof, but it would be helpful for a novice to this approach to get accustomed to what I think is a good exemplar for tackling this level of difficulty of approach. So I refer you to the Orc and do highly recommend you try it out. In particular, it is equipped with a Vernor "Instant Arrest"[2] ventral thruster that all but ensures a soft touch-down, all the time, every time. [1] I use Haystack to rename the part but you can name it in the SPH/VAB before deploying to runway/launchpad (but then you have to clean up the unwanted craft file afterward). [2] instant-on descent-arrester

My primary world, Orbit, is six earth year's old and contains that period accumulation of versions of vehicles and other flotsam, jetsam and, especailly vacsam (which can be quite hard to round up due to distances and orbital mechanics). So I'm in a very similar situation, especially as Dr Albert Kerman's 'Theory of Extreme Relativity' has been validated once more now by observation that Time itself is slowing down in Orbit (relative to Earth time, that is, of course). Advisory: schmaltz alert:

So I have a project underway to explore/define "instrument approaches" using stock KSP. No mods, no navaids. This is raw navball. Camera View pointed up. Skyward. Just after touchdown/shutdown. You'll notice the QBE "marker" sitting center on the VAB heliroof (just in front of the port engine pods). When I spawn the QBE onto the roof using Alt-F12 Set Position: -0.0968 -74.6187 +104, the device actually gets located just under the helideck, in the space below. ("104" being the magic key.) I was so thrilled to pull that off because it's center-deck but not an obstruction to landing vehicles. KSP, in all its majestic wisdom, will however promote it up onto the deck after a scene switch returning to the heliroof. Shazbat. In any case, the Orc pictured (the "Director's Cut") has a vertical control reference and a belly Vernor as well as carrying a small supply of monopropellant oxidizer in the cockpit for "instant-on" descent-arrester control. (Which is what makes the whole enterprise manageable.) Concentration level is quite intense. I 'mimed' the operation in "stop motion" in Vessel Mover to get things into my head just before this first successful 'full-dress rehearsal'. Bottom line is that a returning VTOLjet can return to KSC in fog and land on the roof in zero visibility (plus standard radar altimeter; heliroof altitude is 175m MSL).

(I knew there was a way to do it.) I've rediscovered a way to use the keyboard to set the parking brakes (you know what I mean). Wasn't sure whether I would post it in Shower Thoughts(!!) or here, but I do have a picture that almost made the cut to exhibit here in WDYDIKT -- so now I'll do a twofer. Here's the tip: hold the B key down. tap the 'Esc' key to pause Flight View release the 'B' key tap 'Esc' again to unpause Voila, your brakes are locked. And, yes, I think I prefer this to reaching for the mouse. YMMV. Not enough?? OK, here's the recent achievement:

I am finding that if I wait a long time and then attempt to edit/include some plain text, I can Save the change successfully. The post then goes back to being locked for a long time. Q. What is a "long time"? A. Don't know, but will test & report...

Try CAPS LOCK to nerf SAS over-control? (It's a very forlorn hope, I'll grant you...)

It's a known issue and being worked on.

This might seem a little mundane, but even Kerbals like to have a frolic in space! I recently put a brace of (16x) Kerblink dumsats into a 60x90km orbit using Kerblink C-16 (ad): The Kerblink sats spread out (I know I am oh so very late to this party!) but fundamentally "run on rails", as we like to say at SpaceX. LKO Operations Desk at Mission Control sometimes see a dumsat or two in the vicinity. And when the mission schedule gets idle for a spell, it's relaxing to switch to a Kerblink dumsat (unmaneuverable) and ride with its to its fiery de-orbit. (upper right pic) I do actually have a program running at Mission Control to declutter LKO (and we haven't figured out actually what these irritating little orbital gnats do) so it does all seem somewhat pointless. Therefore, be it resolved: the next batch will go up in a westerly equatorial orbit... Ho ho ho. THe LKO Ops Desk are sure to get a big kick out of the periodic "Kerblink showers" they encounter, particularly those crossing the lanes between 90 and 60km!! Similariy ("fiery re-entry"):

(The forum website 'repeat edit issue' has been rectified. Thank you, moderation team!) News: The 'VLB[1] Approach KSC VAB Helipad' will be published shortly! [1] Vertical Landing Beacon (yes, a new type)

ILS Approach KSC R27: Minimum Enroute Altitude is 2000m. Tune V-SADDL on Coney Island and turn to its bearing use [f4] to light target markers and set a view so that the V-SADDL DME (distance) can be read If V-SADDL bearing is between 274 to 004: fly direct to V-SADDL fly outbound on radial 319 fly to the BEERS fix on radial 319 24 km from V-SADDL use a right-turn holding pattern to descend to 1000m and slow to e.g. 100 m/s turn toward 270 to intercept and fly the I-KSC27 ILS approach using -10 m/s descent per 100 m/s airspeed DH (Decision Height) is +130m MSL; go around if GS deflection exits the -5:-10 deg range if V-SADDL bearing is between 004 to 049 or 229 to 274: fly to DME 24km from V-SADDL and then turn to 004 or 274 (respectively) expect to intercept the 319 V-SADDL radial as the V-SADDL target marker on the navball proceeds nearly off the navball, execute a 45-degree turn toward it when that target again approaches an exit from the navball, turn to radial 319 and commence to track out from the anti-target (behind you; opposite corrections) when you reach 24km from V-SADDL on the 319 radial, you are at BEERS and may turn to intercept the I-KSC9 radial as above If V-SADDL bearing is between 319-049 or 229-319: fly to DME 24km from V-SADDL and then turn to 004 or 274 (respectively) expect to intercept the DME 24km arc and then begin incremental-heading tracking of that arc when the heading reaches 049: turn to 090, fly 30s, execute a left-hand Procedure Turn (to 045 and return on 225) to pick up the 270-inbound localizer commence a -10m/s per 100m/s airspeed descent to track the Glide Slope. or when the heading reaches 229: tune the I-KSC27 ILS to pick up the 270-inbound localizer commence a -10m/s per 100m/s airspeed descent to track the Glide Slope DH is +130 MSL or to personal minimum I-KSC27 target outside of -5:-10 degree declination indicates immediately go Missed Approach Missed Approach is a climbing right turn to heading 090, 1000km, and then tune and turn to V-SADDL, climbing to 2000m If in the case, that you approach along the DME arc heading 049, but are not already at the Approach Altitude (1000m), enabling you to use a 090 Procedeure Turn course reversal to intercept the Glisde Slope: then: you should turn inbound to V-SADDL, execute a right-tun holding pattern until 100m and desired approach speed, heading radial 319 outbound then: intercept the I-KSC27 ILS as above Please refer to this helpful diagram below: So, in brief. you can see that three entries to the approach are possible: Direct, which allows one to fly direct to V-CONEY and then out on the 319 radial 24km to the BEERS fix, which will serve as the FAF (Final Approach Fix). Up through the Intercept areas, which will allow one to fly heading 004 or 274, to eventually intercept the 319 outbound radial and proceed to BEERS. via the Arc areas, again flying 004 or 274, but arriving back at the 24 km arc, rather than the 319 radial. Flying the arc accurately means that headings 049 and 229 indicate arrival at the BEERS tangent to the 24 km DME arc. If not at Approach altitude, a right-turn holding pattern at BEERS on the 319 radial from V-CONEY must be adopted until the desired altitude indicates that the ILS can be intercepted and tracked. Otherwise, a 229 arrival at 1000m can be turned directly to track the ILS 27 inbound. A 049 arrival at 1000m has the option of an outbound left-hand Procedure Turn, tracking the localizer.

I just finished drafting the ILS Approach KSC R27, which is intended to be the magnum opus in this thread. The details of this approach will follow, likely in the very next post.

So cool! (+5 coming your way.) The following has been festering inside my cranium for a couple of weeks now. I deliberately picked the most primitive drawing tool on Earth to further torture myself in getting it "on paper", but that is just part of the whole fermentation process. This is going to be the ILS Approach KSC R27 and it's a lulu because it employs VOR/DME arc segments. I had feared that I was going to need to draft a separate approach for traffic originating from the NW but this will work efficiently for all comers. All of the above will be explained; coming soon...

With the following caveat: I thought I'd get serious and start 'balancing' lifters with respect to thrust, fuel load and max payload mass specification. start with an engine add tanks and fuel until the lift-off TWR will be some nominal minimum (e.g. 1.2). KER at least reports this fly a test to 75 km orbit[1] note the amount of fuel remaining. Its mass is your maximum payload. reduce tankage/fuel capacity by this amount of fuel you now don't need the maximum payload possible might go up slightly, but it will be close enough so keep the estimate from 5 as reserve since some payloads will be attract more drag. YMMV. I haven't flown a real test on this algorithm because a) I've only just convinced myself this should work, and b) I'm taking too many showers to have time for the hot and sweaty business of flying. [1] what about multi-stage lifters? I'm thinking that raising PE to some suborbital 'altitude' describes the situation where the upper vehicle will need time for a circularization burn that is largely determined by the vehicle and the separation PE. The PE has to be higher enough that the circularization burn is short enough that Mission Control can return to the earlier stage for Ride & Recovery. The engine and TWR of the second-stage of the lifter will largely determine the required circularization time. [2] I've many times used parasitical lifters that draw fuel from the payload. This seems like a very flexible arrangement. But I think it's obsolete if one has a range of lifters spanning the payload mass spectrum. If your payload is too heavy with fuel for a lifter you want to use, and you know you want to refuel it in orbit before interplanetary departure, you have the option to unload as much fuel from it as will get it under the max weight for your desired lifter. You'll just have to leave enough for maneuver and rendez-vous for that refueling. [3] I guess some people like the fun of designing every lifter for every individual payload!? They might feel bad about using a range of payload-spanning lifters in a "modular" style? I think every launch to orbit should carry full fuel (even with a lighter payload). The excess fuel should be stored in orbital depots. Then the lifter de-orbited or otherwise re-used. (I send one species to Eve for use there as de-orbital boosters!) [4] time to cool off!

Back in November, I had an Atlas III (ad), my heaviest class of surface miner (622,200 kallons total capacity), arrive in the Jolian system and -- by goof [sic] fortune -- find itself well-poised to simply effect capture at Pol; rather than suffer the hazards of the Jolian pinball machine. It was able, there, to refuel and then head toward its original target, Vall. Today, happy to report capture: In the meantime, I had as well, relocated my Vall miner, Goblin (ad), cap. 32,000 kallons, out to Pol. Here's why -- in a spoiler, because this is a huge, huge "cheat":

It's quite easy to doppelgang, trippelgang, vervierfachengang, ... RCS thrusters.

Assuming you landed with AP engaged and that is what caused the ensuing problem, then... try the following. When you take off again, do it without the auto-pilot. Once you get to a safe altitude, engage the auto-pilot and give it some time to get straightened out. If you get out-of-control, disengage the a/p, get re-established en route, at a safe altitude -- and try again. I think this may help, but can't guarantee it.

"Simplified IFR approaches for stock KSP": some brief explanation of what I mean here by the term "stock". Of course, "stock" does include a completely unmodded KSP installation. And that any of the approaches described in this thread can be flown without any mods at all. At some point soon, I will be able to certify that I have flown all approaches in a pure stock KSP fashion. And in particular, it means that no KSP mod that is specialized in providing new/enhanced instrumentation for the provision of instrument navigation information is required. This is important because it is why this thread exists: its intention is to provide instrument navigation experience (of a kind) without the necessity of additionally installing (potentially-unwanted) mods. This seems reasonable since the odds are high that you might find "flying IFR" in KSP a pointless waste of time -- but hopefully still an interesting/enlightening experience, one-time only. At a later juncture in this thread, I do intend to conduct a review of IFR mods available for KSP and would certainly be happy if a discussion about their various merits started. As you might gather, this thread is hopefully a bootstrap to greater interest in "things IFR". So here, I am referring to IFR nav-aid specialty mods -- and we come to the point of this post: I don't consider mods that help you fly accurately, such as autopilots, as IFR mods; they are orthogonal in nature. You may disagree, but while you can fly these approaches without an autopilot (and General Aviation pilots most usually do fly without autopilots), you will certainly do better in KSP with a keyboard AND with an autopilot. KER, on the other hand, provides heads-up displays that can include information, albeit in numerical form, that augments the navigation information available. I have to class these kind of mods as navigational aids and are specifically neither required nor assumed by the approaches being given. Because flying with a keyboard (or even a joystick) doesn't give the level of fine control that yoke & rudders do IRL, but also due to the aerodynamics of KSP, flying IFR maneuvers is harder/different. I've found that flying a 45-degree bank while keeping the nose slightly above the horizon works pretty well. You can slip in a shot of rudder now and then to hurry the turn along, as you feel necessary.

Humanity is an emergent concept. It exists from people, separately from people. (And, no, I do not mean one can exist without (some of) the other.) Abstracted from "people", if you struggle with the "separately". The real question is why you should want to save it -- and that we should is is a total assumption that we generally consider completely granted. I also have reservations about our space-faring ability. In our current form, we are very unlikely to be able to go personally to any other solar system.

This post by @Dakitess is worth reading! https://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/topic/222559-what-does-your-ascent-profile-look-like/?do=findComment&comment=4355775 Dakitess correctly identifies TWR as the prime variable that leads to the correct choice of my 'X m/s', the speed at which to commence the gravity turn. This had only been an unidentified intuition with me; Dakitess formulates the relationship very clearly. - Thanks, Bej. You might find this helpful, then. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/retardation Please see meaning #1, specifically. But do note 'wiktionary.org', in general, as an excellent online resource! I am a firm believer that people should continue learning/increasing their knowledge of their working language for the whole extent of their lives. (Lest they spend their whole lives dazed and confused.) The internet makes it easy to continue learning and provides an indispensable aid to good communication! - Brilliant! That's it. A range of modular lifters is an essential tool. Makes the investment to find out how to perfect (and document) its ascent an easy choice -- and as reliable as 'Clockwork' to run.

From the Structure of Scientific Revolutions, by Thomas S. Kuhn: ...

Nope. But it is more like a "gated community"...