Warzouz

I'm currently attempting a nightly 550km trip on Eve at 20m/s speed on x3 physical time warp using MechJeb Rover Autopilot. EDIT : after more than one hour and 250km done, everything goes smoothly. I've tried to go to x4, but the rover blow every 30km. On the other hand, I'm testing with the previous prototype. The published version has a higher ground clearance. It could work at x4. EDIT 2 : 560km done. I meet with the latest version of the rover which has higher ground clearance. It can drive at x4 at 20m/s (the rover can't really go faster)

OK, the Doggy Pack is available. I've doing some serious tweaking Rover : removed dorsal docking port and replaced by cubic strut Rover : Science are all individual (no symmetry). Action group 8 activate all 7 science experiments now. Rover : Lot of tweaking to get COM right on the cubic strut Rover : Wheels lowered to get better ground clearance Leash : Part reduction (removed secondary reaction wheel and some cubic struts) Atmospheric Leash : Only one heat shield, 2 big chutes instead of 7, most cubic struts removed. Pack Master: Girders replaced by structural fuselage (nicer, simple lighter) With those upgrades : Loaded Heavy Pack Master is 221 parts for 21.6T Loaded Medium Pack Master is 189 parts for 12.8T Loaded Light Pack Master is 181 parts for 10.1T Loaded Atmospheric Pack Master is 197 parts for 16.2T (instead of 300 parts!) Of course you need a proper interplanetary stage. EDIT : First topic revamped

Well, after building the pack master with atmospheric sky-cranes, the ship (even incomplete) is about 300 parts. I think I've to simplify things... EDIT : Crate Jumping (click to enlarge) any flying boulder

The puppy would have been the prototype

@ryan234abc, I'm testing every thing with HE setting the rover and it's crane into orbit. THEN I do the descent. And my final design topic

"Doggy": high speed rover, sky-crane and carrier (pictures are clickable - except this one...) Doggy is a science probe rover which is designed be deployed on any planet or moon. Deployment is done with a specific skycrane : the Leash. Doggy comes by packs of 4 into the Pack Master which provide support and interplanetary transfer. Due to the number of PB-Nuke, the PackMaster is an expensive tool for exploring a body. Yet, it's nice and fun Typical Doggy missions starts by setting the Pack Master into a polar orbit. From there, it can deploy Doggy rovers powered by their Leash. Deorbit and retro burn will land the Doggy. Then the Leash is undocked and Doggy is free to roam everywhere. Doggy rover package Download package : Doggy Pack (230kB) Doggy rover (subassembly) 4 Doggy rover with leashes (subassembly) 4 Leashed (subassembly) Pack Master unloaded (subassembly) Pack Master loaded (subassembly) 4 Doggy Packs (VAB ship) Doggy, the rover Doggy is a 1.1 ton rover equipped with rugged wheels for performance. It's full science probe with antenna and autonomous power supply. It's equipped with a reaction wheel for better control on low gravity bodies. Only rear wheels provide braking. Only forward wheels provide steering and motion. Doggy is powered by 2 RTG which let it run non stop. It can even send science while running. You may want to stop to recharge faster, but that's not mandatory. Doggy has been tested on Kerbin for a 10m/s hard landing. Doggy has also been tested on Minmus, Duna, Mun, Eeloo, Eve, Laythe and Tylo. On Eve, it had landed on a 30° slope, and rolled to the bottom of the valley. On Laythe, highest speed on a 20° slope was reached at 55m/s, then braking has successfully slow down the rover. Let's say Doggy is very stable. Doggy rover has also been tested on an extensive 550km trip on Eve at 20m/s on x3 physical timewarp without any crash. Also 30km trip on 5 to 20m/s on Mun (beware of ridges). Important : remap WASD keys to numpad or arrows to allow control over roll, yaw and pitch using reaction wheel while jumping. This reduces flipping chances. Unleashed Doggy front and back Leash, the sky-crane On the back of Doggy, there is a node designed to attach a sky-crane, a "Leash". Sky-cranes are used to land and deploy a Doggy rover. Leash is fitted with probe core, engine and/or chutes and heat shield. Leashes are not meant to be kept after landing. Decouple the leash and fire the engines, it'll go away and Doggy can run free. There are 4 different Leashes Heavy Leash : for Tylo, 2600m/s Medium Leash : for Vall, and Moho, 1510m/s Light Leash : for Duna and every other bodies, 730m/s. Atmospheric Leash : for Eve and Laythe (heat shield chutes and engines for 240m/s) NB: the correct way to attach the crane is by having the OKTO2 logo toward the rear of the rover. Light, Medium, Heavy and Atmospheric Leashes (on Doggy) Pack Master, the polar orbital carrier Pack Master is the Doggy carrier. It hosts 4 Doggies with their Leash. The carrier is equipped with a probe core, and non reusable science equipment. It's provided without engines, You only have to get a proper engine and fuel tanks to make it to your destination. Pack Master configurations (without interplanetary stage) : Loaded Heavy Pack Master is 221 parts for 21.6T Loaded Medium Pack Master is 189 parts for 12.8T Loaded Light Pack Master is 181 parts for 10.1T Loaded Atmospheric Pack Master is 197 parts for 16.2T (instead of 300 parts!) Pack Master loaded with Aero Leashed Doggies and with Medium Leashed Doggies Flight operations Set the Pack Master on a polar orbit Use Pack Master material lab and Goo in high space and low space. Decouple the rovers one by one. Control from the probe core on the sky-crane and deorbit. For vacuum worlds and Duna, just do a regular retrograde landing. For atmospheric worlds (Eve and Laythe), set the rover prograde after deorbiting. To Avoid burning the wheels, roll the rover. When speed is safe, detach the heat shield and shake it loose. Head retrograde and trigger chutes. Always keep a bit of fuel to get rid of the crane. Lock brakes before landing. Activate lighting and control from frontal probe core. After landing, decouple the Leash and lift it, then go sideways (you may free engine gimbal). You can use the rover freely. SAS is not mandatory but it makes driving much easier, especially on low gravity worlds. On low gravity worlds, steer using SAS. On high gravity worlds, steer with the steering controls. When braking, you can also go backward and pitch up a bit to help wheel touch the ground. When jumping, use SAS to land parallel to the ground. When climbing, you can hit “6” to go to 4WD. That use more power but helps. Turn it down when you don't need it Have fun Eve atmospheric reentry and rolling from a 30° mountain Laythe speed record (55m/s on 22° slope) and Mun crater jump Action groups 6 : Toggle 4WD 8 : Instant science 10 : Deploy antenna (cosmetic) Feedback appreciated

Yes.I've figure that the rover, at high speed (>15m/s) can bump, even on flat terrain. This result in loss of control. In that case, the rover don't blow immediately. That leave the time to control with the reaction wheel. It's the same when Jumping from cliffs. If you've time to set the wheels parallel to to arriving terrain, you don't bounce and your rover is fine. If you hit one or 2 wheels before the other, you can start a heavy roll. It's recoverable, but hazardous. And BTW, The rover performs very well. I was rolling on a 22% slope at 55m/s on Laythe and I could brake to 0 quite fast without even loosing control.

Well everything is going nicely Here is my Eve skycrane Rolling down a 30° hill on Eve at 30m/s.

Roving on the Mun at 25m/s and jumping into craters is very fun... but dangerous. I added action groups : 6 : toggle 4WD to climb hills 8 : Full science activation 10 : Antenna deploy (cosmetic - it's a dog after all)

Minmus test : that was much less fun than I expected. I don't understand why, the the rear of the rover is lifting when I accelerate. Torque partially compensate. Rover is 1.1T. EDIT : Remapping steering solve this issue : it's VERY important to remap the keys Brake works fine, no flipping. But on stop, with brake on, the river starts to jiggle. EDITs : well, that mountain was very far....

That's true, even if the station I build aren't that big. Basically they are support for science landers and return (to kerbin) vehicles. With ISRU, stations can be much smaller. Back in beta 0.9, I sent a space station into Laythe orbit to explore Jool system. I launch 13 rocket with payload assembled around Laythe. In the end the station a so many redundant parts that it lagged a lot. I had to install KAS/KIS to remove 300 out of 900 parts. After landing nearly twice or 3 times on every bodies, I even used half of my fuel reserves. (landers where around 15 tons even for Pol and Bop)

I don't use RCS thrusters, I use reaction wheels to keep the station on Normal orientation. You don't need translation on a space station. Corrections are rare, you can live without any dedicated engines (I used to add Twitch engines to a station but I don't any more because I never used them). Now I add a LVN engine block, but that's the Miner lander which can be used for interplanetary transfers. One of my space station prototypes coming from Bop and going to Vall orbit (in a Tylo flyby).

Thx BTW I've changed the wheels to reduce flip Front wheels : steering and motion Rear wheels : braking As I use only 2WD and not 4WD, I only need 2 PBNuke and not 4. And mixing wheels and landing gear didn't do well. I started on the runway with the wheel IN the ground and I could get out of it. When I used 4 wheel, not problem. As for the unflip device, I tried the landing gear on top, but that hit the crane and blew everything. I'll do some testing to see if the rover is usable. I was also considering RCS thrusters. I'm not sure about stacking the rover on top of each other. As I intend to increase it's length, that may not fit. I'll try a carrier design this evening. 4 rover may fit around a central axis, I may have to offset 2 by 2. I'll dig into it. Objectives for this evening : Add reaction wheel control to Doggy One Increase length by adding a small lab Test on Kerbin Test in Minmus Design the carrier for 4 doggy rovers (should be quite light but very bulky) And BTW, here is the name of my rover design Doggy : the actual rover Leash : the sky crane (which comes in 4 variations) Pack Master : the carrier probe in low polar orbit

I love space station, but I build "exploration space station". I don't make them nice, I make them efficient and usefull. Here are my tips for space station : Make it reasonably compact. Fancy may be nice but is part and mass consuming. Make it simple so you always find part sections easily. Launch it in one flight if you can. In the end, it's cheaper and your station will end having less parts. Limit orbital assembly : each section may need additional stuff (RCS tanks, RCS thrusters, probe cores, batteries, solar panel...) In the end these are redundant. A station don't need RCS thrusters. It may have RCS tanks to refuel arriving ships. Use one main docking port type. Add ONE large docking ring for extension. Each extension sent should have 2 large docking ring. Concentrate your docking ports at one end of the station Concentrate fragile parts on the other end (solar panels) to prevent messing a docking procedure Put your station on normal orientation, it's easy to find where to dock Add lights to target your docking ports. (this is not as easy as it sounds) Use lights color to help you identify what is where from a far distance. Put lights around ladders and airlocks to help kerbal in EVA Don't over do crew quarters Add few science equipment to get easy "do science from space around XXX" contracts. Add an antenna. If your station has refueling capacity, don't hesitate to stick engines on it. So you can move your station to another body. Always add a probe core with locked battery (this will be used as an emergency reserve) Add large battery for regular usage. Here is my design

Yes I add 2 for a long time, and one disappeared after dozens of hours and many landing. Suddenly, one of the two flags wasn't there any more.

I'll add a small reaction wheel upfront and a material lab at the back. The rover will be around 1 ton. Crane will be OK, but Tylo crane may qualify as low TWR. I'll test it on Minmus. I have a idea for a 4 rover carrier. The carrier will be equipped with science to do high and low non reusable science + a survey scanner. The carrier is designed to be deployed into polar orbit. Total carrier weight should be around 20 tons (Tylo crane version). I'll be able to send it easily anywhere. Do you have any idea for a design with heat shield (I think I could stick it on top of the crane with a decoupler so it would reenter up front and the crane would still be usable with the shield to maneuver and deorbit. Further more, that would still fit in my carrier. Chutes could be added on the crane. But as I increase the size of the rover, wheels may be out of the shield. EDIT : Hopefully wheels behave strangely. As the rover flip while braking, I was doing a classic thing : rdecung brake force on front wheel. That mainly solved the forward flipping on Kerbin. But as I added the crane, I tested the brakes again. and it flipped. That make basically no sense as forward wheel don't brake. Braking could have been less effective and may result in lateral control loss but not flipping forward. I hope 1.1 will improve wheels.

Ok, that was easier than expected ! Here is the science rover "Doggy One" (every science equipment except Material Study), equipped with the Tylo-rated Skycrane (tested on Kerbin). Rover is 875kg and 3660kg with Tylo Skycrane (2700m/s, TWR=1.25) Atmospheric analyzers are useless, but look nice Now I've to develop a variant for Eve and Laythe with a heatshield. I suppose this version will do for Duna. No need for chutes and heatshield. Some more test : The rover can land by hitting the ground at 10m/s, not tire blast. Braking hard doesn't flip the rover. But it can if the skycrane is still attached. The rover can flip while jumping X4 physic warp is... dangerous

OK, here is my starting base. Front wheel : no motor, brake = 100, steering Rear wheel : motor, no steering, brake = 600 It's reasonably stable. To flip on braking. Only flips on hard turns, but I've time to correct. Autonomous.

Thx for your answers. I was also thinking about retrofitting my usual lander with wheels. I'll test that too. I'll do some Kerbin testing. And BTW : do you design rovers in VAB or SPH ?

As 1.1 approaches, I'm starting to wonder on what to design in my next carreer game. On the previous one I sent a probe carrier around Eve with 8 dropable 2.5 science probes. For my next career, I want to do better, I want to carry ROVERS, maybe 4 per trip. I was wondering about their design and especially electricity. The most efficient wheels seems to use 0.7e/s. As I like standard build, I want to do a PB-Nuke rover not a solar one (I had bad experience landing solar probe on Eve pole and getting no direct sun because of surrounding hills..). Does wheels use 0.7e/s per wheel ? In that case should I build a 2 wheel rover helped by 2 additional landing gears ? If I understand, top speed is around 23m/s and tire blow if I go over 60m/s (means I fall ?) I was wondering about structural fuselage and sticking equipment on it. Stack probe up front and stack battery at the back. For vac bodies, I'll add a skycrane stage (and hope not to blow tires on landing) For atmo bodies, I'll go with the heat shield and small deorbiting engine. Do you have some suggestions ? mistakes not to do ?

Agreed, but the runway would be more useful for landing. When I play I always set a flag on both ends of the runway (they are visible on approach) and a rover anywhere on KSC so I can view it from space. More generally, markers could be added. For example, to target a point for deorbiting when you use the same kind of ship. Planetary surface features may be hard to use on the night side. I usually use the western border of the big crater 90° west of KSC. But I night, I have a very hard time to find it...

In stock game, you have to pay once to get a new kerbal. Price increases with the number of Kerbal you already have (maybe because you have to bribe all of them so they accept the new guy/girl !) The cheapest way is to rescue them from Kerbin orbit. Your get many of them there. You can still rescue them from other bodies but You'll need time and resources to get them back to Kerbin (and that'll lock a contract slot longer) Kerbal stock hiring is quite strange.

@Snark. Yes you're right, that depends on how we build our rockets. That why I like 1.0 aero. It's not as obvious as before. I remember nearly always using Mechjeb before 1.0, not because I didn't know how to go to LKO, but because I found that not very interesting. Since 1.0, I nearly never used MJ to go to LKO (well sometime to do the circularizing burn) because it's much more interesting than before.

I just finished my presentation today. Sadly, I had to skip the whole chapter about rockets due to lack of time. But everyone was enthusiast. It was a success ! Here is what I did in 1h30 Chapter 1 : 4 questions about gravity (Why earth orbit the sun and not the opposite ? Why the apple fall and not the moon ? Can we reach ISS with a ladder ? ...) Chapter 2 : Ellipses and hyperboles, basic orbital mechanics. Importance of speed, Newton canon, apoapsis & periapsis, prograde accelerations (as near as mass), changing direction (as far from mass possible), periaps kicks Chapter 3 : Interplanetary missions, transfers (rapid, direct, hohmann), phase angles and ejection angles, aerocapture and gravity assist, Commented 7min video

A agree with you, but I noticed that generally, it's best to cross the 45° around 8km if payload is reasonably well streamlined.