Warzouz

Well, when you have to burn radial to go to LKO, you waste a LOT of fuel. Usually, we don't pack fuel for those kind of burn. If you go to LKO with a regular 3200/3300 m/s you pretty much fail when you reach APO to low. You don't have fuel to burn again to change your trajectory. You might burn up fuel that should have been used for circularizing. Any time I lift off (on Kerbin or on other body) and cross my apoapsis (usually by going to flat too soon with insufficient TWR) no burn could recover my trajectory (with the fuel I usually carry). F9 has always been my only salvation.

Any rocket will need around 3200m/s (either SSTO or staged rockets). I put 3400m/s into my first stage when they need to be returned to ground. If your payload is bulky or non streamlined, you may need more than 3200m/s. Also, if your TWR is too low, you'll need more dV (due to more gravity loss).

Thanks. I spent quite few hours on those launchers, but now I can built nearly any variation my computer can handle in few minutes and be reasonably sure the rocket will go to LKO at first test. I'm not into mods for now. I've lurked on MKS, but restart a stock game in 1.0. The concept if very basic it can be adapted to probably every mod. As dV had reduced between beta 0.9 and 1.0 from 4500m/s to 3200m/s, SSTO rocket are much more viable. A regular staged launcher has around 25% mass efficiency. SSTO rocket are around 15/20%. As you recover the whole stage, I find the difference is not worth dealing wit staged launchers. With the previous 4500m/s dV, the difference might have bee much less in favor of the SSTO rockets. In other words : thos SSTO rocket may be too easy...

Gold rule : make it simple and light If you pass your Apoapris, you failed. You dobn't have enough TWR so you can't increase you max altitude (Apoapsis). As many said : use Kerbal Engineer Redux (KER) mod. With that you'll get reading about your rocket TWR and you delta-V (dV). There are many vehicles that go to space. the easiest way to do it is to pack a TWR of 1.4 or 1.5 and have 3200m/s dV (3500 with largely safe margin) Make your first rocket simple. Use 2 stack stages - One with fins at the bottom which have to set your Apoapsis to 80km - One with a small engine to circularize. An easier way to do it is to create a SSTO rocket. They are easy to fly, but are a more expensive. Only one stage A for flying, there are many videos that explain the proper 1.0 way to go to orbit. I like to turn 5° at 50m/s to aim crossing theb 45° between 8 and 10km. and then flat my trajectory around 25 to 30km (what even my rocket akllow me to do). Don't discard fins before 35km or you may flip. If you rocket flip : increase fins size (don't hesitate to use wing parts) If you can't turn : reduce your wing size or add more control surfaces. And another simple rule : you always want to point your ship are prograde, not more that 5° from it.

Nice one. There are 2 more variations working with fusion from what I understood. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Daedalus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Longshot

Beware that MechJeb may waste a lot of RCS to dock. You can do much more efficently by doing it manually. There is a very usefull mod to help docking: something like "Port Docking Aligmenent". I usually dock my 7 tons (3 tons empty) lander with less than 4 units of RCS, even not tryiong to be efficient. I also dock my 60 tons refueler with 20 to 30 RCS fuel. Be gentle on the RCS thrusters. Go slow, use timewarp instead of using more RCS to go faster.

12000 was in beta. It's easier now. I've landed a 180tons lander with 9400 m/s and get back to low orbit with 2900m/s left. I don't remember which altitude (maybe 1500m). I tried to make a lighter ascent vehicle, but I failed with 7000m/s. This require a lot of tweaking to manager heat and avoiding flipping. Aero streamline is very important. You should be fine with 7500 to 8000m/s. Remember that there is a very large nearly flat aera on the equator which altitude is mostly between 1000 and 2000m. Landing there should be the easiest but maybe not the most efficient (there are higher peaks). My tests were done with hyperedit. I didn't started the real mission yet.

Ah, I designed in my career game. They evolved with science unlock until I was satisfied about them. Ad big probes and big docking rings are end game there is no real way to do it at lower tech.

You don't need full science from each science experiment. To get full science : explore KSC, and a bit of Kerbin. Go to Mun and Minmus (maybe twice when you get new experiments). Get a peek to Kerbol SOI, you should unlock everything and have some Kerbals level 3. Then go explore the universe !

Nice desgn. Beware of aero flip on Laythe. Your mass seems to be quite backward and you do'nt have any fins. Your ship may probably flip. EDIT : Ninja'd

This is a big plane to put only 4 kerbals to LKO ! You don't need that many wings. You don't need that many engines. Structural and radial intakes aren't suited for space planes (use shock cones). FYI, my passenger space plane can carry 10 kerbals to LKO (with 600m/s left for space operations) weights 36 tons and carry 2 rapier and 1 turbojet.

Also, smaller rocket are harder to fly because the flip faster : you may not have time to compensate.

I don't build too big stations. But the interplanertary stage + LKO stage may put them at 350 parts (especially to Moho). Going to LKO may be a pain. but thinkgs get better next. On Beta 0.9, I made the error to send a space station to Laythe in piecies. 13 flight assembled there. Ending part count : 900 ! KAS to the rescue to remove all thos useless RCS packs, solar panels, small engines... Part count went to 600 which was better. The station had 1 return ship, 6 landers (most were SSTO) and 6 orange tanks. I didn't try to reload the station in 1.0.4. The new engine ISP and aero wouldn't allow the Laythe and Tylo lander to work.

Going to Eve is not hard, circularize at low orbit require more fuel than Duna. Areobraking is more dangerous if you ship is not designed for it. Now for landing it's quite easy but taking of is harder. Engines have a lower ISP than on Kerbin and you'll heat up faster. It's propbably the hardest thing to do in stock KSP : ascending from Eve (followed by landing on Tylo, and circularizing at Moho)

Maybe KSP gameplay doesn't suite what you like to play. There might not be any answer to your OP question. Do you like game without built-in goal ? like Minecraft...

As the never-ending-topic-about-space-planes shows, we all play KSP as we like to. Personnally, I like to tweak ships until they're efficient for what they were designed to. I was not sure that anyone would use those space stations, because I wouldn't have. But maybe the charts, the concept could be inspiring for others. But It seems I was wrong and if you prefer to explore body than design ships to go there, It's definitely a way to go.

I prefer turning that the other way : "our time is so limited that we want to focus on what we like to do."

No they aren't. Space planes are cheapest, then rocket SSTO (recoverable), then staged rockets.

It's possible to land on Eve Without airbrakes Without chutes Without drogues Without heat shield only Ker-balls ! http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/130104

Well, I think differenty lifting 100 tons cost twice than lifting 50tons (well even lower in my calculations...) http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/123195 To assemble a ship in orbit, you need engines, docking rings, RCS tanks and RCS thrusters which add mass. In the end, you may not gain from assembling stuff in space. The only advantage is avoiding sending horribly wobbling payloads.

No don't waste too much fuel, you'll need it to take of You have to find a shallow angle and airbrakes combination. Use KER to show "critical temp". Mine is usually between 90 and 95%. I even landed a ship after it was up to 98.5% of max temp.

Wrong forum. You don't need heat shields to land on Eve, you need Airbrakes. You must lower your speed for reentry. I've landed a 180Tons with airbrakes and chutes. Drogues aren't usefull. Airbrakes will slow you down to 200m/s when you can open chutes (not 250 as on kerbin !) It you go too hot, add more airbrakes.

I had that on a old Mun space station. The station was starting to rotate in mostly random direction, even with SAS on. Sometime, rotation could be explosive. Never found what it was I replaced the station and crashed the buged one to the Mun ground...

So do I. Then I add some "stable" save on few occasions when ships are on course or circularized. Quicksave are throwable saves I do for delicate maneuvers. One of my mods also do auto-"backup" saves of persistent and Quick. I think it's KAC, but I'm not sure.

We found who stranded all those kerbals !!!! :D