Zeratul_r

http://www.curse.com/ksp-mods/kerbal/222685-kerbal-engineer-redux This is the link to the mod called Kerbal Engineer Redux. Install it using instructions on that page. With that when you go to VAB you will see the window which contains all the necessary data about a rocket you are currently building (if the window is not displayed press the small button which says "KER" in the lower right corner). The most important part is delta v divided by stages. This column tells you how much delta v that particular stage has and how much delta v all the stages before had. Next step is to find a delta v map. KSP wiki has one: http://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/images/7/73/KerbinDeltaVMap.png It may be hard to read it at first but actually it's quite easy. Let's say you want to land your Kerbonaut on Minmus and safely get back to Kerbin. Find the Low kerbin orbit (LKO) and Minmus. Two points are connected by a line and a few numbers, add them together. It will be 930+340+160+180=1610 to land on Minmus and 180+160=340; all in all 1950 delta v. That is a rough estimate. WIth Minmus it will be probably less because 340 for inclination change is way too much but at first I'd recommend to take 10-15% more just to be safe. So if you build in your VAB a ship which has 2100-2200 delta v in vacuum (press atmospheric and move altitude slider to 70 km) according to KER it will be probably able to get your guy or gal to Minmus and back. Of course you will need to get that ship to orbit. Build the lower stages and look at their delta v estimate (but now use 0 altitude since you will be launching from the ground). Note that Kerbin LKO delta v listed in this map is incorrect. I personally safely launch rockets with 3700+ although many people in this forum talk about 3500. Another important piece of data the KER gives you is TWR. You can have tens of thousands delta v but if your TWR is less than 1 you will be unable to lift your rocket off the ground at all. For launch TWR higher than 1.3 is ok and higher than 1.6 is better. At the same time too high TWR is also bad. IF twr at launch is higher than 2 you should probably remove some engines from the first stage/use less powerful engines since they are basically a dead weight. If you want to see KER window in flight you should add a piece called Kerbal Engineering System (science tab) to your rocket.

Initially Col is at the centre of the floor. That means that there is nothing on your rocket that creates a lift. As soon as you put some aerodynamic elements on, Col will move to its actual position. The general rule that I found to be true on my rockets is that more bigger fins and winglets at the very bottom of the rocket equals more stability.

I think that if there are so many large fins far from the centre of gravity that they can reliably bring back the rocket that started to fall, they would also make it almost impossible to do gravity turn (or any turn for that matter below 15-20 km). It would be like trying to make tilting doll lower its head and don't go back. In my experience (which is not very large to tell the truth) some fins can help but they are not always a best solution. After I've learnt to keep level indicator point inside the prograde market, don't go too fast (not faster than the terminal velocity, although I don't know how to determine it for different rockets) and put things like goo canisters, batteries and protruding antennas inside the service module, my rate of catastrophic failures decreased significantly.- - - Updated - - - As far as I know many modern rockets don't have tail-fins. For example: US Antares and Falcon 9, Russian Soyuz 2 and Angara, based on the photos neither of them have tail-fins.

That is exactly what happened to me. Yesterday I was able to bring 2 pods from the orbit safely by pressing space and deploying parachutes at 35 km and 2300 m/s speed and today all it gave me was a message "parachute was destroyed by heat and something"... I reloaded a save made after launch. I thought that both passengers were doomed because the only option was to aerobrake until the speed was around 500 m/s and the fiery effects died down. The only problem was that my vessel didn't have a heat shield. I gave it a go anyway and after the couple of tries it worked! I lost some small parts like batteries and solar panel mounted on the sides but the engine (which was turned prograde and, if I understand it correctly took the largest amount of heat) didn't even start to overheat (the red icon didn't appear). It's possible that it wouldn't work on return trip from the Mun due to higher speed so I think that in future I will make all crafts with shields just to be safe.