KerbonautInTraining

[Insert Kerbalized magic school bus theme]

From the latest devnote: "Other than bugfixes, there are several small quality-of-life improvements: vessels in the tracking station can be sorted in order of when their next manoeuvre node is set to occur..."

Why is this thread stickied...?

What was the TWR in that configuration? I'd imagine it's pretty darn low.

That's actually really good considering the size of the rocket. I remember trying with a cluster of 5 orange tanks as a lower stage and got like 25 minutes.

Added your entry to the OP and updated the guidelines to be a bit more specific regarding the final stage

Whew, I totally thought this was gonna be banished to the Second Page of Death

Well, that'll make launching a bit easier. I take it that's what was causing the higher than expected payload capacity? Eh, @maccollo a couple of nitpicks: The descriptions for the 8.4/10m fairings are flipped, and the 3x booster sepatron doesn't load sometimes but I think that's something on my end. However it would appear roketman is having the same issue.

I swear to you guys I saw it a few days ago and immediately thought of this thread. I went into the settings menu thinking it would stay there until I started the game again. I was wrong. rip mun castle 2016-2016

I second this. Higher capacity & lower weight at the cost of durability. My two cents on the topic: I think reaction wheel strength could be another useful tool for balancing pods. (Lander can should be weaker than the command pod IMO)

Administration at the Kerbal Space Center was horrified to hear that Jeb planned on landing himself the Mun before they'd even checked to see what the surface is made of. Jeb was not pleased with their subsequent decision to cancel his flight. They said at the very least he would need to wait until they had a probe on the surface of the Mun. Jeb hatched a plan. Your job is to send a probe to impact the Mun as quickly as possible. Soft landings are for wimps. Guidelines: Stock parts only "Indestructible facilities" is recommended (Space center-> Esc -> Settings -> Difficulty Options) The use of KerbalJointReinforcement is encouraged It should go without saying, but no F12 menu or HyperEdit The final stage of your rocket must be a probe core (with no engines attached to it) that is jettisoned from the rest of the rocket No entries over 1 hour 90 minutes will be accepted Include screenshots of your vessel on the pad, a few as the burn progresses, of the final payload on its way to the Mun, and one showing impact in the mission log [F3] These guidelines are subject to change Scoring will be based entirely on time from liftoff to Munar impact. A "featured" scoreboard will be added to highlight any special entries (Single stage, SRB's only, etc) Tips: High TWR is key. It reduces gravity losses and increases average velocity. (Ion and nuclear propulsion are essentially useless) Sort by mass in the VAB to make sure you're not adding unnecessary weight Send a "scout" vessel to the launchpad, timewarp until the Mun is directly over the morning side of Kerbin (setting it as target helps), and recover the vessel. This launch window provides the best lighting for screenshots. Scoreboard: Nefrums: 0:13:58!! FinalHazard: 0:14:53 totalitor: 0:16:05 Atlanticrash: 0:18:48 Reactordrone: 0:22:52 killakrust: 0:32:29 (Bonus: Included antennas and reaction wheels on the probe) DoctorDavinci: 0:37:34 My 0:16:43 entry (I'd be surprised if somebody could get below 15 10 minutes... but then again I'm probably underestimating the KSP community's love for boosters)

I think something like this would go well on engines

Pumping fuel forward to stabilize a tumbling aircraft will be much, much easier now. [HYPE INTENSIFIES]

"NO STEP" On what planet would somebody go "hmm yes I'm just going to step on this multi million dollar rocket stage I'm sure it's fine." I think the Kerbals have influenced our space program.

Of course! As long as the ship has the right fractions of LH2/LOX. Is anyone else having problems with the Pyrios boosters giving NaN thrust values? I haven't touched their config, didn't notice when it started happening. Chances are I broke something.

Well, my point still stands. I thought it was normal to wait 5 months for whatever reason, I didn't know their launch schedule.

SES-9 is in exactly 5 days. The first launch I watched after getting into spaceflight was CRS-7. I got used to the massive gap between launches that launching once a month is totally new to me and I love it.

Yeah, but it would have to stretch well beyond geostationary altitude. As I said, the ability to pop things into orbit 35,000km above the earth would be absolutely amazing. TLI from there would be in the order of hundreds of meters per second as opposed to 3.2km/s from LEO.

Are those screenshots taken on Kerbin? The mountains in the background look suspicious...

Looking back at it, I should probably say more. I'm all for space elevators if we can build one, being able to put stuff in GEO for damn near free would open up tons of new opportunities. They were talking about how you'd go about building it, saying stuff like "oh just start at the top and hang it from the space station" and all throughout they were implying that rockets simply lift their payload straight up, but I don't blame them for that at all. I had no idea what rockets did after going above the clouds until I played KSP, less than a year ago

Pinch me, I'm dreaming. I just built my first SSTO. First time flying it (other than a low alt takeoff/landing test) I got to orbit with 1900m/s left in the tanks. I've never even been that interested in SSTO's because I like to know beforehand my chances of success. I'm very proud of the fact that it doesn't rely on remaining fuel for balance and doesn't go unstable at any point in the ascent. (I didn't base it off anyone else's design, sorry if it resembles something you built!) E: I made some very precise, calculated modifications (slapped on more fuel tanks) so there's 3400m/s left in orbit. It can land on the Mun and return with 600m/s left. It does, however, get a bit unstable when the tanks are empty. As long as the AoA doesn't go above about 20° in the lower atmosphere it's fine.

So I just started reading "Voyage" and they're using chemical propulsion. The propellant for the mission had to be put in LEO over the course of something like 30 Saturn VB launches (each carrying 300t to orbit) not sure how accurate that is, but I doubt it's too far off the mark. I think NERVA will be the propulsion of choice once we get the tanks figured out. Until then? No Mars for us.

The other day I heard some people in my class (including the science teacher) talking about space elevators... need I say more?

Oh my. I totally underestimated the power of ModuleManager, I read skimmed the convo between you and Necro and thought it would effect the tanks, but like, not as much or something. Not sure what I was thinking. Edit: I made an SLS! It can take about 195t to LEO and weighs 3200t, if we compare that to the 150t capacity and 3000t mass of the Saturn V, it's spot on considering the SLS spends a lot less time on the F1's. You really nailed it with SMURFF Random question: I can't get imgur images to embed, I've tried using the "i" button as others have described and it's still not working. Do I have to publish the image to embed it? FINALLY

Just to be sure, SMURFF won't touch Real Scale Boosters right? Just added "SMURFFExclude = true" to all the fuel tanks and SRB's