Nich

Not sure why you are using a final monoprop stage. Is it more dense and you have space restrictions? Get rid of or drastically reduce the final monoprop stage those things have terrible ISP. Even if you are using supper gimped momentum wheels you should be able to get within 50m with a momentum wheel and main LFO engine (ant). I routienly dock 5t satalites with just the .3 tourqe of the probe core and the main engine. In addition 75 isp on the circulation stage can mean the difference between 75x75 LKO or orbiting the Mun

Depends on your altitude actually. In most cases you want to lower your PE first, then extend your AP (for oberith) then full burn to change direction. Most contracts are pretty high up and you have to eat up speed anyways might as well do more of it lower for more oberith.

So I'm sure everybody's thinking it but how long until we get a sticky hint hint moderators

It seems this challenge has been pretty much maxed (after VALs impressive feat) And all of my designs are looking like craft that have already been created. I was wondering about the IRSU rule. Is it acceptable to use an IRSU if you only process ore from Kerbin i.e. don't bring a drill? I have seen else where someone mention at a certain point IRSU + ore tanks beat LFO tanks. I would probably have to bring TONS of payload to compare to VAL point wise but it would at least give me a fresh start.

Slam_jones that is an awsome space plane just beautiful

No it should work in 3d as radius is a 1d scaler it just doenst give you any info about orientation. The angle has to be measured while looking in the orbital plane of the Mun though

WHAT???? What kind of voodoo magic is FAR using?

The problem with straight up tests is drag has very little effect as you get into supper thin atm very very quickly. If you want a real test of drag you have to do 70x70 orbits with gravity turns. My new rules of thumb are <1000 m/s below 10km <2000 m/s below 20k which is pretty easy to do with a TWR < 3. YAAAA!!! oberth effect

Define close? 10m or 10km. I can get within 1km of my target but that is about the best I can do. I kill all vertical velocity about 1-2km over the target by setting a maneuver node over the target when I am 3-4 minutes out. I start burning early (20%) to lower PE. It normally starts out 3-5 km over the target but be carefull not to smack a mountian. Lower your orbit into the ground past the target. Maneuver node should still be over the target if not move it. Switch out of map mode do a full burn at time/2 left and you should be right over the target. I have not tried retrograde pushing on a landed target. Might be interesting so see how close I can get but I suspect I would end up short doing a suicide burn retrograded push (or in the ground)

Why do a plane alignment? I have not done the tutorial in quite a while but normally I just burn to the AN of DN when it gives me an intercept. I will try it in 1.0.4 and see if anything has changed.

Change the heading hold mode or create a new mode so that you get a maneuver heading indicator except green. Then the arrow keys move the green heading indicator (not the control surfaces). The control surfaces then adjust to the delta from the green indicator. The change is slight but huge in my opinion. As it is currently set up if you craft is perturbed right and you tap the left arrow to try to correct the craft will use the new heading from when the arrow was released. If this was right of the original heading you wanted your craft will now perturb further to the right. If a moder wanted to do this it might be quite easy to use the current maneuver node mode and modify it so that when there is no maneuver it behaves in this manor. This does 2 things 1. eliminates the need to be able to trim a craft as you can set the green indicator past where you actually want it to account for imbalances 2. reduces the need for a joystick as it is easier to make small adjustment without getting full deflection of control surfaces.

I was unable to get to orbit Tons of fuel but just not enough umph to get past 1300ish and not enough from the nuke to extend the AP out. Max speed with wips and nuke running was like 1390ish at 26km

All my designs have a ton of OX in them because there are no LF only options for adapter parts. In addition my craft is to big to leave the atm on nukes alone. My current plan is to bring 50-100 OX to laythe just to make sure I can pop out of the atm. My craft is at 5km dV at 71x71. I want to get it up to 6.7km dv so I can attempt to match Val

Math :\ (((sin(your angle)*your alt)^2 + ((mun alt) + cos(your angle)*your alt))^2)^.5 I think..... been forever since I have done geomoitry. Make sure your calc is set to rads or degrees which ever you use

Does surface scanning improve satellite scanning like is says in the description? I have scanned most of the minimus biomes and it seems to be the same. Also satellite scanning says there areas with 90+% but when I get down there 9% is the highest I have seen on the surface scanner.

They really need an AERO mod for SAS or just give us trim tabs we can control. It drives me crazy when I try yawing and my plane starts diving. I am just about to install MJ so I can adjust the PID filter parameters :\

If you have a lander pod, return pod and MPL you can Take all the data out of the MPL Place all unique reports in the lander pod This will leave duplicates in the kerbals "hands" Put these in the return pod Move everything else back to the MPL But to be honest by the time the MPL creates any significant science you should have the tree cleared anyways. I have 4 MPLs Kerbin Mun x2 and Minimus I have only gotten 200 science and I am only 4000 away from finishing the tree. My expedition to Duna should clear 20k if I ever manage to get around to doing it.

Frankly I prefer the KSP website. I don't have steam or an updater to deal with and I get updates asap. I just wish I had not paid full price, but glad I did at the same time especially if this is still an advanced beta and things only get better.

That is a good looking plane selfish. My entry is quite similar (but a little larger with rapiers). Just to be clear you are allowed to test your own plane you just have to take the cost minus recovery cost. That is then subtracted from the final score of the Pro pilot. Although with the step penalty that kredits incur it may be in your best interest to not test the plane if you are truly confident. I have already flown mine 4 times just about empty of fuel. Top speed of 200ish 2 times to fix a stability issue and flexing issue (moved the COL and removed the mk2 probe core to a different core in the cargo bay). Flown 1 time at 500ish and got a wobbly feed back from SAS (removed a control surface and changed the part the wing was connected to) The last one went up to 800ish quite nicely so now I am ready to test a full load into orbit. Luckily I have managed to get most of the plane down all 4 times safely. The thing that really surprised me was changing the part the wing is connected to but off setting the wing to the exact same spot improved the wobbliness. Hopefully I can test it tonight unless someone else can beat me to the punch. I am a little hesitant with no yaw control but all in all it looks good. btw HIDC made me lol (literally at work :/)

Unfortunately selfish I can not accept that design in this competition as it was designed and tested under different conditions and it would be quite difficult to determine the cost of design. If you want to rebuild it then it would meet the design rules technically just be sure to track (via screen shots) how much you spent testing. I would be happy to test it and tell you what you would have gotten or I can wait for a official rebuild. Any help testing would be greatly appreciated my score on Badhat is easy to beat ... The true spirit of this competition is designing a new SSTO that works first try and is easy to fly as most of my designs take 100 tries to get the COM vs. COL, control surfaces and and fuel balancing just right.

I had to delete the MJ stuff from the file to get it to work on stock. Well I failed miserably but the craft flew beautifully. I am sure most people will be able to do it successfully. And yes anyone else who wants to attempt the propilot is still free to try. I messed up somehow set PE to 42,000 over ksp using mono prop. Warped around kerbin and my PE was now 65,000. Tried a full tip at 90 degrees to stop in time but didnt make it. The craft didnt stall or flip just moved down to proprage when the reaction wheels were not strong enough anymore. Ditched in the ocean at 45 m/s and the only thing that blew up was the cockpit. Zero heating issues, Battery zero issues, a little too much monoprop for my taste but it made up for the lack of LF. Cost 33060 recovered value unknown 110 units of fuel delivered to station 3 kerbals dead 3 kerbals rotated Total = -56.2 ug how do you do imgur albums? http://imgur.com/a/bC8kL#0

Ha ha I just had a dream the other week I was doing the horizontal mombo with a girl and I was pumping my AP up each time I trust. I ended up making it to Miniums before I ran out of delta V (and yes I could see my fuel going down with each thrust). I remember being really disappointed because it was like a 15 minute "burn" and it was really inefficient.

Flex after engine shut off will shoot you up. Bang comes right and lower then the VTOL jets so it is safe to assume it comes after due to comic time compression and not wanting to do multiple panels that can fit in one

Anyone can fly anyone elses craft to get the Pro pilot award. Your ranking in the builders category is based off the best Pro Pilot score Don't be disappointed I fully expect most scores to be Negative. I will fly all craft that have sat around for a day or 2. Couple questions 1. Did you do any test runs? If so I need the recovery amount and if any kerbals were lost. 2. What do you expect for performance/payload. Currently all my stations are at 80km-100km

You can relaunch a design if it fails however you have to add up the cost and kerbals lost. You can also test a design unmaned and get back recovery cost, remove prob core and submit it as your design. Any mod that is info only is fine. Any mod that makes the game more difficult is allowed and I will give tonnage to it. I have to look up KScale2 but if it is like RSS it should be fine and your pilot will have an even easier time then you