boccelounge

Stock fairings can be as tall as you'd like; your vessel is just too tall to build it. This is easy to fix: 1. Use the Offset Gizmo to drag your Root Part down, so that the fairing base is near the floor of the VAB 2. Build your fairing. 3. Use the Offset Gizmo to drag your Root Part back up, so the bottom of the rocket is above the floor of the VAB. 4. Profit! Launch. HTH, cheers!

BAH-chee. Pronounced similarly to the name of the guy that used to date Richie Cunningham's little sister... And though it is in fact a reference to Italian lawn-bowling, it is coincidentally pronounced the same as the language Luke Skywalker's aunt insists their new protocol droid speak*... I've been using the handle online for... IDK... twenty years or more (probably pre-dating the "WWW" as such) but the origin is lost to time, and/or too boring to recount (hint: it's the latter). BTW and back on topic, your "hope to do better" comment was entirely unnecessary; I didn't mean my last comment to indicate any unhappiness with the mission report. I admit, I would like to see the rest of Alternis and your efforts to explore it despite BARIS's best efforts to thwart you... but I'm fully on-board with the current storyline (as freaky as those non-cosplayers are). *That's from a really old movie I loved as a kid... hope the reference still holds up...

And I had to google "MLP Franchise" to figure out what the Kell you and @UnusualAttitude were talking about... and now I know. Thanks for nothing, guys. But seriously, as others have said, thanks for all the work with the Laythean tongue, and double-thanks for adding the translations. I too enjoy puzzles, but... sometimes I just want to a) read a good story, and b) know what is actually happening in said story.

That may be so, but put me in the "NO KENLIE!" camp, all the same. Thanks as always for keeping this going, Colonel.

That says it pretty well-- I want to build something for another purpose, and use it to fulfill this contract. I'm currently leaning toward 2 reusable nuclear tugs docked to a "deep space" crew vehicle that will ferry 6-12 kerbs on interplanetary missions. I'm going to combine this Minmus mission with a quick jaunt out of Kerbin's SOI-- it seems more efficient (in terms of my time) to get a bunch of them leveled-up in one go. But... I've been mired down in Mun missions and all kinds of probe contracts, and the Minmus Tour has been delayed yet again... plus there's some kind of holiday tomorrow everyone keeps talking about. Thanks again for all the input/interest. I'm still open to suggestions if anyone comes up with something else.

Thanks, @KSK! That was very cool, and fun to watch. @Just Jim: if he is lurking, I owe him several* 'likes' for saying Jeb looks like his brother. * Several hundred, that is. Plus, you know, several thousand more, for being Scott Kelly.

I understand; this thread caught my attention because I have very similar interests in starting new Career saves. IMO, you need early Science much more than funds-- UNLESS you're unwilling to take on all the tourist, part-test, rescue, and survey/orbit missions. If you are willing to do those, funds are pretty easy to come by. I have a whole line of vessels dedicated to tourism/rescue and within a couple weeks of starting a new game rarely need to worry about funds... EDIT: ... because those tourists always end up in some strange eccentric orbit, or with some random part stuck to the nose of their craft, or landing in some remote Kerbin biome... i.e. I always use the Rescue/Tourist missions to fulfill at least 2-4 other contracts and/or suck up as Science as possible. Just trying to give the rich Kerbs their money's worth, you know.

Would it make sense to simply grant enough funds to upgrade all KSC facilities to Level 2, then rely on contracts to fund the actual missions? Or are you looking for something a little grindier?

Yeah, I agree. I was initially thinking of a landing leg/truss assembly with retro-rockets (think Space: 1999). The mothership would land horizontally, then detach from the truss and ascend vertically. But now I'm leaning toward a rover (rather than legs). I'd really like to get all the surface biome science in one go. And just moments ago I finished returning 3 very lucrative probe missions (and hundreds of Science points), so I now have all the tech I need to make a first-gen deep-space ship. I need dinner now... but no work for the rest of the week, so Operation SpaceTruck is going to move forward quickly.

This mission report just went from "Exceptional" to "Groundbreaking." Thanks man! (Though my personal hypothesis is that the Laytheans are perfectly normal, modern*, underground-dwelling Kerbins**; this bunch are just a fringe group devoted to the Monolith and some weird cosplay fetish.) * biologically modern , that is ** I of course meant "Kerbals"

Of course; that was precisely my initial reaction to the contract. There are two issues, though: 1. I haven't unlocked any ISRU tech, or even resource scanners, and 2. I just don't want to. I have a tendency to spend all my time on 'infrastructure'-- building relay networks, ScanSat missions, refinery rigs, etc., and very little time on exploration/boots-on-the-ground missions. I started this save specifically to force myself to change this behavior, and just "go see what's out there."

Thanks, all. I guess the best option is simply to start my deep space fleet a little sooner than planned. I'll make a crewed craft and give it a detachable undercarriage for landing. Once the contract is fulfilled, it'll be ready to head to Duna. And to maximize return (on funds and my own time), I'll use it as a biome-hopper to grab everything Minmus has to offer in one swoop. I need to unlock a couple more nodes, but we have several probe missions returning to Kerbin, so that's not an issue... I guess the answer should have been obvious to me, but your replies helped clarify things-- thanks much. UPDATE: As luck would have it, I fired up the game after reading your replies, and picked up a couple Sun-orbit contracts. One asks for a station for 12 kerbals. It so happens I current have exactly 12 kerbonauts... so in the next couple days they should all be able to hit Level 3 (Minmus flags, Sun orbit), all in one extended mission. Sweet. It's always awesome when the contract system gives you incentive to do exactly what you wanted to in the first place. There are a handful of probe missions I have to deal with in the next 20 or so game days, so maybe in a couple real days I'll post a screenshot of the new vessel. Thanks again for helping me out/bearing with me figuring out the obvious.

I'm in a new career save, currently "early-midgame" (meaning that I'm cleaning up contracts and science in Kerbin's SOI, and just about to go interplanetary). I wanted to get down on Minmus, and happily took a contract for a surface outpost. Then I read the fine print: - Land on Minmus - Support 5 Kerbals - Have two pilots - Maintain stabilty... Nothing out of the usual, until... - Have 4000 units of Liquid Fuel Now I've done a lot of ground-to-orbit refinery operations before, and enjoyed it. But I really hadn't planned to for this save.and don't even have ISRU parts unlocked yet. I just want to get the Tech Tree mostly filled, and get out to the other planets. And I suppose I could make an orbital refueling station, land it, then put it back into its proper orbit... but that seems so tedious and wasteful-- we won't be spending a lot of time around Minmus, once we've plundered explored its Science bounty, we're probably gone for good. Anybody got any neat ideas how to get 22.5t of LF and tankage there cheaply and quickly (quickly in terms of my actual time playing the game)? 4000 LF is perfectly in the range I use for returnable/reusable nuclear tugs, so designing and flying the thing isn't an issue... my enthusiasm (lack of) and its usefulness (lack of) are the problems. I'm probably going to just build a small outpost (or possibly a large rover) with a very large detachable descent stage... but I'm wondering if anyone has a different angle on it. Your thoughts appreciated... (Note that this is in the Stock system, with mods that entirely stockalike and/or merely aesthetic-- nothing exotic.)

Have you confirmed that you're controlling the rover from the correct point? I assume that HECS core was used for landing... but the rover should be driven by a forward-facing control point. I often find that control points are changed when re-loading a vessel with multiple/perpendicular cores. I always turn on the brakes and turn off SAS when leaving a rover, then reset 'Control From Here' when I return to the vehicle. Apologies if I'm stating the obvious and/or this is something you've already ruled-out, but that "up-facing" HECS looks mighty suspicious...

I almost feel foolish asking this... but TIDES? On Laythe? What was that? Excellent reports, as always-- thanks.

I knew this, but never really considered doing it... I kinda want to try now. Thanks!

Apologies; that's what I get from replying quickly while working on two computers simultaneously... But what resolution have you come to?

That was my assumption-- I certainly couldn't find an altitude that worked. Just wanted to see if anyone could confirm that-- thank you. But, as I mentioned, I actually think the Jool constellation is optimal, as it covers Laythe quite nicely... If anyone's interested, I'm at this moment burning for Tylo; I'm very curious to see if I can set things up there. Should know later this evening. EDIT: Follow-up: Yep, this formation works just fine at Tylo (and is very fun to set up).

I hope no one objects to this reply to an older thread-- if so, apologies. But I've been fascinated by this idea since it first came to my attention, and have finally gotten around to implementing it. Mun and Duna are looking good with their new constellations. My problem is Laythe-- the SMA listed above puts my relays in an escape trajectory. Thankfully, I was able to salvage the mission and set the sats around Jool instead (which may actually be better, as they now cover Laythe as well). But I wonder if anyone can help me resolve this issue? And thanks much to the OP for putting this info out there.

Mr. Richy, I want you to know I had a very enjoyable evening yesterday. I played KSP on one computer, and browsed all your mission reports on imgur and youtube on the other computer. They were immensely entertaining and inspiring (I REALLY need to get to Layther!). Thanks much for sharing!

I love the various Rover-Trucks by WildBlue. But I think the "Feline Utility Rover" by @Nils277 is what we're looking for here. I've not tried it out, but it clearly has an articulated/flexible connector part. I downloaded it some time ago, but have never got around to checking it out... so let's do all do that!

MechJeb has a "Rover Autopilot" feature that includes a really nifty "Follow" feature. Put simply, you can set one rover's course and speed, and have another rover follow it. I've only played around with this during rover testing on Kerbin (never having had a specific mission requirement for it), but it seems to be exactly what you're looking for. It worked flawlessly in all my tests.

What I find even more terrifying is the 11260 Module Manager patches! I thought I was getting bloated at around 300...

I've never tried that... And no, they're just Rockomax 800 tanks with a probe core, tiny Ant (Spider?) engine and tiny amount of fuel. I literally need a 1.5m/s burn to make them impact Duna, but the engine isn't registering that it has fuel. The fuel shows in the staging list, but the engines won't ignite. I fear I may have clipped the engine a little too far into the bottom of the tank. It was kind of a silly/inefficient idea anyway; I just wanted to build a "saddle truss." I don't think we'll be re-visiting that concept. I might try the spacewalk, but I'm not too proud to Terminate in the tracking station... Thanks for the idea!

As others have said, I don''t generally leave debris, preferring to design stages so that they automatically de-orbit themselves. Failing that, a small probe core, battery, and 'reserve tank' allow me to manually de-orbit them. I'm a big fan of using Mun transfer stages that are jettisoned so that they impact Mun directly. But as far as a "junkyard" I do have a collection of obsolete or simply unwanted craft in Minmus orbit-- typically prototype stations or deep-space crew ships. I don't want to use them, but I can't bring myself to scrap them, so they go to the Minmus Graveyard. It's also handy to look back at them from time to time, to recall some design or technique that I'd been toying with in the 'early years.' EDIT: Ironically, as I was typing the above, I was finishing a burn from Kerbin to Duna. As soon as I cleared Kerbin's SOI, I released two droptanks that were supposed to be able to course-correct themselves into Ike... never having tested the design, I now find the engines won't work. So I've got two useless autonomous fuel tanks as flying formation with the Duna Research Station...