Tyko

I've done the "restart a billion times" thing before. I've found that the DV savings between "ideal" and "pretty darn close" to be around 1-3% i.e. less than 100DV My current strategy based on lots and lots of launches is to get pretty darn close on my initial tip over. I then avoid any throttling until I'm well past 45 degree angle to the horizon (which should occur around 10-12km up). At that point the the gravity losses are less of an issue. I let time to AP get to around 50-60 seconds and use throttle control to optimize my flight path.

https://github.com/Tantares/Tantares/releases

Welcome to the Forums...The Tantares mod already has all the parts you need to recreate Russian/Soviet missions. You may want to check it out.

Agreed with @Ozymandias_the_Goat - IIRC most players never even leave the Kerbin local moons and go interplanetary. Going interstellar is just not in scope for this game. Also, even at the game maximum 100,000x time acceleration it would take something like 7000 hours of actual playtime for a craft moving at New Horizons' speed to reach Proxima Centauri - our nearest neighbor.

I didn't want to add the contract portion to the mod because it makes contracts easier to complete due to the smaller size / weight. Without delving into rebalancing the contracts I didn't think it was "fair" to include this part. @theJesuit Thanks for the kind words...this multi-model approach was my cheat to make up for the fact that I haven't skilled up to make models...frankly, all the tweaking it took was quite the endeavor. Not only did I have to get it to look right, but I also had to play with the attach point and the CoM to make sure it exactly weight balanced a Goo Container when mounted on the opposite side...Took way too much time Glad you guys are using it.

Confirmed support for 1.6.x and updated OP

Updated to 1.6.1 and added patch to prevent breakage when loaded in conjunction with ReStock

You'd have an easier time if RCS thrusters weren't placed so far back on your ship. You want your RCS to be as close as possible to center of mass. This is causing your tail end to swing around when you're trying to thrust laterally. Try redesigning your ship so that the RCS is centered around the Center of Mass. I built a ship that uses the same parts as yours, you're using the console version of the game, so they look different but they weigh the same. This video shows one way to adjust the balance. First you want to enable the center of mass indicator in the lower left. Then you can move your RCS forward, you can also move heavy things backwards or make the front lighter. It's actually best to put your fuel tank in the middle of your ship so your Center of Mass doesn't move as much as you use up fuel too...

That's awesome! I know there's a donate button on @Nertea's Near Future Technologies page:

what app are you opening them in? I use Notepad++ and they are fully formatted...

There are examples provided in the Tweakscale download already Examples.cfg Documentation.txt

This is looking really amazing!

Or just right click in Imgur, select "copy image" then right click in your forum post and select "paste" Doesn't work from everywhere, but works from Imgur. It didn't used to.

Don't over-analyze my poorly constructed analogy

IIRC you actually have to get out of the rover and move to another hab to reset the rover timer. Think of it this way - you drive cross country and you're exhausted. Your car drives into the hotel parking lot and you feel better because you know you're going to get to get out and stretch your legs or get some sleep. Then the car driver suddenly decides to pull out of the parking lot again and drive away without letting you get out

They changed something recently because you can copy/paste out of imgur directly into a forum post now.

So....there are other errors in your info. I don't want to pile a lot of critiques on unless you want them. If you want this to live on as a useful guide it's probably worth getting a review by members of the community though, be that me or others.

Here's a another explanation with some wording that would be more common: In aerospace engineering, the propellant mass fraction is the portion of a vehicle's mass which does not reach the destination, usually used as a measure of the vehicle's performance. In other words, the propellant mass fraction is the ratio between the propellant mass and the initial mass of the vehicle.

While waiting for ReStock before starting my next play-through I went back through some old pix of earlier games for inspiration... My first large ship, The "Aldrin" - assembled on orbit (nicknamed the Princess Leia because of the big side tanks). The re-usable lander is docked on the nose. First Large station - the Aldrin core is on the right, under construction and waiting for delivery of the side fuel tanks My first serious attempt at a mining base First Duna Landing

I'm with @Dark Lion every time I've tried to use them I've gotten so frustrated with the attachment behavior I've given up and found a different option

It's a matter of mission profile. Because the Landers mass balance changes significantly if Cargo or Kerbals aren't being carried, on such a lightweight frame the ability to dial back some of the engines in order to keep the thrust balance even is very useful indeed. Yep...Also landers actually need a certain amount of TWR to land safely. I think that the deciding factor for orbital ships is the ratio of engine mass to total vehicle mass...The heavier the vehicle the less engine mass matters and the more that ISP matters. Not sure of the cutoff point.

Here's my 1 Ant Ultra-light lander

I use them all the time. They're so lightweight and they're available fairly early in the tech tree. I'll often use clusters of 2, 3 or 4 of them also.

I totally got sidetracked on another project. Haven't forgotten this. I'll try to get to it tomorrow