Dynamo

The Aero X-1 was the first succesful 'plane' i had. My first plane was back in 0.13 with the C7 mod, that was the RX-1. Standard, kinda boring labelmaker names, but it's amazing what a simple title holds.

Field Dynamics, Research and Development. Made it back when RP was a thing as a corporation, but i still like to run it under that guise. We're a multinational private enterprise probing the depths of space, pushing the envelope of space engineering and science as we go, and pushing envelopes is Jeb's specialty. It's actually quite an immersive element to assign a good name and background to your space program. I've created other legends in my Kerbals, planted legacies on distant moons, and created quite an experience out of developing my own 'company'; it's certainly worth it to get creative with your naming and stick to an immersive title. If i had to give advice, i'd say you ought to find a 'buzzword,' something that is exciting. Coin a parallel term, and use it as your name. For example, if i was into gyros (the food, i mean, i simply picked something random), i'd be going for a greek style. I might try the Olympus Space program or the Hellenic Space program. My own space program name came out of a mixture of preexisting private space agencies such as SpaceX or Bigelow. Any category can have cool titles if you brainstorm enough.

Well, it's always been grueling to get to. You need the dV to incline, get there, and escape the blasted gravity well of 1.28 g's, not to mention landings. Still, i doubt they'd change the angle by only another degree or so; what difference would that make to us? Most of us wouldn't have even noticed.

Interesting how you pitched the Goo canister. I look forward to anticipating how you'll 'interpret' other scientific instruments. One question though, if we ever see the Duna Base crew ever again, will there be instruments at the base as well? It'll be interesting to have the Grand Tour bring science fully into the fold, the definition of the Grand Tour will have to be changed to "Every planet and moon AND a data set for each." I'm still kind of worried about what BERTY defines as science if he cuts up 'biomass' for petty experiments. By the way, a shoutout to Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri fans - the first thing that came to mind after Czo pitched the Mystery Goo in that light was the Recycling Tanks base facility from the Biogenetics Tech. In the words of Chairman Sheng-ji Yang: "It is every citizen's final duty to go into the tanks, and become one with all the people." Basically for those that do not know the game: the dying are recycled for organic matter and component chemicals, similar to BERTY's frankenstein-style research.

Most of my designs end up being drawn up in my head. I have various classes of lifters, and i design payloads as i see fit, and then assign them to a lifter in their class. Most of my small vehicles work this way. However, for the interplanetary i use 'plan diagrams', or prefab constructions of the vehicle as it would be docked in orbit, to get a feel for the aesthetics and structural strength of a docking-built vehicle. I also use typed notes to record my thoughts and notes in the development process, just as an aid for my thoughts on the vehicle and to spur creativity in design. Plan Diagram Examples: From the Talyos Project (Unmanned probe seed of the Jool system) in 0.20 From the Aquilon Project (IP ferry for 2 SSTO's that will put the first Kerbals for Field Dynamics on Laythe) in 0.21

I've always played with an RP idea in my head for my space program... but research has sealed the deal. I feel as though i'm building up from the roots of my space program, back when rockets were 'new'. I slowed down my flight progress... I went atmospheric, then high atmosphere, then suborbital. I'm going at a very exhaustive pace to get all the science. I'm writing chroncicles for near every flight, might make an AAR out of them on the History of Field Dynamics. Would anyone else enjoy that?

Forgetting enough fuel for IPV's. I had to refuel my first mission to Duna twice to get it to come back, and i'm still wary of fuel expenditure on interplanetary excursions.

Always: Redundancies for Kerbals - i use ejection seats on experimental planes. Slap on an RTG on anything unmanned. 1 stage IPV's, i like to flirt with the idea of reusable systems (though i usually end up having to send tankers). Strut all the things. If it has a decoupler, strut it. If you're stacking a silver 32t on top of an orange, strut it. Double check the staging for launch systems. Throttle Mainsails only up to half throttle on launch with orange tanks to prevent overheating. Test base modules on Kerbin, and build mock-ups of docking-built craft to correct the final product if necessary. Test RCS setups on prototypes with grav hack.

Awesome work. I think the title does hold up to the entry here, i've not seen a closer representation yet, as many attempts are 'whitebirds'. How did you get that color? Did you reskin the part?

To be honest, i was a little miffed about it. I went in with some reservations that the public would get a bad vibe about space travel after the movie, but i tried to keep an open mind. The three biggest points i summarized my criticisms into boil down to this: 1. The "Action Box." As many of us have pointed out, Tiangong, the ISS, and Hubble wouldn't be nearly that close. Also, i find it hard to believe that much debris would pile up in the exact orbit of all 3 installations. It seems like they stuffed space into an 'action box' where everything is put in closer proximity for dramatic effect. 2. Early Warning. As far as i know, the US Air Force keeps a constant eye on the tracking of debris in orbit. Any spacecraft in danger of a collision would be informed well before 'imminent impact', during which time the craft could raise or lower its orbital plane to miss the oncoming debris 3. "Interpretive Physics." I know Hollywood gets kind of a free pass on this one, and most sequences were stunningly accurate. But a few scenes that contributed to the plot did annoy me. -First, no space program in their right mind would let astronauts get to the propellant and oxygen reserves to the levels Bullock and Clooney dealt with, in anticipation of some disaster similar to the movie's. I don't think Bullock would've burnt as much oxygen as she did on her ride to the station anyway. Plus, when she grabs Clooney in the parachute rig scene, shouldn't she have canceled his rel-V with the Station? - I don't see how he could've accelerated without any exterior force after detaching from Bullock. He shouldn't have run out of pack fuel anyway, as Bullock couldn't have "slowed him down" on the approach to the station (as she said); one short burst prograde to the station would've let them coast there without a drop more of propellant (and he gave no indication of critical fuel before departing the shuttle, anyway.) -When Bullock tries to use the RCS thrusters on the Soyuz to free its parachute from the ISS, she applies retrograde RCS thrusting, demonstrating its capability to adjust its linear motion as in KSP. Now, when she departs for Tiangong, she 'cannot turn on the engine', driving her near to suicide when she thinks she's out of options. Why not use the linear RCS thrusters?! Sure, it might take a while, but you never said you were out of hypergolic fuel, and it's certainly a better option than a suicide attempt! Other than those itty nitpicks (and a few others not worth listing), i think it was an amazing showcase of our proudest projects we, as a species, have made in space, even if they did get torn to pieces. I still maintain that the producers are making profit of the intellectual property of kerbals - they made an action movie about a normal Kerbal workday. Besides, we deorbit space stations for fun around here!

I was quite happy to find my account survive the mysterious forum armageddon. I actually only found out about a day or two into the blackout about it, but i was nonetheless spared the worst, besides not knowing if or when the forums would return. Went a little all out with my sig though... I could probably get around to changing it or adding something else to it just to spice it up.

Sheesh. Has the crew list been updated? I think the casualty rate is up to 50%! Poor Harsen.... I'm surprised engineers didn't make the systems on the Proteus adequate for rough aerobraking like that. 2 LAGML's and the hab module suffered damage. Was it just an abnormal entry procedure? Either way, losing that much of the ablation paneling will severly endanger the crew. If BERTY decides to take them home, there may be a close call will the shielding, or worse, a failure. Somehow i think Jeb won't allow for a repeat of Kadmos, however. I am wondering why BERTY wanted Jeb on the bridge, however. Either BERTY is hiding a weakness, or he's further manipulating crew morale by coercing Jeb to be on station. Also, excellent job framing Rozer as an ironic ally - Jeb is strained to have the ice cold sadist around again, but he knows he needs him to survive.

Some sites have fileshare hosting for free. Mediafire is a good, free host where people can link to files you upload. I'm sure there's a better alternative however. But i do think i want a shot at rescuing the lad, please do post the persistance file. P.S.: When posting a link, type (url=inserturlhere.com)Text you want to have highlighted for the link(/url) When you post, replace all the ( 's and ) 's with [ 's and ] 's, and it should create a direct link to the site. For example, a link to the beginning of the thread.

The KSP universe is scaled down from real life, i believe the scale ratio is something like almost 1/10 scale (Kerbin's diameter to Earth's). 3m to kerbals is larger to them than it is to us. In fact, the SLS system NASA is developing uses 8.4m diameter tanks. In essence, the 2m command pod is the KSP analogue of a Orion style cockpit. It's just stylized to have 3 kerbals as in the Apollo program. Now, i've not heard of there being any 3m parts anytime soon. I personally think they'd be too much to handle, especially since we can already get some pretty high payload fractions with the 2m parts and a little ingenuity (Yes, i mean you, Whackjob). As a veteran of KSP, i remember having the NovaPunch mod back in 1.2 or something, and i didn't care much for the monstrous parts of the pack. There was trouble adapting the mod parts to the stock ones, and they were structurally unstable. Even if they made stock 3m parts, they would be a little overkill in my opinion.

Interesting. I haven't done too much IP travel, but i have quite a few missions in the works. Farthest had to have been the Laythe overpass i did one game in .20, and i've have never been out past that since, and it was only a cursory examination of the planet from orbit. Closest, ironically, would be either Minimus at its closest point to the sun, or some debris in an interplanetary orbit i dumped after an ejection burn which happened to fall into a lower orbit. I am not very well traveled, apparently. I've only ever seen Duna and Jool!

I'm currently prepping an interplanetary flight to Dres, and i've constructed my ship well before the transfer window. I plan to put my space program 'in hiatus' until the window arrives. However, i would like to get a realistic measurement of the spacecraft's mission time on its flight after i timewarp to the transfer. Since i'll be waiting for 94 days, it'll tell me that yes, my IPV has been in orbit for 94 days. But i wish the mission timer to begin when i leave Kerbin, not when i first orbited the craft. Is there any way that i can reliably reset the mission clock without mucking with the CFG?

It depends on what you want to see. Unless you have some mods to make planetside more interesting, there will only be a couple unique landing spots for Duna, perhaps a crater or a mountain slope. I think you should go with option 2, as you shouldn't limit yourself to only 1 landing, and you can always put counterweight on for the rover if you design it carefully. In addition, since the overall weight of the vessel will likely be much larger than the rover, it can't move the CG that much relative to center. Plus, rovers make exploration of nearby terrain far less painful. Duna has just enough of an atmosphere that jetpacks are inefficient and only suitable for short trips, and the surface gravity is too low to make walking useful. My first trip to Duna carried 2 stock 2-man landers of my own design, a more minimal payload to ease design for my first IPV. Personally, i find it hard to deal with high payload fraction, and i stay away from huge landers to save frustration with making the transfer stage. However, if you've got the vehicle for it, go nuts.

You can indeed wait it out, but Field Dynamics uses Black Magicâ„¢ when high profile Kerbals need resuscitation! The persistance file under the "Saves" folder for your game can be read with any .txt reader. Select "Open With" to open your file. You'll have to do some major digging to find your crew roster, but once you've confirmed you're at the roster, copy/paste the Bill,Jeb, and Bob stats from a fresh save, and they'll reappear for duty! I also use this to 're-recruit' hero kerbals from previous versions, i copy another crew file, paste it, and then change the courage and stupidity values as i see fit. It's a good way to bring back a favorite cast of space pioneers and legends to your game, and i find it very immersive to have legendary Kerbals. NOTE: Field Dynamics does not resume any responsibility in the event of a zombie Kerbal uprising.

If the CPA (closest point of approach) has dissapeared, you're going to smack into the planet. I don't know how the mod displays that information, but that's my judgement on what you've described. If you look on the map screen, your projected trajectory should show up in orange, and if there's no Apoapsis near Jool's orange sphere icon at your rendezvous, you're going to drive your spacecraft straight into Jool's killzone.

Welcome to the Forums, by the way. You can click and drag on one of the parts in the "STAGE" list on your right, where each icon represents a parachute (icon looks like a parachute), a radial decoupler or side mounted decoupler (Looks like 2 bars on the left and right with a dot in the middle), a linear decoupler (2 bars on the top and bottom with a dot in the middle, do not confuse with radials!), or an engine (Looks kind of like an engine). Once you mouse over a part in the STAGE list, the game will highlight the part with a faint green shader, which will let you know which icon means what. In reverse, mousing over a part on the ship creates a white box over the icon, which can identify part to icon also. If you want to create another stage, mouse over the numbered orange labes (such as 01 or 00) in the STAGE sequence, and a plus and a minus will appear next to it. To add another stage, click the plus. If you want to get rid of an empty stage, click the minus. tl;dr: Make another stage, drag and drops the parts you want to go first at the bottom of the list and put them in order from there. Have fun!

It depends on where the ship originates. I'm playing an RP angle that my spaceplane engineers are in hot competition with my rocket engineers, so each craft is named based on which 'department' it's from. The Interplanetary Vehicles are all VAB based, and have Latin-sounding names (ex- Aletherium, Astrium) along with their development tag, IPV-#. The SPH projects get Greek nicknames, like the production version of my first ever experimental aircraft/SSTO, the Boreas Class (named after Greek god of the north wind). Other inter-Kerbin vehicles and projects are usually purpose named ('Rescue Ship'), or are named after classics of music and literature (Auld Lang Syne Station, Scarbourough Training Facility)

My original post, including details describing the projects, took up about half a page, so here's a truncated version. Current Missions either being flown or being planned Inter-Kerbin: Scarborough Training base: Minimus training base staffed by Jeb & Co. Mun Flags: Haven't invested in a Mun base yet, but i have some flags down. Aero Program: The current line of experimental planes i'm making. The program recently churned out my first ever SSTO. [iPV]'s: The head of my development. Current Projects: [iPV-3] , Talyos: Unmanned mothership to seed Joolian system with probes. Finishing design stages. [iPV-4] , Duna Base: Full Service, continously crewed Scientific outpost on Duna with upgrade tiers. In planning. [iPV-5] , Aurux: Minimalist IPV taking my veteran Kerbals to Dres. Current mission, waiting for transfer window. [iPV-6] , Tyberius: Massive Carrier type that is carrying 2 SSTO's to Laythe for flag-planting. In heavy development.

Ooh, let me join in! 1. Traditional scopes + Spacesuit helmet do not work. Whatever genius thought this one up should try to hold the sight up to a helmet visor. So none of them can aim very well, most likely. 2. Astronauts are typically holding onto a surface at one point or another to stay in place, and who shoots an assault rifle 1 handed? 3. -0.12 into the trailer: Explosions in space aren't the same as on earth. Fires are globular, and explosions would cause depressurization, so not too many fireballs anyway. *cough* Michael Bay *cough* 4. -0.19: Who puts astronaut commandos into a milk carton like that? Cargo bays aren't built to house personnel, so why bother with creating the cargo bay adaptor when all you'd be able to do is use it as a 'space bus'? 5. Astronauts have to be trained for months, if not years, before going into space once. You can't expect any old protagonist to put the suit on and be familiar with the procedures and mechanics of spaceflight that would be required to maneuver, much less fight, in space. 6. -0.22: The "Odin" platform has no reason to fire its thrusters toward earth. It's only launching one rod, not deorbiting the satellite. 6.5: Oh, and getting the Delta-V to slow the rods so that they would drop right down onto the city would be entirely redundant. The whole concept lies in using the immense speed from falling from orbit to create a shockwave from impact using only energy. 7. -0.55 ... they left us open to full-scale invasion." The video appeared to show the rods targeting civilian targets to me, not carriers or military assets. Besides, when the cost per pound of orbiting material runs at about $10,000, we can't haul enough of these 37t 20ft/1ft tungsten slugs (according to USAF's Project Odin) into orbit to cause enough damage to cripple the US military without incurring serious cost. If we can assume that the 1 "Odin" satellite was the only station carrying rods, then it would be very unlikely that it alone could cause that kind of damage. Anyone else interested in footing a $750mil bill per rod just to orbit it? KSP is all about space, so other than that, i'll refrain. Sorry to all the COD fans, but the space segment kinda turns me off. I can accept that they're trying to push a new frontier of gameplay, but there's a reason as to why space warfare has been limited to sci-fi. Space is the first place our where species has ever declared total peace. At the height of the Cold War, the two biggest rivals of the world that were threatening each other with nuclear arms signed a treaty promising never to weaponize space (well, strategically, anyway). I personally think that they're tainting the serenity and peace behind space exploration by carrying an FPS into orbit, and ruining the credibility for the world's space programs.

Just caught up with this series.... Czokletmuss, first you give me that distress signal in the middle of a redlit ship, and then the Alien soundtrack? I'm now fearing for my own sanity, not to mention the crew's. I can't imagine what it'd be like to live in space for years only to uncover something like this... an entire crew missing. This is the worst kind of fear, not expecting the 'monster', but simply having no idea what is next. Not knowing where or when the mysterious forces around you will pounce. Congratulations, you made have me afraid of the dark again. P.S.: Kadmos's beacon was scarier for me than the score from Alien. At least the Alien track sounds human(i.e. with orchestral pieces), but the beacon is truly alien.

This one is a little tough. My own intution says that it has not to do with the collision of a proton with matter itself, but rather with its field of influence, the electron clouds. I'm no quantum physicist, but i think i remember that photons can collide with electrons, and raise them to a higher energy state. The emission of electrons, or repulsion of electron on electron as the excited electrons jump around, may generate the tiny forces associated with solar shields. tldr: Light energy excites the atoms into pushing each other. Will come back after a Wikipedia reading!