Readerty2007

I'm in early career- just learned how to orbit reliably. I badly needed funds to upgrade things (VAB caps at 30 parts, no flight planning or patched conics for moonshots), so I was delighted to find a satellite contract well within my technological reach. Easy money! Ha. Ha. Ha. Ha. The job was for Maxo Construction, so I called the satellite the Maxollite. As per my usual strategy, I constructed the probe, mounted it atop fuel tanks and an engine, and then attached four solid fuel boosters via radial decouplers. In short, I had a probe that had more than enough dV to reach even the near Munar orbit required. Given the nature of this thread, some of you may have guessed what happened to Maxollite I. The takeoff was perfect. Smiling, I watched my rocket climb. About 18 km up, the boosters cut out. Spacebar. Fireball. Gasps. There were some red faces back at the VAB. Rather than welding the boosters to the decouplers, a misclick had welded them to the neighboring fuel tank. Naturally, satellites don't come with installed parachutes. Maxollite I hit at over 200 m/s. That alone would be worth the post, but wait- there's more. Maxollite II was much more carefully made. Every system was checked and rechecked before launch. The boosters were on the decouplers. The solar panels were exposed. The battery was big enough to last the night. There was plenty of SAS. So much sass.... Once again, the launch was perfect. Smiling, I watched my rocket climb. Grinning, I watched the boosters peel away and plummet to their doom. Maxollite II easily made orbit. After an orbit, I began to adjust course for Maxo's request orbit. All was going well. Sunlight was gleaming on Maxollite II. Timewarp was humming along in the green. I nodded. It was time. Slash. Maxollite II dropped out of warp. Z. Nothing. Z? Still nothing. What could be wrong? Maxollite II had more than 200 fuel left in its tanks, twice what it needed to modify its orbit. Didn't it? I checked the consumables. Yes.... but.... the batteries were flat. Now, as you recall, I had foreseen this possibility. I had a 200 unit battery and two solar panels. The probe was in full view of the sun. Yet the battery was flat. I actually groaned when I figured it out. Maxollite II had 2 solar panels. I'm early game, so they don't track yet. I also mounted them using symmetry. So they were oriented 180° apart. The sun was at 90°.