Plummet

I always seem to end up with a combination of Aerospikes and Vectors for Eve missions. Maybe fewer Aerospikes and a couple more Vectors would have been better!

I've been enjoying the challenge of trips to Eve and after completing the KSP2 Eve mission and taking a few (non-returnable) planes there, I wanted to see if I could build a horizontal take-off and landing plane. The end result uses 5 Vectors and 6 Aerospikes. It can glide to a landing on Eve and then return to a low Eve orbit. The wings, stabilisers, tanks and engines all separate in stages during the ascent until only a remaining small stage is left. It was super hard.. the biggest problem I had was struts disappearing which my plane relies on and which are also needed for the re-entry heat protection structure. I ended up rebuilding the craft from the top-down to see if that stopped the problem but it still happened. In the end, I had to teleport in a replacement vessel (exact same fuel state and orbit) with save file editing. Also, the Kraken loves to chew on the shields on the top of the re-entry structure, and the 2 refueling stops (1 in Kerbin orbit, 1 in Eve orbit) required very difficult docking. I clocked up hundreds of quicksaves... Still, the landing and return-to-orbit were fun to fly! For my next mission, I am going to do something way more simple...

Yeah, it cost me a vast amount of time.. I tried rebuilding my ship from top-down, but then hit the same problem later in the mission when docking for refueling. In the end, I teleported in a replacement ship (complete with struts!) with exactly the same fuel state and exactly the same orbit by copying sections from the save file.

I think I found the issue. My struts had disappeared. I think I've hit the problem where merging craft causes struts to have the wrong base vessel, so at one of my decoupling points all the struts dissappear...

Hi I've been working on a complex & heavy Eve plane - horizontal landing and take-off. I've built and tested it out, including the heat protection and re-entry, and had it all ready to go. Now I've got to the real mission, I'm finding the wings keep snapping off after getting through re-entry and before landing. It seems I have to be incredibly careful with control inputs, but I never had this issue when testing it out before (with Teleport). I can't figure out what's changed - wondering if parts like wings can get weakened during re-entry, or whether they either survive intact or fail? I built and tested it after the latest update so I don't think a s/w change is to blame. Thanks

Interesting, I haven't noticed that. Then again, I have started mostly using the planner in the alarm clock mod. It is more basic in that it just sets an alarm rather than giving details of the burn, but it's good enough.

I read elsewhere that it's an off-by-one issue: KSP1 start from year 1 but KSP2 starts from year 0. https://alexmoon.github.io/ksp/ uses KSP1 years. So: - Add a year to your KSP2 date when entering it as the earliest departure date - Subtract a year from the calculated departure date when setting your KSP2 alarm It's been working fine for me like that.

Same for me. 11 Kerbals in the same vessel (command pod and cargo bay) to and from Eve but it didn't complete. I believe that docking causes the issue - I docked with and refuelled the vessel in Eve orbit on the return journey. It seems that the save file lost track of which vessel had landed on Eve. I was able to fix it by editing a save file taken just before landing back at Kerbin. Here's how I did it: - Find the name of the vessel that went to and from Eve. Mine had become '(Combined)-44' at some stage during docking - Find the Guid for it: "Version": "0.1", "Guid": { "Guid": "bb017837-6add-49e4-bfbc-405dd2af6496", "DebugName": null }, "OwnerPlayerGuidString": "11e264d5-74df-4fe6-bd68-0f2d3a8dc92e", "OwnerPlayerId": 1, "AuthorityPlayerId": 1, "AssemblyOABConfig": { "RootGuid": { "Guid": "00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000", "DebugName": null }, "StagingState": null, "PartRelationshipData": null, "SymmetrySets": null }, "AssemblyDefinition": { "assemblyName": "(Combined)-44", "localizationNameKey": "", - Towards the end of the save file there is a travel log section which records various events for vessels. Find the section for landing on Eve. Mine looked like this: "TravelObjectIds": [ "a8647eb3-9928-43be-918a-9a6e62044122", "379e225a-a4d2-4ec4-89cd-9efc584e33d1", "4ee1ba2a-9baf-4442-b2f6-e48cbe4db3eb" ], "EventKey": "vesselLanded", "UT": 562894695.19543731, "FlightReportArgs": [ "Eve" ] }, - The GUID for my landing vessel (bb01...) is missing, so I added it: "TravelObjectIds": [ "a8647eb3-9928-43be-918a-9a6e62044122", "379e225a-a4d2-4ec4-89cd-9efc584e33d1", "4ee1ba2a-9baf-4442-b2f6-e48cbe4db3eb", "bb017837-6add-49e4-bfbc-405dd2af6496" ], "EventKey": "vesselLanded", "UT": 562894695.19543731, "FlightReportArgs": [ "Eve" ] }, Reload the modified file, land on Kerbin and the mission completes. Backup your save file first obviously...

Really nice job. I managed an Eve mission in KSP1 (single Kerbal) and have built and tested a launcher for this mission, but can't get it down to the surface with the inflatable heatshields not working properly. Your build looks far more compact than mine.

Ernus mission Hi I'm struggling to put an Ernus mission together. One basic problem I have is that my Kerbal heat-explodes on surface Eva, even it I land when the Sun is low and keep him in shadow. Any way to deal with that? Plummet

Landing on Titanus After my Etal mission I thought the rest would be easy...but then I found Titanus! With high gravity and very high atmospheric pressure it's another hard challenge. Much like Eve, but with the benefit of oxygen for air-breathing engines. I experimented with different engines but eventually used the Whiplash Turbo Ramjet as the thrust ramps up significantly as the speed picks up so you get increasing TWR. I used four outer Vectors to get the party started - you need to get air moving through the ramjets and they help to lift the craft through the thick lower air. There's an inner core of 5 ramjets, with 4 on the outside. On top of all that is a Vector with drop tanks, followed by a final Aerospike stage. So, the staging order goes: - Fire up the ramjets and Vectors, drop the legs, drop the Vectors, drop the outer ramjets, drop the lower stage and light the Vector stage, drop the Vector drop tanks, stage and fire up the Aerospike. It's tricky to get it right and it took many attempts to find the optimal curve before I was eventually able to limp in to a 200K circular orbit. It won't handle sea-level - needs to be at least 3000m ASL. Parts are mostly stock - I used lithobraking legs just so it looks tidier (landing speed is around 10m/s so I could have used multiple sets of stock legs). I also used the ladders from the lithobraking pack - those are great, I had real hassle with Eve using fiddly small ladders. Of course, you have to get there first... I used my standard Space-Y heavy lifter and a nice reverse gravity assist from a handily placed Tylo to get to low Titanus orbit in one launch Then you have to deal with the heat. I used the same trick as Eve - 4 inflatable shields at the base and then a 'flower' of 5 shields at the top to act as an airbrake and to keep the craft oriented through entry. I started from a very low (165K) orbit and dropped the PE down to just 168.5K in order to start a very shallow re-entry. At first the whole thing swings like a big pendulum but eventually it settles down and it was all a bit smoother than Eve. Once through the heat, the upper 'Flower' decouples as one unit, then the craft flips upside down allowing the lower 4 shields to be jettisoned. After that, let the speed come down as the air thickens before deploying 2 drogues followed by 6 chutes. I was lucky to land at a high enough elevation at the first attempt. Then, a quick flag plant before we're off again. Now I just have to go and pick my guy up... surely after that the rest of the planets will be easy! Plummet.

Landing on Etal Thanks KillAshley for putting this great planet pack together. I like to set myself the challenge of landing on all (solid) planets and moons in new planet packs. I've done a few so far (OPM, GPP, Gameslinx). Just getting started with New Horizons as I've spent a fair amount of time struggling with an Etal landing mission... It's one of the toughest challenges yet I think. I finally managed it using a lander I made using Space Y parts. I couldn't do it with stock. The huge gravity requires high TWR and high DV. I used a Space Y Multi-Ratite as the landing engine (!) and 7.5m Space Y parts. The lander has rover wheels to help absorb the landing impact - no amount of landing struts would take it. It also has drop tanks and a mining/refuelling setup. It packs about 6000 dV. I had to upgrade my heavy Space Y launcher to get it there and only just had enough fuel to land. It took many attempts. The drop tanks are dropped during descent, so less dV is available after refuelling. It has enough to get back in to a ~150K circular orbit. After that I sent a rescue probe to pick my Kerbal up, and that packed enough punch to get her straight back home to Kerbin - so two Kerbin launches in total for the mission. Looking forward to visiting the remaining planets and moons...hoping Etal was the tough one as it took ages! Plummet.

Heh! That's true! I'm glad though..keep the challenges coming!

Mission accomplished! Finally completed my goal of planting a flag on all the landable bodies in this great planet pack. I used my standard stock-parts mining lander for all of the landings except Fume. I built a special stock-parts ship for that. I use Space-Y for the Kerbin launches. Took about 5 Kerbin launches in total - I was able to hop from moon or planet to the next to cover most of the system. Thanks again Gamelinx and others for putting it together, I really enjoyed it. I'm not finished yet though, will definitely go back to spend more time of some of these bodies, especially Telos and Butai. Still tempted to get a new PC so I can see them in their full glory! Plummet.

Anyone bagged them all yet? I'm heading home from Quarta, just got Scorch and Fume to go...

Nice.. I've been enjoying hopping around with my mining lander. Currently working my way through the Olu'um system. Hope I can upgrade to 1.1 without too much trouble. Which of the planets and moons support air-breathing engines?

HI - this planet pack looks great. Currently sat on Olemut deciding where to go next.. Sorry if this has been asked before, but has anyone made a dV map? Plummet.

Hi all I've now completed my goal of landing on and returning from all the GPP landable bodles, finishing with Icarus which was more of a challenge than I expected. Thanks again to all who put this pack together, it really is great. Wish I had a better PC so I could crank up all the visual setitngs.. Need another challenge now! Plummet.

Catullus mission accomplished.. I've now successfully launched from Gael, landed on Catullus and returned to orbit. Per previous posts my stock-parts Eve lander did the trick. It was all a lot harder than it should have been as the lander really needs some fixes. In particular: - The bottom heatshields collide and explode on jettison, often damaging the craft. - The ladders are a pain..took about 30 mins to climb back up from the surface without falling off - I got something wrong with fuel lines meaning I had to manually disable/re-enable some tanks and mess around with the staging Anyway, worked out well eventually! Now all that remains is a rescue mission which will then head back in to explore the inner bodies (I've done everything outside Gael now) Photo album below.. Launch: Entry in to Catullus: Chutes deployed: EVA: Launch: Final stage: Orbit!!

Hi I just completed my tour of the outer bodies (including Tellumo but excluding Catullus), so I've moved on to look at a Catullus return. From a quick experiment I found my stock-parts Eve lander as described here: can survive the re-entry and made it back to a 250Km circular orbit with a bit of gas left in the tank. I'll write it up properly once I've done the full mission.

Hi Tyko First - thanks to all involved in GPP. Fantastic job! It's given my KSP game playing a new lease of life. Yes, I have landed a crewed craft (MK1 capsule) on Tellumo and returned to orbit. I used stock parts for the lander (Space Y for the Gael launch booster). Here's my lander: The bottom stage is a pair of Vectors in the centre surrounded by a ring of 6 Rapiers. The second stage has a central Aerospike with 2 tanks strapped to the side, each with another Aerospike. The outer tanks feed fuel in to the centre tank and the outer tanks/engines then drop off once those outer tanks are empty (so 3 stages in all). You'll notice the steerable fins on the lower tanks. In some of my experiments I convinced myself they were needed, but actually I got best result in the end by dropping them immediately on launch - they (and the landing legs) are attached to the tanks by decouplers. The two Vectors are connected to the centre tank via a small tank and a decoupler - so I can actually drop the Vectors once I'm done with them. I think it's a fairly nice looking design..but it's damn tricky to fly and took many attempts to limp it in to a 100K circular orbit. The best approach seemed to be: - Have the Rapiers in air-breathing mode at launch - Run the Vectors at full-throttle until the Rapiers are generated a good amount of thrust (over 200KN) - Drop the Vectors - Fly a shallow profile to keep air ramming in to the Rapiers. The thrust should crank up like crazy and now we're sipping fuel as we don't have any pure rockets running - Hit around 20KM at which point we should be doing crazy speeds and getting heating effects - Pull up sharply as the thrust starts to drop in the thinner air, and switch to rocket mode on the Rapiers for the last few seconds of fuel - Stage and make sure the centre tank for the Aerospikes is not draining (I think I got the fuel lines wrong so had to inhibit it) Getting on to the surface seemed easier than when I did it on Eve. I used inflatable shields fore and aft, with the top one placed back from the craft via girders to keep the centre of drag back so the craft falls retrograde. I also had some Airbrakes on there but don't think they did much: The craft tends to tumble a bit at maximum heating but without harm being done. After that, parachutes do the rest combined with a last-second burst from the Vectors to soften the landing. I used a similar approach for Eve: and had the same issue that getting rid of the inflatable shields without damaging the craft can be tricky. Landing site elevation was 4600m, not sure if I could have made it back from a lower site. After all that - I sent a rescue mission to Tellumo orbit with my favourite workhorse mining lander: and after picking Jeb up from Tellumo orbit and visiting the hidden moon we've been working our way out through the system - currently exploring the Nero moons. Next challenge will be a lander for Catullus.. Good luck! Plummet

Thanks for the tip MaxL_1023 - I'm using GPP now and just managed to complete a landing and return from Tellumo. It is similarly challenging to Eve, although the ability to use air-breathing engines changes it a bit. I used a smaller lander than my Eve lander - 2 stages with 2 Vectors and 6 Rapiers in the first stage, then 5 Aerospikes in the 2nd stage. Quite a tricky launch - took a lot of experimentation to find the right time to switch to air-breathing mode, and what ascent profile to fly. GPP is a really great pack, I'm enjoying it.

Hi I completed my goal of landing on and returning from all the stock bodies some time ago, so recently got around to installing the Outer Planets mod. I'm glad I did - I think it is excellent, adds a lot to the game and has a stock feel. I've now landed on all the outer planets bodies and managed to do so with only two Kerbin launches (using a mining lander) so I thought I'd write that up. I used: - KSP for Steam 1.2.2 - Mechjeb (just for dV calcs) - Space Y. I landed on all the stock bodies with stock parts, but decided to use the larger Space Y components for the outer planets challenge. I'm really impressed with this mod too - again the parts have a stock feel and aren't over-powered. I do have a heavy lifter made from stock parts that is more than powerful enough to do the job, but it runs slow on my PC as it has so many engines! With Space Y it all looks tidier.. - Atomic Age. I used the Nuclear Lightbulb for one of my stages - WarpEverywhere - this mod (or similar) is essential for outer planets IMHO - PreciseNode - Kerbal Alarm Clock The lander The lander is made from stock parts. It has a Rockomax 64, surrounded by 4x Rockomax 32, surrounded by 4x Rockomax 16s with Rockmax 8s on top... Engines are a central Vector and 4 Aerospikes (on the outer ring). It carries plenty of batteries and solar panels, plus a fuel cell array which is essential for the most distant planets. It also has a mining set-up (drill, small Convert-O-Tron, ore tanks) and radiators. Legs are on girders to spread the base and to make landings easier. A Mk1-2 pod allowed me to take a full team of 3. I threw on a comms dish (although I didn't use Commnet), parachutes and a docking port for good measure. It provides 4600 dV and plenty of TWR - 1.33 fully fueled on the heaviest body (Slate). The tour I started by using my Space Y heavy lifter to transfer straight to Sarnus, I used MechJeb's window planner for this launch, but made all the other transfers by eyeball & manouveur node experimentation. The lifter uses a quad-Emu surrounded by Fenir boosters as the first stage. Second stage has a ring of 6 Ratite engines. 3rd stage has 4 Nuclear Lightbulbs, and finally the launcher sits on top of all that. I started with a landing at Tekto (making use of the parachutes) and then worked my way inwards (skipping Slate initially). The refueling setup works well - just warp like crazy for a few dozen days until the tanks are all topped off. I found that in some cases I needed to only use one radiator otherwise I'd run out of electric charge during the night. For Plock and Neidon the solar panels are no use so I had to use the fuel cell array. Fortunately with the radiator panels closed you still make a net gain in fuel when mining. Just have to remember to switch the fuel cell off again when leaving as otherwise all your fuel burns away when warping through the planet transfers! Slate was the only real problem on the whole tour. My lander has enough dV for a powered descent and landing, and after refueling can get back in to a decent orbit, but it doesn't have enough dV to transfer to one of the other moons. So, I had to send a refueling tanker and refuel in Slate orbit. I then worked my way outwards and visited all the moons of Urlum and Neidon, before finalling visiting Plock and Karen. The lander had enough dV to make all these transfers just by hopping from one system or moon to another. Coming home This was one of the most fun parts of the tour - making my way back from Plock to Kerbin without having to send a refueling mission. It took a few stops...the route was: - Plock - > reverse assist at Neidon -> reverse slingshot at Jool -> Duna - Landing at Duna for refuelling (making use of the chutes again). Only just made it...had about 30 dV left on landing! - Reverse assist at Mun, landing at Minmus for refuelling The refuelling stop at Minmus was needed because I didn't pack a heatshield and separator. So, I made a power-assisted re-entry to avoid burning up in the Kerbin atmosphere, and also a final landing burn to make it down intact. All in all it was one of my most enjoyable KSP missions and I highly recommend the Outer Planets pack. Now I need something else.. are there any other planet packs that are as good? Happy flying, Plummet.

Hi all This was a huge challenge for me so I thought I'd write it up for posterity. I used: - 1.2.1 with stock parts - apart from MechJeb for dv calculations and landing predictions (no autopilot) - Hyperedit - just during development/test, not for the full-up mission - Kerbal Alarm Clock - Precise Node As many have noted the two big challenges are: 1. Getting enough dv (and TWR) to get back in to orbit 2. Getting the whole thing down on the ground safely through the intense heating effects The ship From reading other posts I found that at least 7500 dv is needed to launch from the highest Eve elevations, and far more than that is needed for a sea-level launch. 1000m difference in elevation equates to a huge difference in the required dv. I eventually built a ship with an impressive sounding 10,000 dv - but on testing found it wouldn't even leave the ground! You have to get sufficient TWR at each stage of the launch/ascent too. Experimenting with various engines showed that the Aerospike works well in the Eve atmosphere. But, my attempts with Aerospike-only builds weren't successful - partly due to low launch thrust and partly as I couldn't get enough steering control. So, a central Vector surrounded by Aerospikes was my eventual solution. The Vector has excellent gimbal control plus plenty of thrust - I use it a lot. There are 6 Aerospikes on an outer ring, feeding fuel in to another 6 Aerospikes on an inner ring. The outer ring is the first stage to drop, taking the landing legs with it. The remaining lower stage of 7 engines then drops off, leaving a higher ring of 6 Aerospikes surrounding a final central Aerospike. So, that's 18 Aerospikes and one Vector (plus some RCS thrusters) Eventually all that is left is the central Aerospike on top of FLT-800/400 tanks.. it flies straight and true like a Minuteman missile! I tested the Eve ascent using Hyperedit. I've landed on and returned from every other body in the system without using Hyperedit for testing, but I honestly think I would never have managed this challenge without being able to test the ascent (and the thermal entry) before the full-up mission. The final ship had 8500 dv - and I found that's enough to get in to Eve orbit from an elevation of 5000m+. From sea-level it can barely take-off. 5000m does limit the landing sites significantly, but I found (from another post by Brotoro) this site at 6500: 2 49 57 S 171 24 03 W I missed it..but still ended up at over 5000m so was able to get back. Landing entry I used Mechjeb landing guidance but found it fairly inaccurate with my craft. So, it became a game of trial and error - I saved my de-orbit manouver details and then tweaked by a few m/s until the landing was close enough to my target. Thermal protection - 'The Flower' This was really tricky! Coming in to Eve is like hitting a brick wall, especially around 46000m. Others had success with airbrakes, but in the end I went with a ring of 6 inflatable heatshields I call 'The Flower' to act as a an airbrake and to keep the ship retrograde-oriented. They are held back from the ship (to keep the centre of drag behind the centre of mass) using a system of girders. I then had another pair of inflatable heatshields at the bottom to actually provide the thermal protection. It works pretty well - as long as you come in shallow from a low orbit. No SAS/RCS needed to keep the ship oriented. Sometimes at 46000m things get a little wobbly, but it soon settles down and after that point (once speed drops below 1800m/s) the heat quickly dies off too. The harder part is getting rid of the damn shields. If they touch anything they produce a huge explosion, destroying your craft. Getting rid of 'The Flower' wasn't too bad - just decouple it from the base of the girders once you're through the heat and generally the whole thing just disappears. Getting rid of the lower two is harder, I think because they tend to bump in to each other (they overlap). I found the best results came from jettisoning 'The Flower' and then letting the drag from the two heatshields flip the whole vessel nose-down. Wait until a fairly low level (e.g. 10000) where the speed has dropped off significantly and then jettison them one at a time. After that - pop the 6 drogues and the 6 radial chutes. They lower the speed nearly enough for landing - but a last second burst from the Vector allows a landing with almost full fuel tanks and with all the legs intact. EVA No major dramas, although it took a while to arrange all the ladders and I didn't do a great job of it so getting back up was fiddly. Others had used a MK1 pod at the base to avoid this issue. Ascent This took a few attempts. I found that going max thrust and not worrying about heating/aero affects had the best results. A careful gravity turn has to be flown to achieve orbit, but not too steep as you want to get out of that thick, soupy air quickly. Rescue Finally, I sent a simple pod to bring Jeb home. He stopped off at Gilly on the way...I really like Gilly, getting in to orbit and rendezvous with your ship using jet pack alone is fun! If I went back.. I'm not sure I will as it was really hard... but if I did I think I'd spend even more time in the VAB trying to squeeze out more dv so I could return from lower levels. I'd also experiment more with Airbrakes and with some other solution for the lower heatshields. I hope this is of use to some of you - good luck with your mission to Eve!.