Quadkiller

I was doing an EVA science experiment in orbit where the Kerbal spins a wingnut to demonstrate the intermediate axis theorem. As I jetpacked the Kerbal back to the command pod, I accidentally rammed the Kerbal's head into the wingnut which sent it flying directly into a solar panel and broke it! I was not expecting that at all.

Has anyone else experienced cargo parts (specifically the deployable science experiments) randomly multiplying? I'll take an experiment deploy it, and then take a look through the cargo in the ship a while later and see that its still there. This has happened a few times now, so I'm pretty sure I'm not just crazy.

Thanks! I think that it may or may not be better to combine the burn depending on the scenario. On the one hand, you want to save fuel by combining burns with the Pythagorean theorem. But you also want to change inclination near apoapsis since its cheaper. In the ideal case, your relative ascending node is already near apoapsis so you get the best of both worlds. But I'd image if your ascending node is far from apoapsis, you might actually be better off partially fixing your inclination at apoapsis first.

So long story short, I ended up in this really wacky elliptical orbit and I'm trying to rendezvous with my space station in a polar orbit around the Mun. Here's some screenshots: https://imgur.com/a/UP4n12P. I'm creating a maneuver at the relative ascending node with the goal of lowering my orbit so that the burn location becomes the apoapsis, the periapsis becomes 30km (where the polar station is), and the relative inclination is 0. Naturally this involves burning in a combination of all three axes. It's pretty easy to get a very rough burn set up by eye, but refining it is a real pain. The main issue is that I can only edit the burn in the coordinate system of my current orbit, which is completely misaligned from the coordinate system of my target orbit. For example, to adjust the periapsis the best I can do is use anti-normal since its the closest to the prograde direction of the target orbit. However, this is far from ideal since it also adds velocity in the radial out direction (which messes up my apoapsis location) and the anti-normal direction (which messes up my relative inclination) in the target orbit coordinate system. What I end up doing is going in circles fixing the relative inclination, periapsis altitude, and apoapsis altitude one after another until I slowly converge to the optimal burn. I've run into this exact issue several times now, and its always a bit annoying. From what I can tell, the optimal solution would be a toggle that allows you to switch to editing the burn in the target coordinate system. This would mean that the directional indicators would rotate dynamically as you add velocity in the various directions. Has anyone else run into this? Any mods/general tips for making the process easier?

Here's an easy approach for getting 3 satellites equally spaced out in Keostationary orbit with very little math. Get the first satellite into Keostationary orbit. Get the second satellite into low Kerbin orbit with an orbital period of 34m 12.324s (5h 59m 9.4s * (2/3) / 7). Plan a maneuver node for the second satellite to rendezvous with the first satellite, but don't perform the maneuver yet. Delay the maneuver node by exactly 7 orbits, the closest approach indicators should be 120° apart now. Execute the maneuver node, then circularize at apogee. For the third satellite, make sure you target the second satellite not the first one. You can double check it is correct based on the closest approach indicators. In general, the parking orbit can have a period of (sidereal rotation period) * (k / number of satellites) / n, where k and n can be any integers. The numbers 2 and 7 just happen to work out well for Kerbin. Note that changing k will change which satellite in synchronous orbit you have to plan the maneuver with.

Hey. Thanks for the awesome mod. I noticed a very specific bug. I 'launched' a dummy craft and left it on the launchpad. Then I targeted it from another craft in orbit (I was trying to figure out the phase angle from KSC). When I tried to open the rendezvous tab on KER the game froze. To try to narrow it down, I created another tab where the only data being shown was the phase angle, but the game still froze. Later on, I moved the dummy craft off the launchpad (it landed at R&D) and it worked fine. It seems to only apply when the craft is on the launchpad.

@AeroGav Thanks for the detailed answer. Since a stable enough aircraft is way beyond me I'll just stick to nearby contracts for now.

Hey everyone, aircraft flying noob here. So I recently I tried flying a simple aircraft halfway around Kerbin while leaving it on time warp. The plane mostly flew straight but it kept pitching up slowly so I had to keep making adjustments. I'm almost sure this is because my COL is slightly above my COM. From what I read online, adjusting the trim should do the job. So i tried adjusting it using Alt+W but nothing changed. I'm wondering if it has something to do with the fact that SAS was on. Any ideas?

Oh cool, I didn't know that. I'll probably just use cheats. Thanks everyone!

I actually tried this but it said that I don't have a connection to send the command on (I'm using RemoteTec) even though I was above KSC and in the sunlight. Not quite sure why. I'll give it a try. Thanks! I'm not sure if this this is going to work. If you call the plane of Kerbin's orbit around the sun the x-y plane, then the solar panels are pointing in the z direction. So I'm pretty sure they'll never point towards the sun.

Hey guys, So I launched a satellite with 2 OX-STAT Photovoltaic Panels, but i forgot to orient it properly once I reached orbit. So the panels are almost edge on to the sun . However, one of the panels is still getting 4% sun exposure and "producing energy" (it says energy flow = 0.017). The problem is that the batteries still aren't charging. I tried restarting the game but it didn't help. Any ideas?

Thanks!

Thanks for the help everyone. I'll give both suggestions a try. It turns out I was completely wrong in terms of timing the launch. I'll give it a try and hopefully it will work better now. I'll also try out a vertical launch but I'm sure that'll involve me flying by hopelessly far away from the Mun until I get the hang of it :). I just started playing KSP and it's amazing. It's awesome to have a community of people who can help out with getting started. Also by the way, I couldn't figure out how to comment on other people's answers. Can someone help me out?

I'm having trouble rendezvousing with a station that is in a low polar orbit of the Mun. I am able to get a Mun encounter and make a mid-course correction so that I end up in a polar orbit around the Mun. However, the polar orbit I end up in isn't aligned with the polar orbit of the station. How can I time my launch so that I end up with the two orbits as closely aligned as possible?