astroheiko

My Tarsiss SSTO is again in orbit and has met with the mothership at Catullus. Since it still has almost 3000 m / s dV, I come to the conclusion that I could have built it much smaller. The mother ship is now on the way to meet Loki. Then I docked the Rover from the Cargobay to the Lander. And everything marked what I want to visit. Now it can go. Greetings

For 203 m/s I burn a suitable orbit to meet with the mothership. Then in the orbit of Catullus I adjust the inclination by 1.4 degrees (33.8 m/s), brake at the AP for 136.4 m/s to get an intercept with the mothership. Then I dock with the help of the claw. Now the data will be transmitted first and then the crew. The Tarsiss SSTO I leave back, it still has almost 3000 m/s dV. Maybe I need it again sometime. The mothership with the Lander is now on the trip to Loki. I put a maneuver node for 430 m/s to leave Catullus and reach a course that takes me to Loki. For a further 175.4 m/s I can then reach a low PE at Loki. Before I corrected the inclination by 3.4 degrees. At the PE of Loki I then still burnt retrograde to reach a stable orbit. Now I have to prepare everything for the exploration of Loki. This includes attaching the rover to the bottom of the lander. To do this, I loosen the Tug with the claw from the upper end of the lander and maneuver it to the rover. As I approach the docking port, I notice a construction error of the mothership. The LVN engine is in the way. Hopefully I get the Rover out. Of course he remains stuck. Somehow he solved himself and I still get it out. I take the rover away from the mother ship (You can see it in the background), loosen the tug and stick it back to the mother ship. Now i undock the lander and move him to the rover. Then I dock the lander to the rover. Now everything is ready for the descent. Before I mark as usual all biomes. At the control where there is ore for ISRU, I notice that I have not made an Orbital Survey. I'm still catching up. The probe was still in a orbit around Tarsiss. I spare you the maneuvers. Now everything is ready and soon we can land.

The next stop is planned at the Biome Mare Major. Here I refuel again and do some science. On the wayto the next Biom... ...Twin Craters. Next, Lowlands follows. Since I still have some fuel, I am looking for a higher starting place and refuel. The poles will follow next. As always, here too, we will refuel. With an intermediate stop, I reach the last Biom, Great slopes. After that, I set off towards the equator to have a good start position for the ascent into the orbit. I really wanted to start somewhere higher to have better ISP values, but at 2795m it will already go. The Sparks have an ISP of 263.7 and the LVNs 138,7. One last time I fill up full. At the start, only the Sparks are used, since the LVN would only be a waste of fuel. First, I choose a flat angle to reach a speed of 40 m/s. Then I adjust the ascent angle to hold 35 m/s. This starts at 25 degrees and increases to up to 40 degrees. When the oxidizer is exhausted, I turn on the LVN engines. This is the case at 6000m. The ISP of the LVN is now at 240, which is already much more efficient, in addition, I accelerate to 50 m/s. Slowly the ISP and the thrust are rising. At 7500m it is already at 340 and I increase the angle gradually to get on high. At 9500m the ISP is 400 and I have an ascent angle of 55 degrees. When I reach 14000m, the ISP is already 500 and I throttle the engines not to exceed 60 m/s. If I now speed up I will be too fast and the drag eats a big part of the thrust. After all, I have to reach 130000m before the atmosphere ends. At 18500m I cross an ISP of 600 and at 20000m I flatten the flight curve to an ascent angle of 15 degrees. Now I increase the speed to 200 m/s (orbit) and then throttle to 1/3 thrust to only slowly get faster. At 26500m, the ISP is now at 700. The climb rate of the SSTO is now over 100 m/s. First when I have reached 60000m height I increase the thrust to 1/2. In addition, I switch the SAS to Surface and select prograde. So I have the least drag. At 76500m the ISP is almost at 800 (795) and at reaching an AP of 140000m I stop the engines. Then I burn at the AP for 156 m/s to reach a stable orbit. The tanks are still almost half full and I have an awful lot fuel left, 3413 m/s dV. Conclusion for Tarsiss SSTO: Way too big. I should not have used so many wings. In addition, an LVN would have sufficed, as I have used most of the time only 1/3 thrust. So I would have had to take less fuel, of course, and the SSTO would have been half as big and still had the same performance. I have practiced the rise of Tarsiss more than once, and whenever I got too fast too early, I had less fuel left. This is unusual, usually you want to fly as fast as possible to reach the orbit. I think that has several reasons. On the one hand there is the high atmosphere, which causes enormous drag losses until you are in orbit. On the other hand, the fact that the gravitational force is very low and thus less loss of gravitational losses. In addition, you need to accelerate first when the LVN have increased their efficiency.

I have a nice picture for you again. In the background are Catullus, Gauss and Loki. Tarsis is really a gem. If you have the opportunity, visit him in any case. I was a bit cocky and almost lost my SSTO in a Methan lake. By the way - I'm glad you find my home country so beautiful. You can just believe me, the Germans can be funny - at night in the cellar.

I finally got time to land on Tarsiss. When I am exploring, I am almost drowned.

Before I land I mark all biomes. Then I change the orbit to land near the biome "Atoll". Next, I lower the PE to 100km for aerobraking. When entering the atmosphere, I set the SAS on Surface and Radial out to effectively brake. The descent continues forever so I set the SAS to Radial in to speed up. The low gravity is one of the main reasons for this. Then at least we have time to take pictures. Since I have far too much wings I can land only when I am slower than 10 m/s, otherwise, I pluck off and am back in the air. I open all cargo bays to have as much drag as possible. Immediately after landing, I begin with scientific investigations. To reset the Mystery Goo unit, I have to move the front chassis. By the way - I do not know why I have one - at 10 m/s landing speed. Then I set the flag and make a reminder photo. Tarsiss is really a gem. The crew goes back on board and I refuel again with ISRU. 14 days lasts, I only have the small Convert-O-Tron. I remember the ISP for this altitude - ISP at 3571m 160 LVN, 267 Spark. This could be important later, if I want to leave the moon again. Since the Methanlake is nearby, I also want to join this biom. So I release the brakes, roll down the hill and take off without doing anything at 15 m/s. Much to much wings. I glided so beautiful there for and when I reach the lake... NOOOOO! the plane drowned. Now I have SSTU- boat I quickly do all scientific experiments and activate all the engines I have. The ISP is now only 80 for the LVN. Thank goodness, the Spark here still has 250. At 13.5 m/s, I'm back out of the lake. Much to much wings ....I'm looking for a place on the shore to refuel, this action has quite a lot of fuel consumed. At the same time I can still visit the Highland and the Midland Biome. Here you can also see how I stowed the drill in the Cargo Bay. In order to drill, I must move however the rear chassis.

I am planning a rendezvous with the mothership... ...and transfer all scientific experiments and the crew except of Jeb. Then I refuel the Catullusrocket and undock. Because I still need to catch the poor stranded Kerbal. After that, we go back to the mothership, fill the rest of the fuel into the lander, transfer the entire crew to the mothership and discard the rest of the catullus lander forever. Now I have to bring the Survey Probe into a polar orbit around Tarsiss. For a total of 610 m/s I get a nice polar orbit. In the orbit of Tarsiss I lowered the PE to 110km and could thus slow down in the atmosphere very nicely. Then I increased the orbit and performed Orbital Survey Scan. Now I know where I can refuel the Tariss SSTO with ISRU and plan a docking maneuver with the mothership. I take over the team and head to Tarsiss. For just 36 m/s I get an intercept. Where are my pictures? I think because I forgot to press F1. In any case, I lowered the PE at Tarsiss to 115km and reached again with aerobraking an orbit. Then I increased the PE again to get a stable orbit. The Tarsiss SSTO is now waiting for its deployment.

It has worked ... it has worked ... it has worked ... The funny thing here has actually landed AND reached the orbit of Catullus - with ISRU

I am struggling to design a spaceplane for Catullus. I want to bring 3 Kerbals with ISRU to the moon to explore all biomes. This is the best attempt so far. I have not built such a strange thing yet. I can not decide whether it is pretty or ugly. The aerobraking works in any case perfectly, it stabilizes itself and brakes beautifully. Nothing gets too hot. The landing also worked quite well, with 50m / s but a bit fast. ISRU also works. The return to orbit, however, gives me headaches. Before you have not reached at least 100km altitude, you can not really put the pedal to the metal. The atmosphere is furiously thick. That is why I have chosen a high TWR to reach this height as quickly as possible. But can not say whether this was really the right decision. One tank after another is blown off. Lastly also 4 of the 5 darts but the fuel is simply not enough. This was my best attempt so far. I guess I have to install at least 500 m/s dV. Or a higher starting point, or both. There really was not much missing, AP at 200 km, PE was already at -62km when the rocket fell dry. Orbit would be reached at 280km. I'll get you. Greetings

I still have some nice pictures of the landing on Catullus. The rest I pack in the spoiler, I do not want to spam too much. I still have a lot more ... I really have to stop pressing F1 as often.

I landed on Catullus. As always, I have far too many pictures, over 50. I show you but only the most beautiful / interesting. Dissolve the transfer stage and prepare to enter. Just before entering the atmosphere. At the rear you can see Gauss, Tarsiss and Loki fog of horror. A memorial photo for mum. Oops.... (The Ladders, Chutes, Airbrakes and Science were at decouplers) it is not too bad The Ascent has worked well. Orbit reached with 1621 m/s dV left. Greetings

Now we will land, nothing can stop us now. I am separating the lander from the mothership... ... lower the AP, aim to a nice spot and lower the PE to 100km. Then I release the transfer stage, unfold the heat shield and activate the airbrakes. (I have been waiting extra with the landing to I have all the bodies in the background) Shortly before entering the atmosphere, the lander still has a surface speed of 3120 m/s. Somewhere at 200km then the entrance effects come. Everything remains beautifully stable. The entry into the atmosphere is by far not as extreme as with Eve. At 115km the speed has already decreased to 1524 m/s. The maximum negative acceleration is 1.8 G. Here I have already done some scientific research. At about 45km the parachutes release and I slow down to 223 m/s. Now the atmosphere really becomes a soup. The planets disappear in the fog. At 7000m the weather clears up again. The Lander has reduced its speed to 100 m/s. At 2750m the parachutes then open completely and the lander reaches its landing speed of 6 m/s. LANDED Science is first collected, then the devices are reset, and investigations are started again. Collect all and... ...say CHEESE...(In the background are Gauss, Tarsiss and the small moon is Loki) All Kerbals go back on board and then ... Oh my God! No panic. The fireworks were planned (Jeb insisted on a firework). I have attached all the ladders, parachutes, the airbrakes and scientific instruments to decouplers. Before the start, these must be discarded in order to save weight. Here I save first, it can always go something wrong. Before the launch I put the SAS on Surface and Radial out. So that I can see better if the tanks are empty, I have also brought them to the screen. Shortly after the start, the landing legs are still decpoupled. I switch the SAS to Prograde and tilt it slightly to the horizon to reach a Gravity turn. Since I must be very careful. If I tilt her too much, she would flip around. (As a tip for all who bring a similar rocket here, I recommend elevons or winglets to keep the course better. Vector engines would also go, but since the gravity is not so high, one does not necessarily need) The first stage is empty and we no longer need the Balast. At an altitude of 20km, the next stage is empty and is discarded. The rocket also does not lean too much - does not look bad so far. Here I have time to make a nice picture of the ascent. Shortly after reaching the 67km mark, the next stage is empty. The flight curve is a bit too steep, I wanted to have here about 45 degrees. Therefore, I do not load again, it will work. At an altitude of 100km and an AP of 200km I throttle the rocket to 1/3 thrust to flatten the curve. When the AP reached 280 km, I turn the rocket to the horizon and burn the rest of the stage and throw it off. Then I set at the AP a maneuver to bring the PE to over 280km - 1300 m/s. Done. Stable orbit over 280km and still 1621 m/s dV left. At my best test I still had more than 2000 m/s. Now I can go back to the mothership.

All vehicles have now arrived at Gauss. I've done a lot of complicated maneuvers so that everything is in place and on time. This alone took more than 3 hours. I will spare you the pictures of the maneuvers, whoever wants to - can see them in my report. The Catulluslander was docked on the mother ship and the Crew ist waiting until everyone else is in their orbit. The Survey probe has started its work. And the Tarsiss SSTO was also taken around Gauss in a parking orbit at Catullus. Also, I have just received this offer. So lucky for the poor guy that I have enough space.

Slowly it becomes serious, All vehicles have now entered Gauss in the corresponding parking orbits. Also, I have just received this offer. So lucky for the poor guy that I have enough space. Now I'll land on Catullus. Hopefully it will work. By the way - I am seriously considering whether I am developing like a spaceplane for Catullus. Do you think that would be possible? Maybe something with a Surface TWR of 1.2 so you can start like a rocket. From 45km then LVN would come to work? Greetings

Today there are many pictures and boring maneuvers. Soon it gets serious - we are slowly approaching the interesting part of the story. But one after anonther: While waiting for the arrival of the other vehicles, the relays are brought to their final orbit. PE at 1.000km, AP at 2.000.000km. For an orbit they need 1 year and 155 days. The Catulluslander is the first vehicle after the mothership arriving in the Gauss Sphere of Influence. The trajectory fits quite well, I burn a small correction maneuver for 2.4 m/s to lower the PE at Catullus to 280km. For this maneuver I turned off 8 of the 10 LVN and the last two throttled to 10%. This way you can maneuver very precisely. Then I planned a maneuver in the orbit of Catullus to slow down and adapt the orbit to the mothership. The brake maneuver needs 1.441m/s. After this maneuver, I changed the inclination by 0.9 degrees and accelerated at the AP for 84 m/s to reach an intercept with the mothership. With the claw monuted on the mothership I have then catches the Catulluslander. Now the Catulluslander can be manned and everything is prepared. But I can not land yet, because the other vehicles have already arrived and first have to be brought to their Orbits. (Thre are 2 solar eclipses simultaneously on Gauss) The Survey probe is next. In the transfer stage are still 294 m/s left. This I use to slow down at Gauss and get an orbit with an AP of 108.000km. Then I dropped the burned out stage. From now I have still ion drive available. At the AP, I then planned a maneuver for 405.9 m/s to reach a polar orbit at Catullus. There I then lowered the AP to 1.500km to make an Orbital Survey. (Again 2 solar eclipses on Gauss, which does not seem as rare as I thought) Meanwhile the Tarsiss SSTO has already arrived. It has braked at the PE of Gauss for 326.4 m/s and had then also at Catulluss a PE of 280 km. At Catullus, the inclination was adjusted (36 m/s) and braked for another 560 m/s to reach a stable orbit. The Tarsiss SSTO remains here in a parking orbit until I was on Catullus. All vehicles have now arrived and in a stable orbit. When I wanted to finish the game, I once again checked if interesting offers are available. God has that guy luck. Of course, I take him with me. Greetings

Now I have really arrived at Gauss. Here are some impressions. From my mission report: A Journey to Gauss Greetings

Thank god everything works again. So: Red Shirt makes everything broken. First Bill ... now the probe ...And now also the whole program - He does not do half things

My Mothership with the fat-headed little green people arrived at Gauss. I have the two relays exposed .... ... and heading for Catullus. Aerobraking at Catullus is not so highly recommended, with a lot of patience but it works. Now I just have to wait for the Lander, he's still on the way. More pictures and details can be found here: A Journey to Gauss Greetings

So fast 6 years go by and the mothership with the fat-headed little green people has arrived at Gauss. First, I get the science for the High Orbit of Gauss. Then I brake the mothership around 300 m/s to reach a high AP. The PE lies easily in the atmosphere of Gauss, so I get at least some data from the planet. Don`t forget the low Orbit science. Actually, I wanted to first explore Loki, but while watching the orbit I noticed that I am very close to Catullus. And so I decided to go straight to Catullus - Loki has to wait. For just 46 m/s I reach a PE of 296km at Catullus. Before I reach Catullus, I set off the two relays. The two have then increased the AP to 100.000km, so they are not caught by Catullus. At the AP, I then turned the two into a 90 degree inclination - each 250 m/s costs the maneuver. The relays will be sent to a high northern and southern polar orbit around Gauss. I have to split the maneuvers, because I can only burn 240 m / s at a time (Ions). At the first braking I lower the orbit from 100,000km to 25,000km, then 12,000km, etc. It is planned then a PE of 1,000km and a polar AP of at least 1,000,000km. Here I had the opportunity to make some beautiful pictures of Gauss, Catullus and Tarsiss. In the last picture, you can see that Catullus just throws his shadow on Gauss. At the edge of the shadow, Loki also just appears behind the planet. But let us now continue with the mother ship. At Catullus I brake for 230 m/s and get an AP of 20.000km. I will try to get a lower orbit with aerobraking. Since I am at the PE over 4000 m/s fast I can not dive very far into the atmosphere, just 260km at an atmosphere hight of 280km. Everything gets hot very quickly. I start with an AP of 10,000 km. After the first brake maneuver I have 8.700km, it follows 7.980km, 7.232km, 6.637km, 6.030km, 5.407km, 4.864km, 4.385km, 3.962km and 3.574km. This is enough to not be caught by Tarsiss. I now increase the PE to 290km. Finally, I put the claw on top of the lander to capture the unmanned Catulluslander. Now it is waiting for the other vehicles to arrive. Meanwhile, I will bring the relays to the final orbit. Greetings

Where were we? Oh yes, we still need fuel, a lot of fuel. The tanker filled his stomach on Iota and is about to burst. That should be enough to get the mother ship full. I have to be careful not to forget one of the many tanks. After the undocking, I check again that all tanks are full? Check. All Relays docked? Check. Rover on board? Check. Tug too? Check. The lander at the front of the mother ship? Check. Shut off the lander's engines? Check. Then it can finally go. I plan the course to Gauss and carry out the maneuver. 21 minutes burning time - Urgh ..... During the burning process the two upper LVN engines fall out - argh. Through the hardpoint there is no supply and I have to refill by hand. Hopefully I will not miss Gauss. Next is the Survey probe. Because of the Poodle engine, burning is faster. No failures or other dung. I meet Gauss very well. Then comes the Catullus Lander. This time it is almost 14 minutes of burning time - well, it will be finished sometime. The Tarsiss SSTO also takes almost 11 minutes - I do not like anymore. Somewhere in the middle between Gael and Gauss, I then make corrections. Basically, I change the inclination only when I have left the sphere of influence of Gael. This costs considerably less fuel. The individual maneuvers follow in detail. The Survey probe still has 300 m/s dV in the transfer stage. I need 6 m/s to adjust the inclination roughly. This does not have to be so exact, because I have to go anyway at Gauss still 90 degrees. Important is only a low periapsi to break cheap - here I have 600 km. The remaining 294 m/s I will use to slow down when I am at the Periapsis. That fits quite well - I should reach a nice high apoapsis. The inclination changes then becomes nice cheap. Only then will I need the ion engines. With the Catullus Lander it becomes more difficult. If possible, I want to enter the sphere of influence of Gauss so, that the trajectory is so diverted that I then arrive at Catullus. With as little inclination as possible. After getting back and forth I managed to reach this with 15.1 m/s a periapsis of 288km at Catullus and almost 0 degrees of inclination. The atmosphere starts at 280km - I am very satisfied with it. When the Lander arrives at Catullus there are still over 2150 m/s dV available to slow down, which should be enough. The maneuver for the mothership is getting slightly easier again. I set Loki as the target to see the mark for the AN/DN Node. Then the periapsis is placed as far as possible on this mark. Now, if the braking maneuver has been performed, one of the AN/DN marks is near the apoapsis. There the inclination can then be adjusted cheaply. Then I see further where I should go first. The Tarsis SSTO will be the last one, and it will be difficult again. Just like the Catullus Lander, I would like to slow down at the periapsis of Gauss and then reach Catullus with a small inclination and low periapsis. The first maneuver costs 7.8 m/s dV. At the periapsis of Gauus I have to brake then 327,48 m/s, so that I reach a periapsis of 280km at Catullus. Next I have not planned yet, which becomes too inaccurate. Anyway, then at Catullus is planned a breaking to reach an orbit at Tarsiss. Now I'm finally up to date, In six years it continues. It is possible that the reports are now slower and/or shorter because I do not know how quickly I will progress. greetings

Catullus - Really? You must show this, it will be interesting.. A spaceplane I have not dared - but could work, since the gravitation is not as strong as with Eve. Or did you just make a little joke? I've built something like that, it's just half way there. For Tarsiss I have however an SSTO built, if you are interested - I write about it a mission report. A Journey to Gauss Greetings

Since my last freight SSTO was so badly flown and landed, I thought about a new design. At first the re-entry was cruel, but then I installed Airbrakes on the tail - boy, that is a difference. Here are some pictures. I must admit that I do not like the wing arrangement so much. But it flies, arrives in the orbit with almost 3000 m/s dV left, and landing is also good. I can live with that. I just do not know how big the payload is. short before Orbit 2948 m/s dV left during reentry - at the tail you can see the Airbrakes. I flew a little over the target and had to turn around. The landing has worked on the first attempt.

@Hotaru I was bored and I just clicked on your story. Oh my God - these pictures. Breathtakingly beautiful. I have not yet read a word, I am only amazed. I have to look at the beginning of what mods you use. I want to have THAT too. Really great stuff Greetings

The best way is to use Imgur.com. You click on the green button on the top "New post". Then a window appears and you can drag and drop or browse to a folder where your pictures are. Then your images will be added to Imgur. To add a picture in a Post you click on "insert other media" at the bottom right. Then select "insert image from URL". switch to imgur and click copy when moving the button to the upper right of the picture. Copy the link in the Post "insert image from URL". Important ist to add ".jpg" at the end oft the link and the picture should be in the Post. Edit: Poodmund was faster

Since the mothership still needs two Relays and crew, I have thought of bringing the stuff with a SSTO into the orbit. To this I have developed a brand new one. It should have enough space to load a rover and 2 Relays to refresh the equipment of a returned mothership. Also place to exchange the team. In the picture are now only 2 Relays, since a rover is already in the mothership. It actually worked quite well (Apart from the fact that the runway was not enough. 3 times it still bounced in the grass until finally it was in the air) and already on the first flight I reached the orbit. Unfortunately, I did not have enough fuel to reach the high orbit of the mother ship. This is not going as planned. So the mothership had to go to the SSTO, since I have to refuel anyway that does not matter. But the Lander I left in the parking orbit. Otherwise, I may have to refuel 3 times. The Relays I have equipped with RCS so that they can come alone to the docking ports without having to use the Tug. In the picture you can see that the first Relay is already hanging on the mothership and the second is straight on the way. After docking to the mothership, I detach the RCS from the Relays, which we no longer need. Now the mothership can return to the Lander. Then the tanker arrives and gets the mothership just two-thirds full. I need to bring over 100,000 units of liquid fuel, but the tanker has only about 60,000 units. That thing is quite thirsty. And so the tanker goes back to Iota. While the tanker produces fuel, I want to land my brand new SSTO. Oh boy, I should have tested it before - of course, it is not at all stable at the re- entry and I can not slow down early enough. I have flown too far and have to turn around to get to the runway. At least the landing approach now looks good. Thank god I have pressed F5 before, the tail has touched the runway. 6 times the same until I had it down. Here you can see why. The main gear is too far forward. This SSTO I need to revise and without test I run no longer the thing. Once I have to refuel and then I can go. Greetings