AlexanderB

Hey guys, I'm Alexander, 26, student Mechatronics Engineering, and sometimes I play KSP. Actually, I've played KSP ever since 0.13 came out (I was just about a day late after the full version became paid, haha), but I haven't played in a while (before 1.0), and a lot has changed since 1.0, so I guess I'll re-introduce myself, and ask some n00b questions. So far, after playing for 2 days: Lots of new parts, and a lot of renames too. None of my previous designs work anymore. Heat shields/actual heating are a thing now (RIP Jeb) Drogue shutes are a thing (RIP Jeb, plowed straight into the ground at ~mach 2 because I wasn't allowed to open the shutes?) No more soup-mosphere for that matter, nothing gets automatically slowed down to 100 m/s anymore. Mk2 plane parts don't have built in (optional) heat shielding (like they used to?), RIP Jeb & Bill, exploded in level flight. In fact, how do heat shields even work? Do they stack? I killed a bunch of kerbals trying to get back from the Mun (unsuccesful so far), they either burn up right away (too steep?) or burn up after the ablative material runs out from successive shallow aerobraking passes. Meh. I can't get anything to (near) orbital speeds (SSTO) anymore, did they nerf the engines, or am I just doing it wrong? If I ever get anything to SSTO, how do I even get it back down without it catching fire? [edit:] apparently the Mk2 cockpit is no good for SSTO's anymore. RIP elegant SR-71 looking spaceplane design.

How 'low' do you have to fly to hit that thing? I apparently use a much steeper descent path, because I never hit it.. (I make a 35x100 orbit with the PE centered over KSC, it just about drops me on the runway if I follow prograde.)

I'm going to assume not much has changed, but we can run some of the experiments to find out. using alt-click to copy intakes does something weird to them, yes.

To be more specific, alt disables surface-attach, so any situation where you want to stick something to the attachement point but it keeps "grabbing" the surface of something else, you can use this for.

It doesn't need that much fuel, this much is just enough to reach 80x80 to 100x100 orbit depending on how much weight is in the cargo bay, and de-orbit afterwards. (Put your PE at 35-40 km above the KSC, and it will put you on a glide slope that takes you really close to the runway.) If you want to go further (say, to the mun or beyond) you need a LOT more fuel (fuel to get further, and fuel to drag all that fuel up to orbit.) Forward tank is just liquid fuel, I use the turbojets to get to a 100x30-ish orbit (at about 2400 m/s @ 35 km) before they flame out, (mostly) coast to the AP, then use the 24-77's to circularise. It works so well because its a really low-mass design, adding more stuff quickly leads to adding more stuff.

My GF made this for me (for my birthday)

Yeah, ditch the orange tank and SRB's, a shuttle-sized SSTO plane will orbit just fine without them in KSP, and do runway-->orbit-->runway with a couple of tons of cargo or a dozen+ kerbals for the price of just some liquid fuel.. On the other hand, a simple probe can be shot to kerbin orbit with just a small fuel tank and a single engine, or stick a SRB under it to boost its range to mostly anywhere in the kerbin system, especially if you use ion propulsion on the probe.

Not to mess with a pretty creative looking design, but: -Take those R.A.P.I.E.R. engines off and put on some of those small orange 24-77's, it saves a lot of weight, and you already have turbojets which are way better than the rapiers. - It has *no* vertical tail fin, add one (or two) - Make sure the center of mass is in front of the center of lift with both empty and full tanks, but not too far ahead. - Put the landing gear not too far behind the center of mass, so you can just flip the nose up on the runway, without having to rely on the little hop at the end to get you in the air. Add an extra wheel in the back (raised up a little) if the tail hits the ground. If I use the mk2 to 2x adapter, I like to stick it halfway between the engines. - Add more control surfaces. Perhaps some canards too. If you add more to the wing, make sure the wheels are far enough forward for it to have enough leverage. And an added trick, make sure you place x intakes, first jet engine, x intakes, second jet engine. If you don't, all the air will go to 1 of the 2 jets and you'll get asymetric flameout. 4 structural intakes per jet is plenty for the way I fly and doesn't look too overkill, but 5 might be okay too. It may look a little boring, but this is pretty much how I built my spaceplanes for a while now: It carries quite a load to orbit too: (the lander flew from kerbin orbit to minmus on its own) And I also made a slightly longer version that has a couple of those passenger compartments and an inline docking port instead of a big cargo bay, works nice too. [edit:] I see that your CoM is behind your CoL, its really important that you fix that..

Lol, Michael Bay found his way to KSP I see.

My Eve manned return lander has aspargus to get both the TWR and dV to make orbit.. Everything I built used to be aspargus, but since carreer mode, I don't use it anymore, pretty much because of re-useability of the parts == less money spent. A lot of my missions are now SSTO, or use cheap throwaway solid boosters.

Makes sense to me. I'd say, why not.

You can get Mechjeb to do it, but only as long as the ship is focussed, and no timewarp is used. It'll re-align when you come back out of timewarp, but if you're the wrong way around with a big station, that might take a while for it to turn around.

You can order custom-print t-shirts online. I asked, she used http://www.digitransfer.info/ but theres a lot more companies out there that print t-shirts.

No, not really, I've tried to let her play, but she likes watching me play.. Other than that, yes, she might be the one.

Haha, I should, yeah.

My girlfriend surprised me with a very nice, custom-designed T-shirt. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dj7nYuDjKoM The first time she made a digital art work, usually she works with paints and markers and stuff. I think its really cool. What do you guys think?

I see, now Danny can't fall though the planet anymore.. I did, so thats why I never used it. Much better now. Anyway, time to re-boot my science carreer, again.

Do a turbojet-powered suborbital rocket. It'll be small, and the fuel will last a lot longer, so its probably easier to manouver to the landing spot you want.. And then land using parachutes for easymode.

Honestly, replace the LV-909 with a 48-7s, the gain in lower mass should offset the slightly lesser ISP.

or that it wasn't running before. just make an empty stage below the current running stage, and re-stage it to "test" engines while using the same engine to get to the desired test altitude.

If you finish a contract, you get a message there.

Why do we even need firespitter for the animated doors? Can't the devs use the same animation code used for the inline clampotron?

Heat gun works, but don't hold it on one spot too long, or you'll also burn the paint off.

Jet engines leaving a soot-trail like an old steamtrain.

Wasn't there a bug just after persistence was added, where you could fly into your own debris cloud of the previous launch, even if you reverted? Perhaps the reason the 20 km limit for debris on rails was added?