Reusables

Only circumnavigation should be done during the mission(timed run). Other than that, separate mission is fine. (And recommended as well)

Not today, but here's screenshots of swingbys on Jool system. Laythe capture is not only practical, but also allows voyage to other moons in relatively shorter period. Why Tylo? Just more pics: (Immersive on personal appetite - edit: kerbal system in a nutshell?) Besides, spinning top seems to be a thing in ksp. This thing refused to stop spinning until I accidentally timewarped. This thing needs to be shaped.

Is it practical to aerobrake with airbrakes on Duna? I'm planning for fully fledged Duna mission involving tankers. I was a bit worried as I heard that Duna's atmosphere is too thin for a heavy craft to shave off reasonable amount of speed. As its atmosphere is mild as to heating, would it be possible to use airbreaks? Or wouldn't it be needed? (Or, should I use inflatable headshields?)

Aside from aesthetics and control without signal, Mk3 cockpit is great mk1-mk3 adapter as well. As RAPIERs can easily accelerate a plane to 1600m/s, Rockets just need to give 700m/s to LKO. So in most cases LF+Ox storage from the adapter is a waste for me. Also cockpit serves as counterweight for the engines, reducing CoM changes.

No problem The purpose of the challenge is not focused on just making VTOL. It's focused on making an efficient one. EDIT: Modded jet engines are not allowed, for sure.

The cosine rule is handy for this case. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_cosines Just put the maximum phase angle between sats to the angle. Now I wonder what will be going on with elliptical orbits.. Or inclined ones.

8km/s? That's a lot of dv! I recommend packing just enough dv for a trip including safety margin, as tyranny of rocket equation will likely bloat out your ship. I think it is the first to shave off as much as one can, rather than the dry mass. You should be able to reach Jool in 2km/s, and get into orbit with a gravity assist on either Laythe, Tylo or even Vall. Also it won't take anything to return to Kerbin with gravity assists, and 500m/s~1km/s is enough to slow down the craft enough for aerobreaking. So at most 3~4km/s is enough for a mothership. Or are you going for Pol/Bop landing with the craft?

Oops. I'lll add a rule that it should be in atmosphere while counting mission time. EDIT: more strict rules. Now you should maintain altitude overall.

Yes, of course. Actually I encourage this, as it tends to be more challenging and fun. But every landing/takeoff should be vertical.

I'd like to have these features: Optional Dv/TWR readouts with customizable settings. Procedural Terrain Decorations. (in small scale) - seamless; grass, rocks, etc) Per-planet/biome effects. (Dirt particles on impact, walking/sprinting/(wheel)rolling/dragging, etc.) Much more readable & interactive actions for ISRU. Also, tiny objects to feel the scale.

This one is simple challenge of flying VTOL as long as you can, without landing or crashing it. Rules: 1. No cheating, no debug menu, no physics exploits. Electric engines are allowed and counted as honorable entry. 2. There will be a main mission and several missions to show capability of your craft. Any landing or takeoff in any mission should be vertical. 3. The scoring will be based on the mission time from the main mission. Your craft should maintain altitude under 5km overall, and you should not touch any ground in the meantime. * Mission time is the time from the craft takes off to land. 4. Your craft should be able to land on VAB, and take off again. (Proof needed - these capabilities can be done on the separate mission) 5. Your craft should be able to reach the island runway. (Proof needed) 6. Do not stage. Disposal of any part is prohibited. 6. Air-to-air refueling is allowed, provided you can. Refueling time is subtracted from total mission time. All other types of refueling is prohibited. 7. If your craft is stable and maintains altitude well, then you can add (Remaining Fuel)/(Fuel Consumption Rate) to the mission time and recover the craft. Score: Base score is the mission time you flied the VTOL during the main mission There are multipliers based on capability of your craft. Proof needed, can be done on a separate mission. X1.1 (multiply) if the craft can land on SPH. X1.1 if the craft can fly under R&D bridge. X1.2 if engine section of the craft is either ducted or secured in cargo bay. X1.2 if the craft can land on R&D bridge. X1.5 if the craft can reach orbit. X1.6 if the craft can circumnavigate under 5km of altitude. X3 if the craft can land on Duna intact. X4 if the craft can land on Laythe intact. X1000 if the craft can get to and land on Laythe and back. (Don't panic, the multiplier will be x5 once this is proven to be possible) X10000 if the craft can get to and land on Tylo and back. - This alone is a challenge, isn't it? Leaderboards: 1. 65,405 seconds, @sevenperforce , with great tiltplane VTOL SSTO capable of Duna! Judging from the pictures it also seems to have great manueverability, which is hard for a SSTO(especially long-range one). 2.

Broadcast Hoverdrone. Its capability:

Made a small turboprop craft.

Decided to try turboprop stuff. Wanted to make small fan which fits in mk2 cargo bay. Found that it was nearly impossible to make one fit in the bay, but it's possible to have the props slightly pock out. This one likes to be broken when the craft is rolling / moving sideways. Any ideas?

That's more right. The fuel-pumping could be explained with the root part being the reference point of the craft, but gravity should be applied to the individual part for the ground rover simulation to work right. Besides I don't think tidal force will affect the orbit, when the rotation of the parent body is neglected with the gravity calculation. EDIT: ^ as Gluttony said, what I said happens while warping/not in focus!

Let's suppose that it's possible, and one built a ring around Gilly. Then the CoM of the craft should be very close to the center of Gilly. As far as I know, KSP gravity is always proportional to the inverse square of the distance between CoM and planetary center. Thus gravitation will get mad immediately after the build. This means that the game should be broken in a minute. Contradiction

NSEP - Firefox does it as well. I forgot if it drops 'forum' or not.

@tsgaerospace, My Terrance ll2 can launch 1.8~1.9t payload to LKO in 6000. Call me if you get interested and change your mind!

Yeah. Actually I think the ablator is purely cosmetic (with bunch of mass) It has freaking 3300K of heat tolerance, which is more than enough for most cases! Also it will still shield the reentry heat. What ablator does is just preventing conduction of a tiny bit of heat (from the heatshield to the adjacent part). Provided you don't put any heat-vulnerable part(near 1000K) right next to the heatshield, it won't burn up.

So the heatshield got blown up? Interesting, it has the highest heat tolerance of 3300K..

You're right there. Ablator will burn off in relatively low temperature, so longer reentry definitely means it runs out. But the craft won't explode without any ablator remaining in this case - Is this what you mean?

It's because heatshields are so aerodynamic that the craft don't want to bleed off enough speed with high Pe. So it ends up with longer reentry, where ablator runs out and heat conducts to the shielded parts causing overheating. Besides, parachutes have great heat tolerance - you can, basically, use (radial) parachutes as heatshield. I think it's why the craft sometimes can reenter nose-first. (Probably the craft is more draggy in this way, or there's heat-vulnerable parts at the back)

I recommend composing root part and root sections with heaviest ones. So the root part could be fuel tanks which is rarely drained, or with heaviest dry mass like.. mk1-2 command pod(sigh). And the root section containing the root part would be central section as well with refinin/science facilities. It could help you with wiggling problem, and help even more with Autostrut: Root Part.

Dang, you're right, it explodes. Crew cabin is weaker than I thought.. So it seems that couple of elevon 1 saved my crews' lives. I didn't know this..; EDIT: It also allows control of my craft, so I was happily using it with aerodynamic rockets. Besides, I've been actually putting a radial parachute in front of the ml16 one. Which helps heating problem even more.

Then I need to test with 38km, where it decelerates well while not heating up too fast.