mystifeid

I'm curious whether anyone has completed this contract. If so, at what distance from the seismic sensor did you hit the surface? Also, what was the the mass and speed of your craft on surface impact? Did you get the pointy end down and was it under power? My first attempt was pretty lame - floated down slowly and hit 20 km away. I did get a message from the sensor to the effect that there had been no effect. I am, of course, in the process of trying again. (And have had no problem with this type of contract on other planets/moons)

His transfer AP is close to the orbit of Dres. Your AP (at the 5 sec mark in your video) looks like it is out near the orbit of Jool.

Just a wild guess and given this statement, probably wrong. Q is the dynamic pressure on the craft. You mentioned you were using Mechjeb - if so, open the Utilities module and make sure the Limit Q option is not checked (it's the very first option). By default this option is set to 20 kPa and at lower altitudes would result in your craft being throttled back to around the speeds you described.

It appears that you might also be able to use the move tool in the VAB to move parts that are either side of a heat shield to one side enabling fuel ducts to be joined to the top of one part and to the bottom of another before using the move tool again to realign the parts. This gives crossfeed through the heat shield without seeing a "hoop". No guarantees the kraken won't get ya.

When converting ore to fuel, ISRU's will fill all attached tanks regardless of crossfeed barriers like heat shields or klaws. With smaller craft you can place a disposable in-line docking port below the heat shield. For bigger ships you could radially attach docking ports or even make a detachable engine with probe core/monoprop/rcs/battery/etc that when detached exposes a docking port on the rear end of the main ship. Or, you can make the "hoop" - 2 x cubic octagonal struts stacked on either side and joined by a fuel duct works for a heat shield. Or, you can uncheck "Resource transfer obeys crossfeed rules" in the settings. Or, you could try to evolve a game style that seldom requires refueling craft with these parts. Also, since this has been the case for a considerable period of time, "Breaking Ground Support" might not be the best place for this thread.

Limiting Q in Mechjeb Utilities?

Deployed science in 1.7.2 seems to be working ok - I've completed a few contracts now. The screenshots in the OP appear to be from 1.7.1.

Crew reports are not per biome when taken low over the Mun. But they are when taken low over Kerbin. Low over the Mun the per biome reports that are possible are EVA reports and gravity scans. Low over Kerbin the per biome reports that are possible are crew reports, EVA reports and temperature scans. ( All three types of reports have 3 levels - high, near and flying over [biome] Wrong again. Temperature scans and Crew reports have four levels - high, near, upper atmo and flying over [biome] - and are per biome only in the lowest level. EVA reports also have four levels - high, space just above [biome], upper atmo and flying over [biome] - but are per biome at two levels - while in space just above and flying over. ). Given the number of edits received by this post, it's quite possibly still wrong. If so, c'est la vie.

I'm not sure about other requirements but I've always started getting sentinel contracts after researching/buying the telescope. (Lvl 2 tracking station was ok in this game at least)

Below is a screenshot of some EVA and gravity reports just over a few Mun biomes. I am also playing a new 1.71 career game. That's what I'd be doing. Asteroid contracts still exist too although I've noticed that the rewards seem to be lower and the required orbit never changes.

Looks like there might have been other changes. For example, after crew reports, EVA reports, temperature and pressure reports have been received on Kerbin, they appear to be worth zero points to a mobile processing lab if they are collected again.

Try using some asparagus staging.

I let one keep going to 12000+ % of 50% of... Still incomplete. So I used the contract section in the debug menu (Alt + F12) to complete/get rid of them.

I really enjoy doing stock challenges. But for careers? My preferred options for careers are hard difficulty, no extra ground stations, g-forces, pressure limits, plasma blackout etc but allowing quicksaves and reverting. The goal is for every planet/moon to have a base, a station, a few rovers, a five star crew and a few different ships. And it takes a lot of launches/missions/landings. To do this once or even twice with a stock install is fathomable but to keep doing it for five years or more is not. I'd go insane without using MJ and KAC at the very least. The simple answer, as others have pointed out, is to have multiple installs. I have a stock install for challenges and at least one other install with whatever mods I feel like.

Hard to see?? I drove completely around the Greater Flats and found two Olivine formations which were pretty hard to spot. Mercifully your tip about turning the ROC finder on instantly paid off and I finally found a green sandstone not far from where the rover had originally landed. This is the green sandstone from about fifty metres away. It's quite invisible. Scanning the little sucker. Remind me never to take contracts to find these again.

I don't know about that. When playing with Mechjeb I often use the LAN to change from one polar orbit to another required polar orbit . Speaking of Mechjeb, you could always use the LAN module in the Maneuver Planner to change your LAN to 0° - maybe best to be in a polar orbit - and see where the line between DN and AN is pointing. (Or I suppose, with the feedback from the Advanced Orbital Info, you can just as easily do this without MJ)

I hope you get there. For myself all I can say is - Never Again!!

Wow, again. The trike made it back to the Dessert Airfield with a little under 5% fuel remaining - despite my best efforts to use as much as possible from a long way out. It continued south until veering south-west to miss the wet stuff before following the coast southward again. Finally, after 45 hours and 15 minutes, it ground to a halt with all fuel and energy depleted. Total distance covered - 2128km. Fastest speed - 37m/s. Highest elevation - 1447m. Distance Outward Leg Start Latitude - 6° 33' 36" S Finish Latitude - 90° N Sub-Total - 96° 33' 36" Distance Return Leg Start Latitude - 90° N Finish Latitude - 16° 41' 51" S Sub-Total - 106° 41' 51" Total Degrees - 203° 15' 27" or 203.25° Total Distance - (203.25/360) x 2 x pi x 600km = 2128km Everyone has come for a piece of the little trike. The Wheeled Automaton Society was out in force after proposing a new unit of measurement - the "Dumpling" - to replace that unfortunate collection of words - two thousand kilometers. They imagine it will have all sorts of useful applications. Picture it. The kids ask "Are we there yet?" The modern Kerbal gives a wry grin and replies "Are you kidding? There's still half a dumpling left to go." "Did you say dumpling? Ooo, we're hungry." "Good. I'm tired. Let's stop for the night." Or - "What sort of orbit are we aiming for?" "Fifty dumplings." "Reminds me. You gonna remember to pack the snacks this time?" "Help. Fuel is bzzz crackle..."

Since it appeared to be impossible to continue for another 1000km in a straight line, the best idea seemed to be to simply turn around and head for home - back to the Dessert Airfield. After a big day, the little rover is back at the 40th parallel (50 degrees traveled today). So far it has covered 146.5° or 1534km. A little over a quarter of my fuel remains with my goal still around 480km distant. Whatever happens, it will be close.

After just 21 hours the little trike completes the 1010km to the North Pole with half a tank of gas remaining.

At just over 500km with 75% fuel remaining.

A couple of things bothered me during the night. I wondered about the cause of Mechjeb's inefficiency. Was it the speed control or heading control. I could live without the speed control because it had to be micro-managed anyway but I really wanted to use the heading control. The small rovers have a fair amount of directional instability and my own heading control kinda sucked. Not to mention the tedium of tap-tap-tapping for days on end. Perhaps Mechjeb could pay for itself over a long trip by keeping me pointed in a straight line. The other concern was the blob-like profile of the rover so I removed the probe core from the back and placed it underneath. A small nose cone weighs 10kg and placed in front of the dumpling, if nothing else, makes it look a bit meaner. I start from the beginning again. Subjectively it certainly seemed to go down hills quite a bit faster. After finishing with a long downhill coast last night, the first unmanned trike was stopped when it slowed to 4m/s. Today, I reached that rover still doing more than 9m/s. The icing on the cake is that yesterday's rover used 0.48 LF for the first 100km. Today, and while using Mechjeb's heading control, I used just 0.41 LF. I decide that this is good enough and keep going... Rather than start with a minimum of EC, Valentina comes along to fire up the fuel cell so that I can begin with zero electricity. Fuel cell started and Val is staged. Meeting up with yesterday's effort just past the 100km mark.

So after shedding 30kg from my trike I disabled Mechjeb and tried a short run north from KSC through pretty typical grasslands terrain. It took a while to sink in but with a jolt I realized that I wasn't just more economical than MJ, I was much more economical. Ok then. Time to pull out the big guns. Kerbals in command seats weigh more than 90kg and in my first attempt, Jeb made up one quarter of the rover mass. Plus an Okto 2 weighs 10kg less than a command seat. Even better, in an unmanned trike the fuel mass of 110kg becomes one third of the rover mass instead of one quarter. I returned to the desert with my new 304kg rover. And put the foot down. I was really quite profligate with the gas yet after 100km had used just 0.48 units of LF. At the same point in my first attempt my rover had used 0.87 units of LF (For whatever reason this section is one of the most economical in the entire route). That's a difference of 0.39 LF. Even in Jeb's rover that's enough fuel to travel 40km. But in this one??

That's fine as long the battery starts with zero electricity but as the Juno has an alternator this should not present a problem. I believe that I too can achieve an additional 10% range. Mechjeb looks to have cost the equivalent of 60km and by eliminating the river crossing (adds another 40km) I think that I might be able to do an extra 100km. Not sure that I'd like to do it though.

Wow, what an epic. Pretty happy to see the last of that fuel go. Total distance driven - 1057km. (at 10m/s - work it out). Part 3. (Corks popped and the champagne flowed at the 1000km Dumpling Explorer Club while across town at the rival but slightly more exclusive Hundred Degree Dumpling Club, similar celebrations ensued) After contending with two more serious (600m +) height gains and losses, first in the grasslands and then in the tundra, Jeb finally made it onto the ice shelf. And some time later arrived at the north pole. Total distance traveled thus far - 96.5° (or around 1010km). But there was fuel remaining - enough for more than nearly another 4.5° of travel before Jeb ground to a halt, exhausted. Start Latitude - 6° 33' 36" S Finish Latitude - 85° 36' 29" N Total degrees (after passing through the North Pole) - 100° 57' 7" - or 100.95° Total distance - 1057km Jeb making some hay in the tundra Jeb at the North Pole Finished at last