farmerben
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Posts posted by farmerben
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And then I went to the Mun in 39:12
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Finally 1:47:55 !!! After about a dozen different attempts. This one started with a Rhino surrounded by 8 Skippers. I still used aerospike for most of the slowdown, but finished off with a terrier because its light. Capsule is less Kraken prone than command seat designs. No payload fairing.
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7 hours ago, vyznev said:
I might try this later. In the mean time, some random thoughts:
- It looks like most (all?) attempts so far have spent some time coasting under time warp. That's wasted time that could've been spent accelerating (and later decelerating), if one just had more delta-v. Over two hours seems long enough that nukes or even ions might be worth using for their high Isp (and consequently high achievable delta-v), even with their low TWR.
- At the kinds of velocities and accelerations involved, both Minmus and Kerbin gravity should be basically negligible. So is the orbital motion of Minmus, too. That means it should possible to approximate the ideal flight profile with some basic high school physics.
In particular, I believe an ideal flight profile (using stock KSP with no fancy autopilot / landing assist mods) should look roughly like this:
- Time warp until Minmus is near its ascending / descending node.
- Time warp further until Minmus is overhead from KSC.
- Set Minmus as target and burn towards it until your remaining delta-v approximately equals your velocity relative to Minmus (with a bit of safety margin).
- Turn around and coast (hopefully not too long) until your time to target is somewhere around half(!) your total remaining burn time.
- Burn retrograde to slow down. Make sure not to miss the target.
(The "half your remaining burn time" estimate is assuming constant thrust and neglecting gravity. A proper suicide burn calculator should be able to give a more accurate estimate, or you could just quicksave and use trial and error to find the optimal start time for the deceleration burn.)
That's pretty accurate. Nukes are not adequate to slow down 6000 within Minimus' sphere of influence. I've switched to the aerospike for the final stage, in fact I want higher TWR to slow down than initially.
I haven't been worrying about the AN/DN etc. Launching when nearly overhead works well, I can just hold straight up to escape Kerbin then eyeball it onto target pretty easy. Holding toward target on the navball works for most of the burn.
New personal best 2 hrs 3 minutes (still struggling). Also I'm relying on 5 layer onion staging, as asparagus is too Kraken prone for me.
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New best time is 2hrs 13 minutes, jeez that two hour mark is tough.
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The two hour mark is a difficult challenge. The Kraken tends to destroy my rockets if I have too much asparagus. I tried with Nukes and was unable to slow down fast enough
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A relay is a great idea. Launching multiple probes is good too.
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I just pulled it off in 2hrs 40 minutes with a safe landing, no part breakages.
Next attempt, success in 2 hrs 16 minutes. Getting to Minimus in fewer than 2 hours is very impressive. I can't beat Jack's current record. It requires going over 6000m/s toward Minimus and being able to slow down.
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On 11/20/2022 at 3:08 PM, physius said:
How did you manage 5 hours 44 minutes, that's nuts!
I launched vertically when Minimus was directly overhead. Once I was above the Karman line I corrected course a little bit East. I lined up my trajectory with the center of Minimus, then I would burn prograde, then course correct.
Eventually I figured out the angle on the Navball where I could burn continously and stay lined up with Minimus.
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I did landed on all Jool Moons with this massive vessel.
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I landed on the Mun and then back on Kerbin in 3 hrs 26 minutes.
I launched when the Munwas exactly overhead, which hits an approach course. I found a vector between radial and prograde which was close to directly at target, and burned half my fuel while aimed directly at the Mun.
Crashed and quickloaded a few times, I landed on the Mun at 1 hr 46 minutes. I was landed near the part of the Mun closest to Kerbin, so I launched straight up and then was able to burn the rest of my fuel on a vector aimed at Kerbin. I set my hyperbolic periapsis to 10000m, the ablative heat shield did its job. and brought me to a safe parachute landing.
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After a shakeup in KSP management, an order came down that unused inventory that has sat for more than a year must be used immediatelly or scrapped. Even with the sudden flurry of new missions, nobody wants the humble puff engine.
In order to use up this otherwise wasted inventory you decide on an otherwise impossible to fund mission. The moon Tylo is thought to be seismically dead, but you decide to prove it one way or the other once and for all.
Design a probe using only the puff engine, carry a seismometer, antenna, and generate power. You will need over 500 charge to transmit seismic data, and probably some extendable solar panels.
You may cheat to Tylo orbit using alt F12
Here is mine:
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Burning and decomposition on the surface release gases right away. But underground carbon is different. Terra preta includes underground charcoal pits. Burried wood without char is called hugelkulture, and it is good too.
The living humic acids in the prairie soils of Illinois cycle about every thousand years. That's mostly leftover carbon from before agriculture when tallgrass prairies were regularly flooded, burned, and trampled by bison.
Soil with plant cover is not exposed to the sun, so darker soil is generally better.
By my calculations turning the atmospheric CO2 into graphite would cover the planet in about one mechanical pencil's worth... like half a millimeter. That much carbon absorbed in the top few feet of topsoil is feasible and would do no harm.
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That's pretty good. My first attempt took 6 days 2:30 . I flew direct without orbiting either body. But I didn't want to accelerate halfway because I got my apoapsis lined up with minimus.
second attempt: 3days 1:30
third attempt: fatal crash 3 hours 21 minutes, collision with Minimus at over 3000m/s
fourth attempt: 5 hours 44 minutes success
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5 hours ago, kerbiloid said:
The wood which stays solid, extracts the carbon from air and accumulates it in inert solid form.
Rotten wood releases it back and doesn't help with that.
Thus, the planet lungs are cold Northern bogs, rather than jungles.We should be cutting trees (leaving the area for the new trees) and bury them underground, bu making wooden pit props for the coal mines.
Wait, isn't what the dwarves of the Middle Earth were doing?
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The main reason it's so inefficient is you need 1000 degree steam, which if provided by a nuclear reactor would bring the net CO2 level down considerably.
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9 hours ago, kerbiloid said:
Mad Max is fantasy.
IRL they would just turn to the synthetic petrol made out of coal, like Germany did.
But then no faery tale would be filmed.
It's a heat intensive process which releases about double the CO2 of regular petrol.
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We know exactly how much coal there is total, and we have used about 1/4 of it. Recoverable gas could be multiple times the proven reserves. There is a lot of undiscovered gas and marginally profitable gas.
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1 hour ago, kerbiloid said:
This week they are protesting against the usage of heavy oil products on the railroad instead of certified coke briquettes produced out of natural coal with sawdust."Serious research goes into turning elephant grass into fuel to drive steam turbines.
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This is a fun way to play. The science development is much slower than with a manned campaign. I cheated 70 science, but did not use kerbals to explore the KSC. The first time through I nearly completed the science tree, with a massive nuclear Jool ship carrying 8 science jr, and the rest. It's hard to say whether Eeloo and Moho have enough science to finish the tree, though there are a bunch of biomes I have not landed on. Before completion the Kraken started killing my campaign, probably due to 4 or 5 sentential tracking asteroids. I could turn them off and try to keep going, but I restarted another campaign.
The second time through was easier do to better balance of always using double mystery goo, unlocking the small reaction wheel as fast as possible, and other things.
Both times through money was not object, satellite missions pay well and its often possible to get several with one probe.
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Do they plan on doing the trip many times?
A single stage of chemical rocket can go from LEO to the moon easily. NTR does not have more thrust, just more dV. So a single tank of fuel with an NTR might do the transfer a dozen times. Solar electric propulsion is totally different.
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This is fun! I thought I needed mechjeb to pull it off, but I managed it manually. My vessel had 8 panthers which handled the entire landing. I also had 16 aerospikes and 1 vector. A cupola, and hitchhiker storage module had room for 5 kerbals. I used airbrakes and reaction wheels.
I forgot how to post screenshots. If I'm reminded how I will post a few.
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how dare you
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Maybe they are talking about this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilopower
It's probably one of the first things you want on a Moon base, where night lasts 28 days. It's not a propulsion system though.
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It doesn't make sense. For a Moon to Mars ferry sure it would make sense, but not just to the Moon and LEO. For "military maneuvers" , hypergolic thrusters make more sense.
The 100,000 metre and back death-defying speed challenge
in KSP1 Challenges & Mission ideas
Posted
3:36 I started with 4 mammoth engines onioned on to this stage.