rynther

I will say after hearing what they are, I have mixed feelings about using them. I do thank you guys for the time explaining them, that's good to know. I will also say it sounds a lot like cheating. Meanwhile, I think I know what I'll do in the sandbox, autostrut everything on an orbital station, and dock something heavy and explosive.

That sounds a bit like cheating

I've seen mention of this, and how to enable it, but not where to find it, or how to use it. I'm still not entirely sure WHY I should use them. Do these differ from normal struts? do they affect part count? weight? I've seen this in several threads, and I'm curious, someone please enlighten me on this.

I'm pretty sure it's the tracking station that needs the upgrade, right click it, and it will list the current capabilities, mouse over the upgrade button and it will list the added features of the upgrade.

I've heard autostruts mentioned before, what/where are they, and what's the main difference to well placed regular struts?

As far as game glitches go, the size of the rocket doesn't really matter, here and there, you just can't stage a rocket, even a fairly small and simple one (less than 50 parts, under 100t to start) and generally it happens when the game has been running a long time. (8+ hours) So far, I haven't felt the need for 100t+ transfer systems, but I don't have a network of stations that would be able to utilize the fuel. My current fuel taxi is something like 60t, so a wolfhound and a few srb's to kick it to high apoapsis is more than enough for my very small orbital base so far. I think my only real complaint about engines, is that there are no true 5m engines, making any 5m upper stage inherently unstable. (I think the last time I played with super huge rockets was like 0.45 or so, and there wasn't really any goal other than how many tons it could get to orbit without exploding)

Hey Paul, I never suggested "run test" would work in the first place, I was POLITELY pointing out that it won't.

Not that worried about it, I posted for the people still reading this, and clearly, there are people looking for this answer, I was looking for it 3 days ago.

In the PC version, the "run test" does not work, you must stage the engine on at the right altitude and speed, so you'll want to use a flea with the throttle dialed back to lift it to the "test window" and fire up the rt-10 within the window. (If you're using a mk-1 capsule, use a decoupler, 2 droges (optional) and a mk-16 parachute, and you'll have a soft fluffy landing.)

If you click on the resource tab, (top right, looks like a milk jug) and click the buttons for fuel and oxidizer, it will display all tanks connected to the station, and you can push or pull fuel wherever you want it, also works with mono-propellant. (For those not into keyboard shortcuts)

The key elements are weight, (how much stuff) Thrust, (how hard you can push on stuff) and fuel, (how long you can push that hard) The game does a lot of the heavy lifting for the math, but I tend to use the m/s as a shorthand, as an example, I like to have the first stage at about 16.4m/s of thrust (I use mechjeb to get the relevant info while building) I haven't done a bunch of mun landings, but it needs about 1400m/s worth of fuel to land, and re-launch to orbit, without being empty. (That does not include the fuel to get there, just the landing, take off, and a little bit left over) If you are flying it manually, rather than using the autopilot, expect that you will likely use more fuel, unless you are very good at flying. (which requires a ton of practice) BTW, the mun has very low gravity, so you don't need huge motors for the lander itself. (I use the small radial motors, or a terrier) I hope this helps a little, but really, rocket science is complicated stuff, it takes time to learn about.

Just BTW, here and there, the game will glitch, and stuff just won't work, sometimes you need to re-start the game. Not sure if that has anything to do with the OP or not, but it seemed like something to mention. The Rhino engines came up in conversation, and I gotta say, I haven't found a good use for them, for the big fat rockets, you're generally gonna be better off running vector engines, given the "mount anywhere" nature. My favorite for the 5m rockets is to put 9 vectors on it. (it would be interesting to know the actual payload weight and destination.)

Dude, it's a game, are you really going to compare that to reality? If you want to pick nits, you could observe the effect here on earth, if you spin a wingnut in a vacuum and watch it fall. (NASA has a huge vacuum chamber that would work)

Well, not exactly Spricigo, inertia works the same everywhere, but without a strong local gravity field, you can see subtle effects that would otherwise be much less detectable.

Very close to the ship, Vanamonde, but not holding on. BTW, I'm happy to accept that I'm doing something wrong, but it is hard to find details about constraints for use for a whole lot of the science stuff. FruitGoose, you may be onto something, as I am trying to use this in orbit, it would be nice to see better in game documentation for this stuff. I understand that not everything can be listed without loosing some of the flavor of the game, but the KSPedia has little to nothing about the use constraints of the EVA kit, which seems to be vaguely important. Not taking the time to look up jetpack controls, my bad, I can be lazy like that. Oh, and the only mod is mechjeb 2.2, because controlling rockets by hand is kinda dumb, that's why all the real rockets have a flight control system. Could you imagine NASA flying a Saturn5 manually? How many falcons would get re-used if a human had to execute the landing maneuver by hand?

This is something I see a bit, usually the engine gets switched to a stage above where it should be in the staging stack, so it doesn't show the thrust Kn or max acceleration or count the delta v, at least for me.

How gravity is handled has changed a bit, the way traction works not really sure, but many parts have had the specs changed, so that's the most likely culprit.

Actually, it looks like a test of using the jetpack, which has no forward thruster, unlike 10 year old NASA stuff. so basically just a mission ending exploding briefcase designed to kill your kerbal. Have I got that about right?

I've designed quite a few orbiters, not real good at landings, so haven't done much with landers or rovers yet. I did make an interstellar probe that was kinda fun, it had 17km/s worth of fuel, and enough secondary to do the coarse burn to eloo. (stupid expensive parts, not really cost effective for career stuff) I took it out past eloo, circularized, then flipped it to a polar orbit, and still had plenty in the tank. I'll have to work out posting pics, but I'm lazy. I'll be spending some time on orbital bases and fueling stations, might actually build a 5m rocket for tanker lifting, haven't had a good excuse to build one yet. Edit: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2432160735 This is a bit hard to steer without the motors running, but is an ssto orbital base with large science bay, lots of solar, 3 seat capsule, but it's a sandbox only item, more for giggle and snort value. Really stable flight for such a big rocket, but it should have an intermediate stage, just to keep the trash lower.

Trying to do an EVA experiment over minmus, but for some reason, it keeps blowing jeb away from the orbiter, anyone have some clue? Are they rigged to go off sometimes, or is there something else I need to know about these kits? I'd like the extra science points, but don't like the sudden boom throwing my kerbal into deep space.

Well, thanks for spending the time, it made an interesting read. I will mention that from a cost perspective, solid fuel boosters are much cheaper, though a bit less stable. The main trick to solid boosters is throttling. I've been playing Kerbal for some time now, but I am new to the career mode, I find it pretty constraining. I don't tend to have any problem keeping missions on budget, but unlocking the tech tree is murder.

The game by itself is unplayable, the mods can't be downloaded at all from apparently the only site that has them. You got my 10$ extra for the DLC, but it's not useful. enjoy that money, you'll not be seeing anymore soon. Hey mod, since nobody else will ever see this, just tell the marketing dufaces.