Shmauck

After some additional testing I must say that I am just stupid. In fact, the separator DID NOT separate the payload from the launcher which is why no craft appeared in the tracking station and I was unable to switch to it using the bracket keys. Sorry to bother you but thank you for your help.

Ummm no, sorry for being misleading and unspecific here. The docked tug and payload are visible on screen, they float peacefull in space right before my eyes. But switching to that craft with bracket keys is not possible anymore. And that is weird, especially in the second case when I activate the stack separator first, before I dock the tug to the free-floating tank. I am in control of the tug, then it docks and I lose control. Seems like the tank is considered as the parent and the tug as the child and since the tank has no probecore and no cockpit, I lose all control. But it is also not considered as debris of the launcher. It also dors not appear in the tracking station. Confusing... And no, no autostruts involved so far. I am not at my computer right now but the last hope I have is that I can select the crew hatch on the cockpit and EVA and reenter the pilot to regain control. If that doesn‘t work I can still relaunch the whole thing without the separator and try again.

Me again with another strange thing happening. I have to carry four large fuel tank modules to my space station in LKO. For the first two tanks I used a one-way launcher which would deorbit and rapidly deconstruct. I used to dock my small construction tug to dock to the payload, undock the payload from the launcher and bring it to the station to dock it there. All fine. Now I modified the launcher so that it can survive reentry and I used a stack separator to connect the launcher and the payload. End result is that I can't use my construction tug anymore after separating the launcher and the payload. This happens regardless of the sequence I do: I dock the construction tug to the payload and then activate the decoupler I active the decoupler first and then dock the construction tug to the payload Both ways I end up with the launcher still being a ship, a debris part which is the stack separator and nothing else. The construction tug and the payload completely disappear. Why is that happening? Any other ways to do it?

Workload (Y2 D369) "Here are our plans." Gene clicked and the big screen on the wall of his office revealed the upcoming milestones to the Kerbals around his conference table. Wernher, who knew what was presented, looked into the faces of Benten and Wolfheim. "First of all, Kerlumbia will carry the second part of the Alpha expansion into LKO. It will be mated with a tanker transit at Dawn station. On your way there you will pick up another stranded pilot from orbit." "Not again!" Benten leaned back in his chair. "Oh yes", Gene chuckled, "I have no idea what these guys are doing wrong but they keep doing it. Anyway, the contracts pay off, especially with our fully reusable shuttle. And most of the stranded folks are happy to sign with us after their rescue. Take that new girl Zeldous, she reminds me of Val when she was new. So positive and enthusiastic, even after her breakdown up there. And Kirwell, the other new pilot, he is almost as relaxed as you are, Benten. You should consider picking him for that mission. We'll run him through the simulator at Quasar's place so he can join you then." Benten nodded briefly, then Gene continued running them through the plan. "Then we will launch your new tanker vessel, Wolfheim. It already has a name. Administrator Shmauck managed to acquire sponsorship from the Kerbonas corporation so that will be its new designation." The engineer leaned forward. "I am thinking about a three-letter-acronym system that works so well in many fields. Can we name the tanker ships FTVs as in fuel transport vessel?" Benten rolled his eyes and grabbed a bottle of water. "What would we call the Kerlumbia then? BMW as in 'big multi-use workhorse'?" Gene smiled but ignored the remark. "Actually I like the idea. FTV Kerbonas sounds rather professional. I will pass it to Shmauck. And you develop a system that works for other vehicle classes and types, Wolfheim." "Oh, I have already", the engineer quickly responded, "the fuel storage modules for Dawn station will be FSMs and the manned construction vehicle should be called MCV. For the Kerlumbia I could imagine STS as in space transport shuttle." Gene interrupted gently, immediately picking up the suggestion. "Speaking of the shuttle, there will be another mission for STS Kerlumbia before the end of this year. Wernher?" "Oh... yes, sure." The head of R&D cleared his throat and sorted his papers. "We have this new device which we call the claw. No idea how that fits into your three-letter acronyms, Wolfheim, but it could be very useful to collect debris from space. We could mount it on a tiny little probe and take it up to orbit in the shuttle cargo bay. And once we collected valuable remains of space debris we could bring it back down with the shuttle." "You must be kidding", said Benten, slowly shaking his head. "Recover the stranded and collect the garbage, that's what we use this great ship for? STS should stand for stranded and trash service!" A moment of awkward silence passed, then Wernher, Gene and Wolfheim broke out in laughter. Benten, irritated at first, joined in. "That was a good one, Benten", Gene finally giggled, "but really, the Kerlumbia can show how versatile she is and you will have an additional mission to train the second pilot." "I will think about that small probe to carry the claw and also about an acronym for it", added Wolfheim. The boss prepared to close the meeting. "To wrap it up, gentlemen. First is a shuttle launch to bring up the next part for Munlab Alpha and to recover a kerbonaut. Second is the commissioning of the new tanker Kerbonas to Minmus. Third is the shuttle launch to recover some component from the orbit. That should bring us close to new year's eve. We could think about some fireworks." Benten smiled briefly and Wernher caught it with a strict look. "Don't even think of blowing up equipment!" "Wait and see", the pilot replied. Gene raised from his chair. "It's time for me to get back to mission control. We are currently moving the Munlab into a polar orbit and once we are there we will prepare a landing in Mun's polar crater." A viewpoint for the Mun (Y2 D389-D392) "That's close enough, well done." Benten patted his copilot's shoulder. Kirwell Kerman had proved to be an eager and fast learner. He had gone through the shuttle trainings and simulator runs with ease. On his first real mission aboard Kerlumbia he was tasked to take over the shuttle's controls and to rendezvous with the Dawn station. He had managed to maneuver the large vessel within close range of the station in orbit above Kerbin. Benten pressed the talk button to activate the radio transmission. "Dawn, Kerlumbia here. We have a package to be delivered to the Mun. Will you take over?" Valentina responded promptly. "Sure thing, guys. I hear you also have a passenger? Welcome to the show, Sigsel!" Benten turned and looked over his shoulder. Sigsel occupied the seat behind Benten. The pilot had been recovered from his stranded capsule two hours before and had since been quietly sitting in the backseat to follow the procedures between Benten and Kirwell. "Hi, this is Sigsel Kerman. Thank you for the warm welcome." Valentina undocked the Kernoco tanker from the station. The tanker had been brought back to LKO to transfer fuel coming from Minmus and Gene had once again decided to take advantage of a tanker rotation to bring another expansion to the station in Mun orbit. Val directed the fully loaded tanker craft from her remote controls inside the station and maneuvered it towards the shuttle. After she had stopped all relative movement, Benten took over the shuttle controls. He brought the shuttle up below the tanker. The payload was a crew module with a viewpoint called cupola, intended to be used by third party crews aboard the Mun station. The module was entirely lacking any means of control and therefore the handover of the payload would have to be treated with maximum care. Kirwell had left his copilot seat and watched the cargo bay monitors to assist Benten and to release the payload from its docking point when needed. Benten called Valentina. "Dawn, Kerlumbia, we're perfectly aligned, ready when you are." Again, Vals response came quickly. "Then release and slowly dive away so I can pick it up. Ground, you copy?" "Green for payload release", came Genes brief confirmation. Kirwell activated the undocking mechanism and Benten very slowly moved the shuttle aft and down to avoid even the slightest touching of the module. "Dawn, Kerlumbia, we are slowly falling away, payload is stable and stationary, go ahead", the pilot reported calmly. Val ordered the tanker to follow the shuttle's movement in constant distance. She used her own instruments and cameras to see what was happening, but Kirwell gave additional visual clues from inside the shuttle. After long and tense minutes she had brought the Kernoco tanker in the correct position to dock. With a final puff of lateral forward motion she moved the ship towards the module's docking port. "Contact, all sensors green", she reported and then, "docking ports engaged, payload is locked." "Well done, Val, congratulations! We're all very happy here at mission control." "Thank you, Gene", she responded, "now let's bring Kernoco and the module on course to their destination." "Sure, we'll take over from here", Gene said. "The trajectory is already programmed. You can watch together with the shuttle crew. We have not docked Kerlumbia to the Dawn station yet. Time for another first. And show Sigsel around. Ground out." The Kernoco tanker brought the new module safely to the Mun station and released it by a similar procedure. Danlan Kerman, the current pilot aboard Munlab Alpha, remotely controlled the undocking and left the module stable and stationary in space close to his station. He then undocked the unmanned mini tug and piloted it remotely to dock with the payload. Once he had docked the tug with the module he used the tug to bring it back to the station. Alpha had now received another upgrade and the external contractor happily acknowledged the successful delivery of their module to the station. The mini tug provides the link between the new module and the station for now until there will be a way to move an uncontrollable component from one docking port to another. The new claw may come in handy at some point. At the end of day 392 Kirwell performed his first landing of the shuttle at SSC under the eyes of Benten. He came in too high and zoomed past the runway at supersonic speeds some twenty kilometers above the SSC so he entered a wide downward turn to perform a first shuttle landing from the east.

Thank you all for your replies. These are definitely helping me understand KSP better. Also I never used KerbNet yet and will surely change that. Too bad I terminated all the abandoned pods of rescued Kerbals. Didn't know it would bite me later. Many thanks!

I found that "first point of Aries" as well. This is for sure not the case in KSP To put it simple: How do I know where to burn an inclination change to turn an inclined orbit into an equatorial one? I assume that if I knew the LAN then I would know where to burn anti-normal so I can flatten that out. How do you guys do it?

I am struggling a bit to fully grasp the content of the new "advanced orbital info tab" in the mode UI. As you can see in the following image I managed to establish a few equatorial orbits (inclination almost zero) around Minmus despite my ships and stations were originally coming in at an angle. So far so well. Since 1.7 we have this nice advanced orbital info tab but I can't figure out what the LAN value means. I miss the origin of that angle. Longitudes on Earth are referring to the zero meridian in Greenwich, that's clear. But what does this Longitude of the AN refer to? And is it a local reference point on the surface of the celestial body? Probably not. Obviously it is also not the prograde vector of the body nor can it be a fixed star outside the Kerbol system. I hope someone can help me understand the parameter in KSP so I don't have to guess where to do my inclination correction burns. And sorry if this is written somewhere. I have looked in the in-game help page, in the wiki and searched the forum without success. Thank you in advance!

Three-stop shuttle rescue (Y2 D366-D369) "Kerlumbia, your launch window is open, you're cleared for takeoff", came Genes voice over the cockpit speakers. "Roger, let's do this", replied Benten Kerman. He turned to his right and looked at Wolfheim Kerman who was occupying the copilot seat for this first flight of the new shuttle. "You ready, mate?" "I can't wait, get her going", Wolfheim grinned. Benten reached for the thrust levers and pushed them fully forward with one slow move. The cockpit vibrated from the roar of the five RAPIER engines in the back of the shuttle. The two pilots were pushed against the backrests of their seats when their ship jumped forward. Both had completed eight starts and landings for training purposes during the last two days, at daytime and at night. They had experienced this acceleration before but Wolfheim was still as impressed. He had not taken the training Benten had received so for him everything was still new. But this time it was for real. They would go all the way to orbit with a four-seated crew module inside the cargo bay. Their mission was to rescue three stranded Kerbals from a low orbit around Kerbin. Benten gently rotated the craft and Kerlumbia entered a shallow fifteen-degree climb, fully accelerating. Wolfheim retracted the gear after they had cleared the runway, headed for the stars in front of the cockpit windows on a straight eastern course. "It's still amazing. We just keep going and going, keep accelerating like this all the time and then suddenly we are no longer a plane, we are a spaceship", Wolfheim babbled. "This is a dream to me! And I have dreamt about this ever since I was a child!" Benten smiled at the engineer. "Sure, but don't forget to check the altimeter and engine thrust readings. Otherwise we may wake up early from your dream and will still be on a plane." "Nine thousand five hundred meters", reported Wolfheim a while later, "airspeed two seven five meters per second." Benten pressed the radio button on his control stick. "Okay, time to go supersonic, ground, do you copy?" "We are go for supersonic, Kerlumbia, throttle up", Gene replied. Benten carefully pushed the control stick forward to lower the craft's nose a little bit, then increased thrust. The RAPIERs screamed and the massive ship vibrated just a little more, hitting the surrounding air with increasing force. Kerlumbia climbed while quickly gaining speed. Wolfheim continued reading out the instruments for his fellow pilot and when the ship had passed twenty thousand meters at roughly 950 meters per second, Benten activated the closed loop mode of the engines. Visual signs of thin air heating up around the ship became visible, filling the cockpit with an orange glow. Wolfheim had seen this happening during re-entries before. He looked up from his instruments and saw the sun rising over the horizon right under their nose. They were on course to space. Gene called: "Kerlumbia, go for the NERV engines." Wolfheim activated the nuclear thrusters and Benten raised the nose of the ship as they were climbing faster and faster through the higher layers of Kerbins atmosphere. "Oxidizer under ten percent, RAPIER engine cutoff in twenty seconds", announced the engineer. "We're good", replied the pilot. At mission control everybody was watching the orbital parameters. Kerlumbia was on course to reach orbit ahead of the first stranded capsule. Gene ordered to insert the shuttle in an higher orbit so that the wreckage could catch up to the shuttle. After their circularization burn, Benten and Wolfheim were between five and ten kilometers outside of Ferbald Kerman who was the first to be rescued. Gene was satisfied. "Good job, Kerlumbia. That was one flawless takeoff for our very first spaceplane mission!" "Thank you, ground. We are glad all went so well. I guess Wolfheim will be wearing that big smile for quite some time." After two orbits the shuttle lowered its trajectory to rendezvous with the tiny one-seated can Ferbald was orbiting in. Kerlumbias cargo bay doors were opened to expose the crew module and Benten maneuvered the 100-ton ship carefully up to the can. The remaining distance of roughly one hundred meters would be easy to bridge for Ferbald's EVA jet pack. Ferbald climbed out of his tiny can and pushed it off which lead the small craft to enter a wild spin. The scientist initialized his thrusters and brought his own spin under control before he aligned himself to face the shuttle. He reached the cargo bay easily and slipped inside the crew module where Benten greeted him. "Welcome aboard, kerbonaut!" "Glad you came by, I was starting to feel very alone and very hungry inside that tiny thing", Ferbald said. "They shouldn't be doing this to scientists like me. I would much rather like to work in an environment like this." "I am sure we will have an offer for you. We are constantly looking for scientists as far as I know", the pilot replied. "Now have seat and a snack. Make yourself comfortable, you will soon have company in here." Benten and Wolfheim raised Kerlumbia's orbit again to wait for the next ship to come by. After they had repeated the procedure for a third time over three days they had successfully rescued pilots Kirwell and Zeldous from similar orbital mishaps, had closed the cargo bay doors and had prepared their shuttle for the deorbit burn. They relit the nuclear engines just south of the large meteor crater and entered the upper atmosphere of Kerbin soon after. Benten put the craft in a 35 degree nose-up attitude to expose the full underbelly to the airstream and to bleed as much speed as possible. Wolfheim closely watched the temperature sensor readings and announced necessary attitude corrections. Kerlumbia made her fiery metamorphosis back from spaceship to plane when the engineer reopened the air intakes and fired the RAPIER engines up in air breathing mode. They were exactly on course. "Ground, we have visual contact. The weather is spectacular. We can clearly see the SSC", Benten reported. "I am just totally thrilled!", shouted the engineer in a much more enthusiastic outbreak. "We have made it! We are almost back home in the same craft that we launched in! What a great piece of engineering!" Benten activated the intercom to the crew module in the cargo bay. "Ladies and gentlemen, we are preparing to land at SSC. Put your seats in an upright position and fold up the tables in front of you." The pilot performed another perfect landing on the runway at the space center. Kerlumbia touched down in the bright afternoon sunlight of D369 and rolled out before Benten brought it to a halt on the taxiway to the SPH, just like he had done six days earlier during the opening ceremony. "Thank you for flying with Shmauck air and space lines", he announced over the intercom. "You may now unfasten your seat belts. Time for a photo shoot."

A shuttle to be re-used (Y2 D363) „There she comes!“ All eyes turned westward, where a large and bright white dot was falling fast and steep from high in the clear blue sky. A large crowd of staff members, press representatives and special guests had gathered on the provisional stand next to the brand new building on the campus, the space plane hangar or short SPH. The band in front of the stand had stopped playing and immediately the sound of idling jet engines became audible. Soon the distinct shape of the ship was recognizable for the spectators. A voluminous body with low and short wings that ended in characteristic large upward winglets. Then the craft raised its nose the underbelly became visible and revealed the stretched delta design. The crescendo of the five large engines accompanied the rising excitement on the stand. Gene, who stood on a podium in the middle of the first row of seats, raised the microphone again. “Ladies and gentlemen, may I introduce: Kerlumbia!” The bulky ship flattened its flight curve into a flare, hovered dramatically along the first few hundred meters of fresh tarmac before its wheels came down to touch the brand new airstrip. Heads, binoculars, telescopes and photographic lenses followed the vehicle’s path along the runway, cameras clicked constantly. The craft slowed, then exited the main runway and stopped on the taxiway to the SPH where another podium had been set up. “Please come with me to take a closer look”, Gene said over the loudspeakers before he put down the microphone and left his booth. Applauding spectators on the main stand raised and motioned towards the stairs on both ends of the seating rows. The band picked up their instruments again and began to accompany the walking crowd. “She is really an impressive ship” Wolfheim said to his colleagues when they reached the edge of the taxiway. The airlock door was opened from inside the craft and a ladder had extended down to the ground. Benten Kerman appeared in the airlock and waved to the crowd before he turned and climbed down the ladder. Then, @Jett_Quasar entered the airlock and waved as well. Gene had meanwhile made his way to the end of the ladder and welcomed Benten with a handshake. “Great landing, pilot”, he smiled. “Thank you, Gene”, the pilot responded calmly, “this was a bit exciting. New ship, new runway, a crowd watching… I just tried not to screw it up. But she is very patient and forgiving.” After Jett had reached the two, Gene turned to the spectators and guests. “Ladies and gentlemen, we are all very happy about this addition to our fleet and with all our achievements in science, research and development, construction and expansion of our facility. I wish to express my personal thanks to @Jett_Quasar who developed this ship for us and who trained our brave pilot Benten Kerman to fly it. We will now hand it over to our ground crews to prepare it for its first mission under our flag.” Gene gave his speech about the next steps in space exploration and the upcoming milestones of our program. He elaborated on the capabilities of the new buildings on the campus and gave an overview of the recent results of the R&D department. He concluded announcing a change of plans for the Dunalab Gamma. “Progress has been made so fast that we decided to rethink our Duna plans. The station we currently have on orbit will not go to Duna but remain in Kerbins orbit to serve as our gateway to space. We plan to expand the station’s habitation, storage and docking capacities and use it as a main hub for all our missions in space. When the next transfer window to Duna opens in about 300 days from now we will have new skills, new developments, new capabilities. We will build a new Duna mission that reflects what is up-to-date then. And we will see it coming together at our station orbiting Kerbin which will now be called ‘Dawn’.” The ceremony continued with a guided tour of the SSC for media and space enthusiasts. Wernher and Gene generously gave personal interviews and hosted public tours through R&D and mission control. Wolfheim had a thrilling time showing Jett around his offices and presenting his next projects to the talented constructor. The two spent quite some time and a few drinks dwelling about engineering, construction and design. Benten elatedly invited selected guests into the spacious, four-seated cockpit of the Kerlumbia and explained each and every button to them. Even the administrator himself, Shmauck Kerman, climbed the ladder and had a seat at the controls of the ship. When Kerbol set in the west and the immense buildings casted long shadows over the campus, Shmauck Space Center had seen an exciting day and public awareness and interest in our space program had greatly increased.

A story of success (Y2 D347-D366) “You have achieved great things for us.” Gene nodded in acknowledgement after Wolfheim had taken a seat in Genes office in the astronaut center. “Your fuel truck is a great idea and a valuable addition to our fleet. We may launch a second one to Minmus in the not so distant future. We are glad to have you on board.” The engineer straightened in his chair to receive a handshake from the boss. “Thank you so much, Gene.” “You know”, Gene continued, “our current lead engineer Bill will remain at Minmus for a while. Our operation there is becoming a cornerstone of our entire program. Soon our fuel needs for all missions out of Kerbin will mostly be coming from Minmus. I asked Bill to take a leading position up there and to manage the expansion of the Beta station, the outposts on the surface and the operation of our tanker fleet.” Gene raised and made a few steps towards the window. He made a wide gesture. “Here on Kerbin we have more great things ahead. Construction work on the airstrip and the hangar will soon be finished. We have reinvested much of the agency’s money to include these two facilities into our operations.” “Does that mean space planes?” Wolfheim asked. Gene nodded with a smile. “Wernher and the R&D team have presented a full range of aerodynamic parts and airbreathing engines to the committee recently. The guys have definitely delivered on that and they keep going. Very soon we will have everything we need for space planes in various sizes. It all comes together very nicely.” Wolfheim was unable to contain himself any longer. “Gene, sir, that all sounds amazingly exciting!” he broke out and raised from his chair. “I can’t wait to have these parts available in the design team!” “I know.” Gene smiled. “But I have to tell you that we will have a fully reusable transport soon after airstrip and hangar are ready. We have contracted Jett Quasar to construct a craft for us. Wernher and Jett are in close collaboration about it for months now.” The engineer felt a bit disappointed. “Oh”, he murmured, “that’s good for the agency. But I would have loved to be involved.” “That I know as well, Wolfheim, and you will have your chance. We just wanted to get a head start on the designs and put our new assets in operation with a big bang. There will be a ceremony for the public when the transport makes its first landing on the airstrip.” Wolfheim nodded. “I understand.” Gene walked up close to the engineer and looked him right in the eyes. “Don’t be disappointed, Wolfheim. I ask you to accept a new role here on Kerbin. I want you to be our chief designer.” Wolheims face brightened with surprise and delight. “Now that’s overwhelming, Gene. Oh yes! I gladly accept!” They shook hands again. “Great. Then let’s go and inform the team.” The engineering team applauded Wolfheim after they had been informed by Gene. The boss turned to the whole group. “There is work ahead for all of you. Before we think about the Beta station expansion we have one more thing on our list.” Gene elaborated on a new contract to upgrade the Alpha station around Mun to double its crew and research capacity. “This will be a good exercise to prepare the Minmus upgrade”, he added. “Also, Wolfheim and Wernher will soon have some surprises for you. Get to work on the Alpha expansion!” With that Gene left. Wolfheim and his team created another incarnation of the science station design, based on the latest Gamma installment. A crew module and a science lab was the requirement. To meet the high electric charge requirements of the contract they added large battery discs to the backbone and kept the large solar panels. Extra hardware like RCS fuel and a set of reaction wheels would go into a large service bay, four additional docking ports completed the exterior design. On the electronics side they had some great new gadgets to play with. Wolfheim decided to give the newly acquired remote guidance unit a try. It could serve well as the central control point of the upgraded Alpha complex but could also provide guidance to the Mun lander when operating on the outer side of Mun. To upgrade the communication equipment of the station further, the engineers added a high gain 88-88 antenna and an RA-15 relay antenna. While the next tanker ship from Minmus was completing its aerobraking orbits in Kerbins low atmosphere we rolled the Alpha expansion to the pad on top of a rather small launch stage. Gene had planned to use the Minmus tanker as a transit stage for a payload again, this time to Mun. We would just dock both the tanker and the Alpha expansion at Gamma in LKO, mate the two and bring them on their target trajectory to Mun. This plan worked out very well and the Alpha station has now doubled its science and crew capabilities. The Minmus tanker would have to be relocated from Mun to Minmus at some time in the future, ideally with an efficient swing-by maneuver around Kerbin. Mission control took the task to plan for the relocation. The image shows the new configuration of Alpha including both Mun tankers, the Mun lander and the Minmus tanker.

Trucking dangerous goods (Y2 D344-D345) „Ground, it is here, I can spot it in the distance!“ Bardine Kermans voice sounded somewhat excited out of the speakers at mission control. With the first rays of sunlight touching Minmus’ surface she had climbed out of her airlock and had taken stance atop her plant to look out for the fuel truck. Wolfheim, who had spent most of the past days at mission control without getting much sleep, produced a smile on his tired face. During the last couple of hours, everybody at mission control had been waiting eagerly for Bardines visual confirmation. For reasons of direct communication, we had to undock and land the fuel truck over the dark side of Minmus which was facing Kerbin. Our experience from earlier night landings at Minmus made us confident that we could also land the rover based on instrument readings. As additional safety measures we performed the landing with the craft strictly pointing prograde and at least two kilometers away from the plant. The prograde orientation allowed us to roll out the twelve-wheeled rover to bleed off forward motion on the vast flats of Minmus. According to our sensor reports the fuel truck touched down gently a little more than two kilometers away from the fuel plant and rolled out some extra two hundred meters before it came to an RCS-assisted halt on the icy surface. We left the craft there with brakes locked to wait for the dawn of the next Minmus day to approach the fuel plant only during daylight. This would allow us to generate power through the solar panels while using the electric motors and would avoid stranding the vehicle powerless. Now that Bardine had confirmed she saw the truck we activated the motors and steering and released the brakes. The truck seemed to behave quite well in Minmus’ reduced gravity. Only during turns we had to be very careful because Wolfheim had optimized his construction so that the center of mass of the truck would be exactly centered for flight with full RCS and maneuvering tanks and empty payload tanks. Therefore the truck’s COM was high above the ground which demanded cautious steering inputs. We slowed the truck down directly east of her plant and fully stopped it ten meters away from the plant’s east docking port. Bardine gently dove from her outlook down to the ground using her jetpack to watch the docking from up close. Wolfheim, still following the video stream of Bardine’s helmet camera, took over the remote controls to personally guide his craft slowly towards the outpost. With the help of Bardine who voiced him through the last step giving onsite visual confirmation of the progress, Wolfheim achieved a smooth docking to the plant. Everybody at mission control had held their breath until the docking clamp arrest lights showed green. Then the ground crews broke out in loud cheering. On the shoulders of his colleagues Wolfheim was carried back to the crew quarters to finally get some well-deserved rest. Bardine however took over the truck by landing on its top side. She reconfigured the fuel flow lines so that her plant could start to pump fuel into both the storage and the maneuvering tanks. Soon the precious liquid filled half of the storage capacity which was our limit for the first trip back to the Beta station. As we had never had the chance to test a loaded relaunch in reduced gravity we did not dare to fully load the truck. After she had finished the loading and had confirmed that she had reconfigured all flight tanks back to flight mode Gene had a little surprise for her. “Before we launch the truck I want you to officially name it in a christening ceremony”, Gene broadcasted from his desk in mission control. “I know I have been a bit reluctant about names in the past and I want to change that. Our fleet is growing and our ships shall have proper names so we can use them as callsigns. This truck will carry the name of the famous Kerbal truck manufacturer Kercedes.” Bardine smiled and chuckled inside her helmet. She then disconnected a water tank from her EVA pack, stopped in silence, breathed and then threw it against the vehicle’s front cone. Kercedes was then undocked and after Bardine had made her way back to safety aboard her plant we fired the Twitch engines to lift it off. Its thrust proved sufficient for half-loaded configuration, we just had to use some of the payload fuel to adjust orbits and approach the Beta station. Docking went well and we now have all the tools in place to establish a regular fuel supply from Minmus to Kerbin for our missions.

Holy mother! Is that how you do it? And this? Can't wait to get home to try these out.

Yes. Let me have it. I want it! Reasons are all mentioned in this thread. I am still in the mid-game stage of my first career but I can see that once the tech tree is fully unlocked it will become somewhat repetitive. Going back to planets/bodies I already visited with new deployable science experiments, new robotic vehicles and new surface features sounds good fun and will most certainly glue me to the game for another high 3-digit number of hours. Yes. I will happily pay 15 units of currency (EUR, pounds, dollars) for it. Reasons have also been mentioned before. Game development costs money, both for stock DLC and free upgrades. I don't get why so many demand to get these additions for free. Granted, I am a very old dinosaur and surely settled in my budgetal situation. But what really matters is the "fun-for-money" relationship. As someone posted, at the price of about 60-70 credits (EUR, pounds, dollars for base game, MH and BG) we get hundreds and thousand of hours of fun. Not bad when I look at the hundreds of games for various platforms piled in large boxes in my basement, of which many have not given me 20 hours of fun. And yes, I want these upgrades and additions directly from the developer, producer and publisher. I will keep my KSP career bone stock because that's just how I am. I don't like mods for reasons others have also mentioned here. This should not be understood as being disrespectful to all the creativity and quality the modders deliver. I just don't like fiddling with systems anymore, which may very well be a matter of age. Live and let live. I am excited about the new DLC and can't wait to get it.

*facepalm* Oh yes, I should have seen that myself. Thank you guys!

I want to land an outpost on Duna. The community dV map in this forum tells me that 1450 m/s of dV is required to touch down from a 60km orbit. Q1: Is that the figure for a fully powered landing without chutes? I am planning to put about 1480 m/s on the outpost and to add 4 drogue chutes and 4 brake chutes for 18.6 tons of mass. And I wonder if that will be sufficient. My orbiter around Duna currently travels at 865 m/s in an 84 km orbit. Q2: Is there a way to calculate this properly?

Roving Minmus (Y2 D330-D343) While the tanker crew in mission control executed their braking orbits around Kerbin, we had another first to celebrate outside on the campus of SSC. Wolfheim Kerman, one of the engineers who joined us after a space rescue mission, had been busily working in a hangar on the research and development complex for an entire month after he was involved in one of our early briefings about our mining and fuel refining plans. He had been experimenting with wheeled ground vehicles for quite some time. When he saw the plans for our ISRU plant he urged his fellow engineers: "Do me a favor and throw some docking ports on the plant if you can, as close to the bottom end as possible. I have a great idea!" Then he ran off to his hangar and little was seen from him except in our all-team lunch breaks in the astronaut center. Then, on D330, the large hangar gates opened and Wolfheim stepped out of his lab, carrying a remote control and wearing a big smile. Behind him followed a huge 12-wheeled tubular truck. Many of our staff gathered around Wolfheim and his giant companion to admire both. Wolfheim presented us the first ever roving vehicle of our fleet and Gene was very happy to officially christen it the "fuel truck" after our gifted engineer had explained what he had in mind for the vehicle. Equipped with four large tanks and a large RCS tank, the fuel truck was capable of holding the entire production of the ISRU plant but not only that. Wolfheim had added some extra tanks, engines and all other necessary bits to allow the truck to land and takeoff on its own and therefore carry the produced fuel to Minmus orbit while the plant would remain in place on the surface. Gene was immediately thrilled and headed off to the mission control building. As soon as he had understood the potential of Wolfheim's work, he had another brilliant idea. What if we would use the tanker ship that was supposed to arrive in LKO soon to carry the fuel truck on its way back to Minmus! That would give us another opportunity to reuse stuff that we already had. All it took was another launch to LKO to bring the fuel truck up to Dunalab Gamma and meet the tanker ship there. It turned out that this would actually work if we would just use some of our free fuel. So we just did it. The morning after the tanker vessel had arrived at the Gamma station we saw a clean liftoff of a mid-size launcher with a very oversized payload fairing on its top. A couple hours later, the fuel truck made its first successful docking in space and Wolfheim was a very proud Kerbal. Valentina Kerman, our commanding crew member on the Gamma station, performed the required docking maneuvers from her controls inside the station. She first undocked the tanker vessel and piloted it around the station to dock it to the fuel truck's rear docking port. She then re-balanced the fuel loads according to mission control's calculations to make sure the truck/tanker duo had exactly the right quantity to go back to Minmus with the truck's extra mass of 13.5 tons. Soon we were ready to bring the vehicles on their way to the outer moon and Val watched the lengthy ship coast away over Kerbins desert. Mission control took over and fired the tanker ships engines over the dark side of our home world for the transfer burn. Nine days later the Beta crew on Minmus orbit watched as mission control directed the fuel truck slowly towards the docking port right across from where their lander was docked. Our newest craft had made it to its destination. Norzenz Kerman took control of the ships and finished their journey by relocating the tanker ship to the free port at the end of the lab section. The truck was now ready for operation and waiting for its first descent to Minmus.

Scanning grounds and hauling fuel (Y2 D306-D333) After the welcome party aboard Minmuslab Beta had ended and the crew of four had rested (or recovered from their hangovers) it was time to go back to work. Bob and Bardine began to configure the crossfeed lines so that the first load of free fuel could flow into the two tanker ships of the station. Back on Kerbin, we were all glad that our earlier missions had not only resulted in sufficient storage capacity for fuel but also given us the opportunity to ferry the fuel back to Kerbin aboard the unmanned tanker ships which had been transfer stages in the first place. Bardines first trip to Minmus had given us enough fuel to fill both tankers. Gene decided to let the first tanker undock from Beta and make the trip back home. While mission control staff piloted the tanker on its escape trajectory, Gene established a comm link to the Da Vinci lab on Minmus to get in touch with Bill Kerman, our chief engineer. We had been wondering if the tanker design allowed us to perform fuel-saving aerobraking maneuvers in Kerbins atmosphere when bringing the fuel back into LKO. Bill, who had designed the tankers himself, recommended to make careful attempts at around 55 km altitude but to retract both solar panels and the antenna during the hot phase of the braking maneuver. Another task for the folks at mission control was to move the surface scanner from Muns orbit towards Minmus to give us a better understanding of where to land the mining and refinery ship on the next descent. The guys in orbital maneuvering calculated a rather aggressive approach to a polar orbit on Minmus while ejecting from the retrograde Mun orbit the scanning satellite was currently in. We relit the upper stage engine on D306 and put the craft on course. Crossing the tanker's trajectory back to Kerbin, we corrected the satellite's flight path half way to reach a polar Minmus orbit of below 80km. After the capture burn, the surface scanner started to create a complete map of Minmus' resource reserves which proved that our assumptions had been correct. Our first landing spot was not the ideal place to mine for the precious ore and we would most certainly not go back there to continue. The lesser flats appeared to be much more promising for mining. We transmitted our new findings to Beta and ordered Bardine to prepare the mining plant for its next journey. On D311 she set foot on Minmus' lesser flats and planted a flag after the lander had made another precision landing under remote control. Meanwhile, the tanker control team took the steps recommended by Bill to prepare the craft for its first pass through Kerbins atmosphere. At a periapsis of about 58.5 km the tanker made its way safely through the upper atmosphere, lowering its apoapsis by about 13,000 kilometers. The aerobraking proved to be a patience-testing approach but we were not in a hurry. Our goal was to refuel the remainder of Dunalab Gammas launch stage which was still connected to the lab. This stage, consisting of two X200-32 fuel tanks and a Skipper engine, was very capable of putting the Dunalab on its escape trajectory when it was completed. Unfortunately it had never been designed to be reused for that purpose so it was not equipped with a docking port or autonomous control. Gene nonetheless insisted that engineering should come up with a modular solution to allow a very cost-efficient escape, using free fuel in a free stage already on orbit and connected to the station. On the second aerobraking pass, we lowered the periapsis to 55km, which was Bills recommended limit. This time, the tanker was exposed to much more friction but this trajectory - together with the braking burn to lower the periapsis - lowered the apoapsis significantly by another 28,000 km to a point just outside Muns orbit around Kerbin. After two more aerobraking passes we had collected enough data. Gene decided to assist the braking process with some of the fuel aboard the tanker. Considering that the tanker itself, the fuel and the launch stage to Duna were completely free in this phase of the program it would not matter much to waste some of the free fuel. On D333 the tanker finally approached Dunalab Gamma on its 80 km orbit around Kerbin and executed the docking maneuvers just fine.

I now rotated the probe core so that the initial direction of the navball is "upside down" (sky down and ground up). Now I don't have to activate "control from here" anymore. Brilliant hint, mate! Thank you!

That solved it. And I know that I did do that first thing on all the previous tests. It was very late yesterday... Thank you very much! You're right about the runway but I want to save the funds to upgrade the SPH for now. My navball points 90 east, probe core is oriented correctly. BUT the navball is rotated 90 degrees to the side, sky facing right and ground facing left. Once I select "control from here" on the forward docking part, that changes to sky facing down and ground facing up. I believe that's the reason for the wheel behavior. I'll try to change that in the editor. Thanks! And yes, it's a VTOL with four Twitch engines mounted near the front and rear wheels. Thank you for the hint about the action groups! Did that now.

I seem to have a strange wheel problem. I constructed a fuel truck in the VAB and put it on the launch pad to test drive it. So far so good, everything worked fine. Then, to test docking to my ISRU plant, I switched to the SPH and tried to launch it on the runway, which didn't work because my part count exceeds 30. So I switched back to the VAB and put the truck on the pad again. Now I experience the following: Steering fully left (A key) makes all wheels move to the correct direction except those on the 5th "axis". Steering fully right (D key) causes all wheels to steer "outward". Not sure if this is related to switching the editors or what else may be causing this. Any ideas about the cause and how to fix this? Thank you in advance!

Minmus mining and fuel production (Y2 D295-D306) While the flying staff was happily switching positions within the Kerbin/Mun/Minmus perimeter, our engineering department had brought to life something they had been dwelling about for quite some time. Following the Kerbin surface scanning experiment we had conducted as contract work earlier this year, Kerbal geologists had suspected that also Kerbins moons could be hiding valuable resources under their skins. To prove this hypothesis we approached the Integral corporation again in an attempt to partner with them on a surface scanning mission to the Mun. At the same time, our engineers teamed with our associates at Kerbodyne to develop mining tools suited for vacuum conditions. Both companies accepted their respective challenges and work began. A second surface scanning satellite was launched to the Mun around D260. It revealed that our inner moon indeed carries some exploitable ore concentrations. Oversized as the satellite launcher was, we left the satellite on a counter-clockwise orbit around Mun and kept the upper stage docked to it to conserve the large amount of fuel still waiting to be burned. In total, the tandem held enough juice for another 3,600 m/s of dV, good to go to Minmus later. In the high bay of our VAB at the space center, the engineers joined the Kerbodyne mining equipment with our usual spaceflight gear to come up with a mining and fuel production lander supposed to be deployed on the mint ice moon. The craft itself had undergone thorough testing here on Kerbin to prove that it is capable of excavating ore from deep under the surface, store and process the ore into all known blends of spaceflight fuels. We used our grounds at the space center for those live tests, leaving some nice holes around the otherwise perfectly trimmed lawns. We have not yet decided how to fill these holes but the good news is that we could confirm all requirements of electric power and specialized cooling in daylight and at night time without having to shoot the craft to Minmus in an untested state. The 16.5-ton-ship is supposed to be manned by an engineer to operate and monitor mining and fuel processing at all times. It features four tank compartments to store liquid rocket fuel and oxidizer and a large tank for monopropellant. At launch, the monopropellant tank contained only a minimum quantity of RCS fuel to be able to dock the ship, the other tanks were launched completely empty. The two small tanks on top of the engines were filled to cover the need for landing burns. We ended up with a 21-ton payload for launch, including two heavy drills, the large ISRU unit, thermal control systems, large solar arrays and fuel cell arrays for electricity generation and a single seated lander can. We nominated Bardine Kerman as our engineer on duty, who had joined our team during on of our numerous orbital rescue missions. She beamed with pride when we informed her, totally surprised about the confidence we had in her after the orbital failure we recovered her from. Well, our confidence was in fact a bit less than she understood because we remotely controlled the launch, orbital insertion and docking to our Minmuslab Beta. We felt safer to trust our folks at mission control to fly the delicate craft rather than the young and inexperienced engineer. The following image shows the fuel production plant in a parking position close to Beta, waiting for the docking maneuver. Bardine didn't have much time to meet the crew on Beta because our team at SSC was way too eager to see the plant in action, landed on the surface of Minmus. And we hoped to bring her back to Beta soon enough when she had completed her first mining and refining trip to the ground. After checking all systems for fuel transfer in docked state and checking out the Terrier engines for landing we undocked the plant from the station and began the landing sequence towards the Greater Flats of Minmus. The capabilities of the engines carrying the plant was the only thing we were unable to test at home. Here, in the ice-cold reality of space above Minmus, Bardine would be the first to find out if our calculations had been correct. We had no reason at all to be worried. The craft performed a spectacularly smooth landing on the flats in bright sunlight with only a tiny bit of fishtailing motion right before the touchdown. Now the only remaining question was if we would be able to lift the plant up from the surface once we had filled it with fuel. Being our first engineer outside of LKO, Bardine was delighted to receive the "go for mining operations" from mission control. With the solar arrays and thermal control systems operational, she deployed one of the drills. After confirming a good penetration of the icy surface she activated the ore harvesting and transport. Readings on our screens here at SSC proved that the mining was actually successful, delivering minor but solid quantities of ore. Once the mining process had stabilized we were ready to activate the fuel production. All systems worked very well and within their designated specifications. Bardine also deployed and activated the second drill and the plant started to produce liquid fuel and oxidizer at its capacity limits. We were overwhelmed with our success and Bardine was elated about hers, hearing the joyful cheering from the engineering crew via comms. When the daylight faded on Minmus, we had half of our tank capacity filled with free rocket fuel! Then it was time to let the remaining parts on the plant go to work: our fuel cell arrays. Also these components proved to be well suited for their task. Power generation allowed us to keep fuel production running through the entire night of Minmus which is about twice as long as on Kerbin. When the greater flats of Minmus saw the dawn of a new day, all our tanks were full of fuel. The remaining steps were to produce monopropellant, fill up the RCS tank with it and then launch back to a rendezvous with Minmuslab Beta. We also got the final checkmark on our lists when the ascent of the plant went exactly as planned. After the docking clamps clicked we knew that we had achieved another important milestone in our space exploration program. And this time, Bardine finally left her lander can and joined the Beta crew for some serious celebration of our success.

That's great news for all future updates as well. Thanks for highlighting this.

I am totally with all of you on the fun part. I am trying to run a realistic space program and going to Duna and back in as little time as possible with lots of time warping and doing nothing in parallel isn‘t tempting me. I think I will try option 3 first as I am currently assembling my Duna mission in LKO and it is most likely going to be too large to take the trip to Minmus. Also, I think I need more practice to pull off option 4. Aerobraking the tanker at Kerbin is a great idea. Thank you guys very much for sharing your insights!

Interesting, but I am not sure if I understand you well. When you say launch Minmus > LKO > interplanetary, what would that mean for LKO? Would you fully circularize a low Kerbin orbit and then do the escape burn? Or would you try to slingshot around Kerbin to find the right escape trajectory?

I wonder what is the most efficient way to provide my interplanetary missions out of Kerbin with farmed liquid fuel. I would launch empty transfer stages from KSC and fuel them on orbit. I can think of a number of ways: Mine ore on Minmus (probably not Mun due to its higher dV requirements) and bring ore to LKO to process it there Mine ore on Minmus, process it in Minmus orbit and transport the fuel back to LKO Mine ore and process fuel on the surface of Minmus, then transport the fuel back to LKO I assume all three options to be more efficient than launching the (paid) fuel from Kerbins surface due to Kerbins gravity and atmosphere. Is this assumption correct? Which of the three is the best way to do it? Are there numbers to calculate this kind of efficiency? If someone can point me to a posting or a video to explain this, I‘d be happy. Thank you in advance.