AHHans

Not that I know of.

Well, for me it wasn't a station, but a contract satellite that I put into orbit the wrong way around. And I did "waste" the fuel by burning radial for a looong time. ("Wasting" because I wasn't going to do anything else with that fuel anyhow.)

Hi @Ron_Shadow_TTM Do I see it correctly that you solved your problem, or is there still an issue?

Well, as far as I can tell that's only true for the Structural Pylon. The other (regular) [Edit]radial[/Edit] decouplers behave as expected, i.e. they push themselves (and anything connected to them) away in the direction they are pointing: (Notice how both structural pylons are in front of the smoke from their decoupling.) [Edit:] O.K. I now also tested the TD-06 and TD-12 stack decouplers, and they also behave as described by @Laie

What makes you say that? Which rockets have the denser component on the bottom? The only one that I know of are the 2nd and 3rd stages of the Staurn V. (Where I believe they wanted the lower weight on the common bulkhead.) But back to the original question: having the CoM farther in the front makes the rocket more aerodynamically stable. So everything else being the same then yes, rocket engineers would have their tanks drain from the bottom up. But this is not enough of an issue to compromise anything else. As @Laie mentined: active steering and the right choice of flight path (pointing the nose prograde, straight into the wind) allow you to get even fairly unstable rockets into space. (In KSP and I believe also in RL.)

Thanks. In addition to being an adornment and its qualities as a sail, it was good for 24 m/s or so on the satellite. Well, that was never my plan. I just noticed a potential loophole in the rules and decided to ask.

That would be horrible! It would mean that you don't actually get immunity to this. But with a sensitive test for RNA/DNA fragments I wouldn't be too surprised if that reacts to "trash" that took a while leaving your body. (Or, well, I just hope it is that.)

Nope, that doesn't work. And you are not the first one to be annoyed by this, see the bugtracker issue #22946. Feel free to upvote the issue on the bugtracker, that will increase the chance that it will be implemented before the heat-death of the universe. [Edit:] You can also say that the yaw, pitch, roll, and the 3 translate custom axes behave like custom control axes that just happen to be mapped to the same keys as the yaw, pitch, roll, and translate commands.

So here is my contribution, but first a word from our sponsors: Crikey! Who knew that the 0.625m decoupler was tech-level 6? Is it really that hard to make those explosive bolts a bit smaller?!? So here it is, the Boot - notice the stylish neck ring between the stayputnik and the MK1 pod: So Valentina takes it out for a spin, asking comrade Bill to join her. The - lets call them special - aerodynamic properties of the craft require a rather steep ascent trajectory in order to get out of the thicker parts of the atmosphere as fast as possible. But it is nothing that Valentina cannot handle, so they make it into orbit with dV to spare. Time to run the experiments and deploy the satellite: After waiting for daylight at the KSC it is time to deorbit. During max-q of the aerobraking Val runs the engine again for local attitude readjustment to keep the unstable craft from spinning. Once the danger of material (bay) failure due to overheating is over Val allows the craft to flip over and fly sideways. But soon the parachute opens and with a quick burst of thrust with the last fuel reserves the craft comes to a safe landing. Recovery nets 6678 and 4 successful experiments. Val and Bill hope that this qualifies them for 1st Class Insignia with Silver Claw, Pearl Escutcheon, Onyx Eyes, Vermilion Heart, and Cobalt Stripe. The effective cost of this craft was 9876 - 5000 = 4876. [Edit:] P.S. The full imgur album is here: https://imgur.com/a/wU7GU2r

O.K. Batt-Man it is. So no strapping a chair to the top of a Mk1 command pod and getting the Vermilion Heart that way.

You can restrict the angles to which the servos can move, and then have them move to the maximum or minimum angle with an action group each. And setting the lock on the servos can help with the floppyness. On my VTOL I have: release lock and set angle to horizontal flight mode on AG 8 release lock and set angle to vertical flight mode on AG 9 set lock(s) on AG 10 When I want to switch mode I tap 8 or 9 a number of times and when the nacelles have moved I tap 0 a number of times.

OMG! How does the dragon not immediately get eaten by the Kraken?!?

You mean when you plan - i.e. set up a maneuver node - a plane-change burn? Or when you try to do a plane change by locking to radial in/out and firing the engine? Yes, that's part of the "come to a stop" part of a plane change maneuver. Think about it. When you e.g. want to do a plane change by 90 deg (and could do it all in one short burst of dV), how fast would you keep going in your original direction? What exactly do you mean with the "messing around" part? In general -a @Superfluous J already wrote - it is more efficient to combine two burns in different directions into one combined burn.

@Chequers: The lowest tech-level part that is usually considered a power source is the OX-STAT at tech level 5. So it is impossible to get both the Cobalt Stripe and the Onyx Eyes in the same mission. Is that intentional? Or are you willing to relax the rules somewhat, e.g. by allowing a large enough battery capacity for the satellite, or the solar panels for the Onyx Eyes? [Edit:] And while I'm asking stupid questions: is it allowed to bring the second Kerbal in a lawn chair for the Vermilion Heart?

Du meinst das hier? https://www.kerbalspaceprogram.de/

Hi @coconutturtle, welcome to the Forums. The screenshot was posted nearly a year ago, I believe the issue has been resolved by now. But if you have questions feel free to start a new thread and ask.

There are a few videos about the KAL-1000 youtube: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=KAL-1000 Some of them are more others are less useful, but I believe that this is the best way to learn how to use them. Some comments about propellers: at the start you'll want counter-rotating propellers that cancel out the torque on your craft (plane, helicopter). These can be on the same axis with one or two powered rotors or on two separate but parallel axes. For the start it is easiest to have them on one axis with an unpowered (remove the motor in the editor) rotor or serve acting as a bearing and a powered rotor with blades at both ends powering both propeller discs. When attaching the propeller-/helicopter-/fan-blades you need to turn the 90 degrees so that the front faces into the air. Then you need "deploy" them and set the deploy direction so that they give thrust in the direction you want. Propellers are complicated! Also have a look at the design notes about propellers. I prefer to keep the rotor RPM constant and change thrust by changing the deploy direction the the blades. Helicopters are even more complicated! In RL too.

Well, to quote Randall Munroe (with pictures linked from his site): Space isn't like this: It is like this: And once you got going it's hard to change direction. Welcome to the club! I believe most of us have at some point.

I actually didn't notice, I was still too full of adrenaline from trying not to crash during the descent. (There is a reason I have rubber bumpers on the feet of my lander.)

Well, you can argue about if my Mohole lander is smaller than @mystifeid's or not, but my rocket definitely is: (It technically doesn't need the fins, but I think they make it look cute. So there!) The major difference is that I used an ion engine for the transfer from Kerbin to Moho. This made the transfer stage much smaller, allowing for a smaller lifter, and in the end also for a cheaper rocket at 31526. Name: AHHans Date: 15. May 2020 Destination: Moho / Mohole Type of Submission: Images (imgur album) The lander on the VAB: First stage in action: The first stage gets the craft all the way into orbit, but I let it fall back into the atmosphere. This is after fairing separation, but before the circularization burn: The 7.8 km/s in the ion stage is enough to transfer from LKO to Moho - including a large plane correction burn - to capture at Moho, correct the orbit around Moho, and to deorbit most of the way - it doesn't have enough TWR for a safe landing, inside or outside the Mohole. Before I overshoot the Mohole or crash into its rim, I ditch the ion stage ans switch to the lander with its spark engine. What follows is the decent, deeper and deeper into the lonely depths of the Mohole. At some point the craft stops and the camera goes crazy, we have arrived. Switching off the engine and SAS lets the lander settle the last few cm. Time to run the experiments: And to watch the sunset: There are quite a few more screenshots in the imgur album: https://imgur.com/a/vOCxGhb

Kind sir, maybe we can interest you in one of our products from the black division of AHTech Industries: Sure, it doesn't look like much and, indeed, our company has sounding rockets on offer that are bigger than this. But in our division we consider a low profile an advantage. And don't let you fool you, there is an extremely capable probe under that fairing: You can see, we've fit a probe powered by an ion engine under that fairing. And with enough solar panels to run the engine at full thrust in Kerbin orbit - and closer to the sun - from solar power alone. We've also attached an universal storage container on top of the probe. For demonstration purposes we filled the container with three spare experiment control units as a dummy payload. We at the black division believe that we can come to a gentelkerbal's agreement that we will deliver the craft with an empty container even though the record - and our bill - will show that a full container was delivered. In exchange we will not ask any questions about what you put into it prior to launch. (We do suggest that you match the mass of the payload exactly to make it easier to pass official inspections of the craft and the flight trajectory.) A documentation of a test flight can be found here: https://imgur.com/a/DsNPk24

Well, on PC there is a "Restart" button in the lower left of the window where you can choose which scenario you want to play.

The most draggy thing on top of your rocket is the side-attached Experiment Storage Unit. If you attach it in-line between the capsule and the parachute, then you'll have a lot less drag there. (And you'll the the storage unit out of the airstream during reentry.) Having experiments attached to the side of the capsule creates only a tiny fraction of the drag of the storage unit. And most of their drag is assigned to the capsule (because KSP physics) and thus the center-line of the rocket thus it doesn't create torque. The exception is the Mystery Goo unit, that does generate torque if attached to the side of the capsule. But if you attach two Mystery Goo units in symmetry then the torque cancels out. Your liquid fueled rockets are those reliants or swivels? The latter are better because they have thrust vectoring and thus give you a lot more force to steer the rocket if it looks like it is starting to flip. And finally: By keeping your direction close to the prograde vector (on the navball) you keep the nose of the rocket pointed into the wind and thus keep the torque from having most of the drag on the nose of the rocket low.

That's true. But they also added new features that allowed you - well, at least me - to build better, more realistic craft. This allowed me to got from this, to this (eliminating the extra servos), to this and actual helicopter with tail rotor. So I'm not too mad at them. Some helpful(?) comments: Before taking off with a rotor powered craft activate the "Aerodynamic Forces Overlay" and check if the control scheme and thrust direction works as expected. (Well, see the comments above...) Rotor thrust (Helicopter main rotor, tail rotor, propellers on a plane, or whatever) is better controlled by leaving the rotor RPM constant and adjusting the blade pitch, than the other way around. This gives better and faster control with less side effects. (Well, having the RPM drop because the engine doesn't have enough torque is usually fine.) Control direction matters. My craft only work with the control direction in one direction (for the quadcopters up, for the Heli forward) because with changing direction the axis "names" change (yaw becomes roll etc.) and the assignment of the axes to the controls get messed up. Also control up lets you set SAS to "surface" - "radial out" and thus have it keep your craft from getting into a position where it cannot generate lift anymore. You can get feedback on settings like max-RPM, rotor-torque, deploy-angle etc. by opening and pinning the PAWs in flight.

LOL! But @aspacecephalopod: for a Kerbal that's just another day at work (you can't really call it "in the office" can you?). Keep in mind that it is not unusual for a Kerbal to spend a century or more in such a "lawn chair" in deep space waiting for one transfer window after another.