Kchinger

Did it work for you? How long until you think it could be the actual release? Or, if it works, can you point me towards instructions for using it? PF is the only thing holding me at 1.7, and I'm about to make my first trip to something beyond Kerbin sphere (Duna I think) and it's silly but I really want your first time I see another planet to be with the new textures, so I haven't played in months.

Thanks. They use the terms extended and standard on the screenshot on the first post of this thread. Standard on far left and standard extended on far right, those are the two I've unlocked so far I think. The others must come later (like hollow, etc).

So apparently the standard base unlocks after the extended one for some reason. Or maybe my tech tree was just messed up because I installed part way through a career, but anyway, it was in the next aerodynamics node. Still not sure what the benefits of the extended are, but I'll try the normal and maybe it will become apparent.

Landed my fuel ferry on Minmus to start getting fueled up. Kerbal is for scale (by the right landing gear, under the KAS hose). It holds a LOT of fuel, and should be able to get most of it back to LKO since Minmus is so easy. Other than that, just some normal contract stuff. I set up KAC alarms for transfer windows to all of the planets, so I can start sending relays and doing a bit of science at least. Possibly might just go ahead and send a manned lander and see what happens, but that's scary, so I dunno. Duna isn't the first window, which is giving making me wonder what to do exactly on the order. Need to get a LKO station set up, for a contract and just to get a launching pad for inter-planetary.

What are the benefits of the extended base over the standard base, and what is the actual standard base called? The only one I can ever get to work is the extended one, and it seems wasteful if it's not necessary. Maybe I'm not using the correct "standard" one.

Today I returned 600 units of ore from Minmus for a contract, despite connecting the 10m heat shield incorrectly (forgot the decoupler below it, so I couldn't deploy it). First time I hit the water, sank, and broke up when it hit the ocean floor. Tried again and got land, no problem even without the heat shield. From left to right, ore return ship, miner, and base. Then I landed a tourist ship on Minmus, switched a rescued Kerbal to it, fueled up, and headed off to orbit the Mun for the tourists. Tourist ship with the entire Kerbin system in the background. Then I built and launched a giant (950T or something at launch) fuel ferry ship. The idea is it heads to Minmus, fuels up, then returns to LKO to fuel ships. I have my doubts that it can land, or maneuver well enough to dock, but we'll see. I didn't drop any tanks, just 6 Mammoth engines in two stages, which were all recovered with Stage recovery (and a silly number of parachutes). I think it has about 550T of fuel off the top of my head, plus maybe 4500 units of MonoPropellant. And I just now noticed on that screenshot that there are Kerbals aboard. It has a probe core, I just put the command module on in case it came in handy to ferry some Kerbals later. Ugh, now I have to get those people home somehow. I wish putting people on ships was less automatic and had more checks. If it works I'll modify it slightly and make another one for liquid fuel. And if it turns out it can't land on Minmus, it still got about 200T of fuel to orbit for pretty cheap.

So is this confirmed working in 1.8.1 still?

Got my Minmus base to the surface after picking up a new scientist from a rescue in LKO. Had to hop a few times to get within range of the KAC hose (35m I think) and then actually banged my solar panels into the other ship's panels on deploy, but no harm done. Got the ore loaded onto the ore return probe, and loaded it up with fuel, so it's ready to head back whenever I'm ready. Will have to send the new scientist back to Kerbin surface at some point to complete the rescue contract, but for now he and another 2 star are in the MPL on Minmus surface, loaded with data. Considering its Minmus and on the surface, I don't think it's making appreciably more science than the one in Munar orbit, which seems odd. Tomorrow will be to return the ore, and I'm not sure what else. Maybe start building some fuel ferries to make the mining worth it. And perhaps time for a probe to Duna, leave the Kerbin system finally.

So I'm not the only one having crew management issues. Maybe I need to hire a manager to keep all these people straight and get them on the correct ships.

Well, I managed to land the Minmus Rover Miner. Only took two tries. First one rolled a bit off axis so I couldn't control it with the Thuds and it slammed onto its side. Definitely harder to drive in the low gravity. It wants to flip and roll if I'm not gentle. Drove over to the ore lander about 2 km away, set up for mining, and quickly realized I had two issues. 1. I had a pilot, not an engineer. I had tested on Kerbin with an engineer, but somehow ended up with a pilot on the pad. This isn't the first time this has happened, I need to get in the habit of checking my crew on the pad to be sure. 2. I had never used the KAS transfer station before, and didn't realize how it worked. I thought you used two hose things to attach, I never saw the socket piece, so I can't connect them. So, another opportunity! Got a contract for a Minmus base and a Kerbin rescue. So I built a lander with a big 4 person module plus an MPL. I'll grab one scientist from orbit rescue, then I've included an engineer with the sockets and tools to fix the existing ships, another scientist, and a pilot. My current pilot on Minmus will round out the necessary crew for the contract, I'll get my hose stuff fixed, and send the ore back. How will I get all of those people from the new Minmus station back to Kerbin? Maybe I won't, I dunno. They can level up from there, they can reach orbit without even needing a ship, and fuel ferries will be landing anyway that they can hitch a ride on maybe. The base is in LKO, ready to rendezvous with the rescue, and should easily reach Minmus surface tomorrow. Needs a much more precise landing since it isn't a Rover.

If you're using mods, smart parts has a fuel bleed valve you could use to get rid of excess weight.

Today continued my work from yesterday (doesn't it always?). Got the huge mining rig into LKO, took 4 orbits with the little NERV to get it to Minmus intercept. It actually beat the Ore Lander/Return ship to Minmus, but I parked it high up and then sent the lander down to scout for a good location. Hopped once and got to the Great Flats, with 15% ore. Perfect. Tomorrow will be landing the rover, and starting the mining. Should be fun. Rover in its fairing looks a bit ridiculous, and makes the huge rocket look ridiculously tiny. But it worked. The much, much smaller ore transfer lander. This will satisfy "return a ship from Minmus" and "return 600 units of ore from Minmus" at the same time. Well, at least it will if I can manage to keep it from smashing into Kerbin's surface once it has 600 units of ore on board. It's loaded up with parachutes, drogues, and a 10m inflatable heat shield. And it's pretty light otherwise. We'll see.

Yesterday I finally returned everyone to Kerbin from set of explorations and rescue contracts at Mun and Minmus. Got about 6k science, mostly from Minmus, which helped my tree considerably. I haven't even spent it all, since I'm not sure exactly what I need most. Today I built a small Minmus hopper/lander probe with empty ore tanks and a KAS fuel line and a surface scanner. Sent it on its way to Minmus to find the best spot and hang out. Have to bring 600 ore to Kerbin surface for a contract. I'm hoping I can slow it down enough. Stage Recovery says yes. We'll see. Then I spent a ton of time building, testing at KSP, and refining a Minmus mining rover. Based on one I saw here, it will land on the bell and then tip onto wheels, with two Thuds to slow the descent of the nose. I'm hoping I can land it. I managed it once in Kerbin gravity, so might take a few tries but I think I can manage. Strapped it on the biggest rocket I've built yet (36t or so payload to Minmus surface). It made orbit, sort of, but middle stage TWR was too low so the orbit was super eccentric and wasteful. Made a couple modifications and I'll try again tomorrow with a more efficient launch. 6 big drills, 1 big convertor, 12 gigantor panels, another few surface mount panels from Near Future I think, enough radiators to cool all drills plus two conversions. Should be enough to be efficient. No fuel cells, so no nighttime mining, but that's alright. My first try at mining, I'm excited. Once I get the base set up I'll build a fuel ferry or two to get it from surface to Kerbin or Minmus orbit, and then I can start heading to my first planet.

So this has happened multiple times lately, and it's driving me nuts. I'm on 1.7.3 still. When this happens, I can still use my mouse to select my menu items, I can click to check status of parts, etc. But I can't control the ship in any way, I can't click EVA, I can't click SAS, I can't use the WASD to do anything, I can't switch to Map mode, I can't use escape to bring up the menu. I can't warp, I can't switch vessels (it says "Target Switching Locked" I think. You can see that RCS and SAS are somewhat grayed out maybe. But I have plenty of electric charge, I have people onboard, I'm not warping. I can't figure out what is happening here. I do have mods, including EVE, KER, Firespitter, KAC, procedural fairings, SCANsat, Near Future stuff, CTT, Chatterer, Docking Port Alignment (which I can't figure out how to enable), transfer window planner, trajectories, Stage Recovery, RCS Build Aid, MechJeb, KIS, KAS, Gravity Turn, and some other stuff I don't even know why or what it is. The game keeps running though. Time passes. I just can't do anything. I end up having to kill the game with Alt-F4 and then go back in and go to a save. Strangely, it Autosaves (or at least says it is) while I'm stuck like this. Any ideas?

Continuing in the vein of "it's always something", I sent up the second ship with the scientist. Went to do my capture burn around Minmus and realized I'd forgotten solar panels. Luckily I was able to use the engine to gimbal and generate just enough electricity to control the attitude and complete something resembling an orbit. Then it was time for the second rescue, this time with an engineer with some panels and an electric screwdriver. Successfully docked (no easy task, I stupidly relied on the built in RCS of one of the command pods, but my ship is way too big still for that, so it was mostly an engine affair, which the skipper is less than ideally suited for). Got the panels attached to rescue #1, and it headed off to rendezvous with the original Minmus lander ship so the scientist and pilot can continue their mission to land. Rescue #2, meanwhile, will rescue one person from Minmus orbit for a contract and then head to Mun, meet the low on fuel lander in orbit, stick a probe core with two docking stations on it on top of the lander, and then Munar lander probe will head down to rescue someone from the surface for a contract. And do a bit of science while there on a hopefully new biome. Probably going to have a ton of fuel left on various craft after all this is done, so I might use it to move my Mun MPL station into orbit around Minmus before everyone heads home. Drop off some extra science from Minmus surface at the MPL on the way, maybe swap on a two star scientist for a one star that's there. If there is still fuel left and the Minmus lander hasn't hit every biome maybe I'll fuel it up and go again. This game has endless possibilities of things to do and endless ways to screw those things up. I love it.