king of nowhere

in the video you posted you were NOT killing velocity. Look at 0:34, when you said at this point it should stay, the thrust is not at 0. the most likely explanation, if you were pressing x, is that some mod was interfering with that. maybe some kind of autopilot. maybe you were miclicking. maybe you changed config so that x does not zero thrust. whatever the reason, thrust is not zero.

why not high quality and two parts? or three high quality parts? ok, I suppose if one wants to run a realistic space program one has to account for cost and mass. me, using kerbalism for grand tour challenges, I never had to worry about mass and cost but I did have to worry about lasting for centuries. So I went for 6 redundant high quality parts. and I finally understand why at some point the ship just stopped getting broken. after a dozen malfunctions the remaining time of every other piece is just so long that it stops mattering.

it's been a while, but iirc somewhat over 100 tons. the final plane is around 30 tons. nowadays I am a lot more experienced and I recognize going reusable there was a suboptimal choice. Not Albatross is a perfectly fine laythe plane, to turn it into a jool plane I had to add somewhere between 80 and 100 tons. I could have made a disposable jool lander for less than that, and save mass overall.

problem solved. when the "bug" manifests, you simply did not shut down the engine properly. look closely at the throttle. see how the needle is not exactly on zero. see also how there's a light glow behind your engines, further showing that those engines are, indeed, working. see also how, on the data window on the left, in the first case it says acceleration 0, twr 0, and in the second it says acceleration 0.16 and twr 0.02 I don't know if you changed the default controls, but on pc standard to shut off engines is X. that will shut down the engines for real. Unless some of your mods can activate them, maybe some kind of mechjeb docking mode; I'm not familiar with those. well, turns out both sides were right. you were right in that it was not orbital drift. we were right in that the game was not bugged.

Today I discovered I have to give a raise to whoever is developing the solar panels. Because I botched a landing and tilted the ship and... A single solar panel is holding up a 64 tons lander! In 0.3 g! What do they make them of? One of the drills was still touching the ground, so I was able to refuel and launch back to orbit. The ship was even conveniently pointing eastward - roughly. I wonder what other used one can have for nigh-indestructible solar panels

first you said that the acceleration was slow, now you say rapidly. which description is false? keep in mind that ksp has smaller planets with faster orbits, and so the effects of drifting are bigger than in real life. both hotel26 and 18watt already did mention the possibility in their answers. if the two ships are sharing the same orbit, one in front of the other, they can be very stable. if they are one above the other, they will drift away much faster. perhaps. what you described the first time is perfectly compatible with normal orbital drift, now you say that the change in speed is fast. I have experienced bugs with trajectories too, so there may be a bug at work. we questioned what you know of phisics because you do not talk like an expert. Except for a few throwaway line that do hint at technical competence, like mentioning the physics of two spaceships orbiting each other (without whom I'd just dismiss your claims of MS as internet bravado), most of your messages come across as just ranting about things that have perfectly reasonable explanations. what you described in your first post was perfectly compatible with orbital drift, so the simplest explanation was that you were experiencing orbital drift and had no physical knowledge. even now, you boast of a MS in aerospace engineering but you never correctly describe orbital drifting. We who are posting here have years of practice at this game. we do not have a degree, we do not know how to write guidance control code, nor we know about crafting techniques for advanced aerospace materials, realistic aerodinamic models, actual gravitational equations, or a bunch of similar stuff I suppose is studied in aerospace engineering. but we do have a lot of practical experience running orbits, rendez-vous, dockings, transfers. I showed ksp to a friend with a phd in physics - he specialized in particle physics, but he took courses in orbital dynamics - and I was surprised at how much more knowledgeable I was than him. I would bet good money that when it comes to this practical understanding of the kind of orbital operations required in this game, we are actually more experts than people with actual degrees. in this specific field of space navigation, we are even more experts than several people working at nasa, because there's plenty of people who are not working on orbital mechanics but are instead building rovers, improving thermal shields, ruggedizing delicate science instruments so that they will survive space, how to establish communication protocol. Or perhaps writing code. And so we also don't appreciate being talked down to with snarky comments questioning what we know about physics either.

others have already explained well why drifting happens and why it's so normal (really, I am surprised that you are knowledgeable enough to think of the two ships orbiting each other and realize the physics is wrong, but you still didn't realize how those ships, close as they are, they are still in slightly different orbits). I will add that, for the purpose of docking, once you kill velocity you have enough time to dock. just don't take too much time, you can ignore drift if you dock fast enough. otherwise you can use rcs to correct for the drift.

yeah, right, I forgot to mention. I'm not the greatest expert in aerodinamics, but I'm aware of a few techniques: 1) magic wings, with lift/weight ratio of hundreds. 2) fairing/cargo bay sheanigans, to make parts dragless 3) placing parts and dragging them inside the ship, to close a node without generating additional drag of those, I suppose 3 is allowed (an open node causing extra drag is a game issue anyway). 1 is definitely not allowed, I've seen stuff way too ridiculous based on it. in a normal challenge I would not allow 2, but what the hell, it's probably impossible without it. any other aerodinamic trick I didn't mention? EDIT: wait a moment, how is it possible to ssto jupiter? all the stock aero tricks will get you out of the atmosphere, but you still need to provide, like, 20 km/s or so of orbital speed... 1) it is much flatter. it starts at 6 atm, but it reaches 1 atm around 7-8 km and it disappears completely at 55 km. so you have to climb roughly 20 km from the higher point you can reach on propellers to the point where drag becomes low, as opposed to 35 on eve 2) I wasn't considering reentry. i used inflatable thermal shields for my mission there. a spaceplane may actually be unable to land in one piece. however, the objective is to take off and orbit. 3) composition is 65% nitrogen 30% hydrogen 2% helium, so it's definitely a lot lighter than eve.

the spaceplane community keeps getting better and better. nowadays an eve ssto is considered pretty standard, and somebody even managed an eve ssto that can save enough fuel to reach gilly. can you guys step up and make an ssto for valyr? valyr is a planet in the whirligig world planetary system. It is significantly bigger than Eve, with a surface gravity of 2.17g and 1100 km of radius. speed of a low orbit is roughly 5 km/s. so a valyr ssto would need to have 1.5 km/s more than an eve ssto, and a greater thrust. seems pretty impossible so far. but valyr has two saving graces in its favor. first, it rotates fast. on the equator, you already have 600 m/s of lateral speed, reducing quite a tad the deltaV requirement. second, its atmosphere, while denser than eve at sea level, thins more quickly, disappearing at 55 km. this translates in less overall drag and less altitude to climb. with those two factors reducing the cost, going ssto on valyr may quite barely be possible. I think it's not, but I'm throwing this challenge to the spaceplane community because I may be wrong. alternatively, i'm declaring the winner of the contest whoever comes closer to orbit in deltaV terms. to take this measure, you have to have an apoapsis outside of the atmosphere, run out of fuel, and create a maneuver node to enter a stable orbit. that would show how much deltaV you're missing. good luck In case somebody manages to orbit valyr, the next step is derbin. derbin is a moon of mesbin, it's as big as valyr but it does not rotate. so it's basically same as valyr, but with extra 600 m/s required. but while I may be wrong on valyr being impossible to ssto, i feel pretty confident that derbin is completely impossible. a view of valyr. it's basically a bigger version of laythe. according to the science reports, there's life in the oceans. valyr is lovely, isn't it?

it's possible. you can get 10 km/s even with a nuclear engine, and the right ratio of fuel cells + on should give almost twice the Isp. furthermore, you can get nearly as much deltaV as you want with drop tanks. simply put your tanks on decouplers and discard them when they are empty.

that's why i see your new records only every once in a while. it took me nine months for the rss/kerbalism grand tour, and it involved 360 years, with regular inspections of the nuclear reactors every three years, with a very laggy ship, with 47 recorded bugs getting in the way. nine months for a simple stock system grand tour is mind blowing.

in my mission where i still hold the current record i didn't get that vessel recovery science. i sent the mothership back to kerbin orbit and sent up a shuttle to land the crew, specifically to avoid faking the result in this way. no, just kidding. i sent the mothership back to kerbin orbit and sent up a shuttle because in all my planning I completely forgot to think on how the crew would land. still, the unintended result was there. I think, anyway, removing that small science contribution should be trivial, if it was ever needed.

after too many afternoons spent doing gravity assists to lower my orbit, I managed to reach the inner gememma system, in the whirligig world planetary pack. the sights were worth the wait. First the planet gannovar. somewhat bigger than duna and with a dense atmosphere. I came in at 5 km/s of intercept speed, and I had to use repeated flybys to turn my trajectory around and convert those 5 km/s coming from outside the system to 5 km/s going inward. the planet is just big enough that I could eventually do it, but just small enough that it must have taken a couple dozen flybys. But after a long time using gannovar, I finally lowered my trajectory enough to reach lowel. And wow, look at it! lowel is also slightly bigger than duna, with enough atmosphere to fly. lowel has a moon called ollym, or maybe it would be better to call it a binary system. ollym is slightly smaller than duna, but still bigger than vall. it has a very thin atmosphere. it appears to be dominated by volcanoes. I was hoping to be able to aerobrake on ollym, but I had 3 km/s of intercept speed, which coupled with the 1.2 km/s of escape speed of ollym means I still come in way too fast. Boundless, my mothership, can at most take 3.5 km/s on an atmospheric pass. so, more gravity assists followed. all those planets orbit the red dwarf star gememma, here seen up close through a cupola. The dot is the dwarf planet ammenon, which I will also have to reach eventually. As it takes 30 km/s for the two-way trip and I plan to do it without ions and without staging, I expect it will involve even more gravity assists than I just had. it will take me at least another couple of months to get there. the red glow of gememma reflecting on the oceans of lowel during an ollymrise. it's transfixing. more of the transfixing red glow over water. Ollym has those straight canals, I'm looking forward to land my spaceplane there and run some science. and here we have a lowelrise while aerobraking on ollym. I finally lost enough speed that I was able to get captured. now that I put the mothership in a stable orbit, I will start refueling, then send the landers around.

if you try to make realistic looking stuff, everything in ksp is overpowered. actually it's not that the parts are overpowered - they significantly underperform compared to their real life counterparts. but the reduced size means that to orbit earth you need 10 km/s, to orbit kerbin you need a third of that

yes, of course it is. the terrier quadruple its deltaV in vacuum - though i don't understand how you can have 2 stages both based on terrier engines with similar twr there, unless it's some mod to rescale (i checked, only the terrier has that atmosphere Isp). anyway, this leaves you with 2300 + 2300 + 1200 = 5800 m/s. you should actually go to orbit and have half fuel left in the second stage. if you don't, then there are two possibilities. maybe the rocket is a lot more draggy than you think - just because it looks aerodinamic, it doesn't mean it is. aerodinamic is glitchy. or maybe you are not doing your gravity turn correctly

yes, I read somewhere that the equivalent Isp is roughly 1300 s, so an ion probe with fuel cells and lf/ox tanks will still have more deltaV than a nuclear rocket, albeit at a lower thrust. as for the right lf/xenon ratio, you will have to run some calculations yourself.

I will add that going for immediate rendez-vous like that is cool, but actually more expensive unless you have computer assistance to time everything perfectly. as a human, your timing won't be perfect, you will have to make some correction, and it will cost a bit more. if you go into a lower orbit first, it will be cheaper somewhat. also, the timing is different on different planets. on kerbin, you generally want to launch your rocket when the target is passing from the western desert to the ocean. on gilly, you just wait until your target is above you and go straight up

atmospheric and vacuum deltaV can be very different. using a vacuum engine for the first stage, or an atmospheric engine for the second stage, can make a huge difference. if you use a reasonably aerodinamic rocket with a good atmospheric engine for the first stage and a vacuum engine for the second stage, then 3400 m/s (vacuum) is a reasonable amount to orbit kerbin. if it takes 4000+ m/s, you are doing something very wrong. if you want a more detailed answer, post some pictures of your rockets and your ascent profile.

never had crashes myself, so far. though I did have conflict with other mods, but alone it worked perfectly

right click on the hitchhicker container with the detox unit, there is the option. just like you can turn it on from there, you can also turn it off from there.

too big? Not Albatross is 30 tons, so I can understand the concern; but Sole, the first plane, is only 7 tons total, including jet fuel - and a bunch of food, water, and radiation shielding introduced by a mod that you won't have in the stock game. you can't make a laythe lander for much less, not if you want it to move on the surface. as for landing on water, it's actually fairly easy. much easier than landing on land. just keep your vertical speed low, and you're good. And in general, Sole is very easy to fly. if you are willing to drive it on the surface, you may also be willing to not use your mod for the descent and ascent phases.

if you want to move on the surface and go back on orbit, you are better off with a plane. getting a plane to take off from water is hard, though, it needs a lot of thrust. I made a few such models this is the easiest case. it uses the panther engine, it's got the afterburner mode that gives it extra thrust at the cost of extra fuel consumption. I managed to squeeze some 500 km of range from it, plus two water landings and an ascent to orbit. to orbit, that spacepane would eject the wings and the atmospheric engine (you can see them on the upper left corner) and ascend with a terrier engine. it could reach 20 km of altitude on that panther engine, but i was running out of jet fuel. this instead is Not Albatross space seaplane, it works with propellers and nuclear power generation so it has unlimited range, it can take off from water as many times as it wants and it goes to orbit even on kerbin - though it is hard. to make it take off from water, it needed several adaptations: powerful propellers for its relatively low mass, high wing surface to increase lift at low speed, and most of the mass concentrated on the tail, so that it could lift the nose more easily. flight performance is not as good, but it can fly straight and move around. you can also use it as a boat, it glides on water at 50 m/s. building it is difficult to achieve, but if you want something that can land on water and move around, a plane is your best bet. if you just want to go to the nearest land and plant a flag before taking off, then just any plane will do, you can glide on water until you reach land and take off from there.

it's not about the center of mass, i have a similar rover that is not finely balanced, and it still manages to fly using gimbaling to compensate. in fact, you should not need rcs. maybe that's part of the problem? is gimbaling active? if gimbaling is active, you should balance no problem. wait, maybe too much gimbaling. the vector is the engine with the greatest gimbaling, and it often overcompensates, pushing so hard that it unbalances the ship more. so tuning down gimbaling to 20% or so may work. too much thrust? seems like that rover has a huge twr - unless it's a lot heavier than it looks - and I see sometimes ships have more instability problems at higher thrust. where is that rover supposed to land, tylo? another idea, maybe the rover is flexible? the rockets push at the edges, the rover bends, and the rockets are suddenly off-center. which is related to fuel draining and thrust, the fuel is on the edges of the rover, draining the fuel increases the acceleration of the edges compared to the inertia of the center. seems the most likely issue. and in that case, moving those rockets closer to the center of mass would help. P.S. I can tell you are experienced because the first half dozen solutions I thought, i read a line later "and i checked this thing".

yes, vessel orientation does influence radiation dose. cme events damage the crew of parts exposed to the sun, but if there is something else blocking the sun the crew will be safe. the easiest way is to put a large fuel tank on a narrow crew cabin. to ensure that your ship is properly oriented, you can turn it around during a cme, while checking the irradiation see in the image, the lower part of the info window, where it says environment, it has radiation and habitat radiation. radiation is external radiation, you can't influence that, but habitat radiation should be down to a few mrad/h, or nominal. in the case of the picture it's not possible because it's the effect of a radiation belt, but with cme you will see the value change as you shift the ship. afterwards, if you orient the ship correctly and then change ship, the game will consider it oriented correctly as long as it stays out of physical range. but save often, because sometimes the mechanism glitches.

Part 9: A tale of giants and dwarfs Boundless enters the Gememma system and explores the moons of binary gas giants Mandrake and Rutherford and the dwarf planet Pragnik. Left, the positions of Mandrake and Pragnik around Gememma; Gannovar highlighted to showcase how tiny is the inner Gememma system in comparison Right, the moons of Mandrake. Rutherford is a gas giant roughly the size of Sarnus, all the moons are bigger than Minmus but smaller than Mun 9.1) Welcome to Gememma! 9.2) Boundless in the sky with gas giants and moons 9.3) Rally racing on Tatian 9.4) Lozon and Jancy, not quite interesting enough 9.5) Remote Pragnik 9.6) Beagrid, the waxy ocean