Scarecrow71

Yar

I am going to try making for Eve, if for no other reason than to finish the tech tree. And while I am not confident in my ability to get there and back (including Gilly), I am thinking that maybe this will spark something in me to be able to design a Jool-5 rocket. But again, I don't have a lot of faith in my ability right now.

Ernie

And it looks like I am going to have to forfeit and drop out of this. I only have Eve and Jool to go, and I could probably complete Eve and get the last tier of the tech tree unlocked. But I cannot do a Jool-5 in one launch; that appears to be the limit of what I am capable of in this game. Were I allowed multiple launches I am quite sure that I could finish Jool and all 5 of its moons. Being able to dock extra tanks and extra landers and all that in space would make a Jool-5 run not so impossible-seeming. But to do it in one launch? Can't do it. This isn't me whining about it. I simply have reached what I can do in this game. I simply cannot design a rocket that has enough fuel and thrust to get me off Kerbin, get to Jool, explore all 5 moons, and get back. My best attempt is that I can get to Jool, and then I get to pick 1 moon to explore before coming home. I simply run out of fuel, and I cannot seem to design anything that can hold enough fuel for me to do anything else. I know - use ISRU. Which I don't know how to do yet, and even if I did I would have to take those components into account on any rocket I design and fly. And I'm having major issues without that, which means that I cannot do that either. Sorry, guys, but I just can't continue on this one. Unless someone can implant rocket design material directly into my brain, I've simply reached my limit.

Well, I got off the ground. This game really goes backwards in that bigger is not better, which goes against everything we ever learn in games. Levelling up and getting better equipment should mean that the bigger stuff does more and works better...but this is not the case. I scaled down the tanks and was able to get off the ground. Unfortunately, I still can't do a Jool-5 in one launch; I run out of fuel. I think I've reached the limit of what I am capable of in this game.

And I'm still running into the problem of not being able to put enough engines on this thing to get it off the ground. No matter how many tanks and engines I put on it, I cannot get enough TWR to get off the launchpad. What am I doing wrong here? I try using the Kerbodyne S4-512 tanks with any combination of Mastodons and Mammoths, and with asparagus staging the best I can get is a TWR of 0.78. I have tried every configuration I can possibly think of with the liftoff stage, and I cannot get off Kerbin. What am I doing wrong?

I do use MechJeb to plot burns...but I always have to do correction burns because MJ tends to plot and not burn correctly. And while I can do correction burns, I'm just not good enough yet to do the primary plot/burn outside Kerbin's SOI. As far as starting orbit, I was told 100km was the right height. Is that nor correct? Can you explain how to do this properly? All the videos I see show correction burns to get a Pe close to what you want your orbit to be. As far as capture from solar Ap...? I'm not sure what you mean here?

I'm using MJ's readout for dV. Yep. And again, I cannot put enough engines and tanks on this thing. Keep in mind that, per the rules of the challenge, I need to leave a ship in orbit with at least 1 kerbal in it over every moon I land on. So at a minimum I need 1 mothership and 1 lander. This means I need enough fuel to: Get the whole contraption into LKO. Get the whole contraption to Jool. Move the whole thing from moon to moon. Land on every moon. Get the command module home. And keep in mind that I have to do this in 1 launch. I can't send stuff up into LKO and then launch a second time to collect stuff. 1 launch. I know I'm bad at rocket design, but I am missing something basic here. I'm out of room going vertical, and the thing will not stay together no matter how many struts I use. Autostart doesn't keep it together either. I have looked and looked, and I cannot find any post that helps with this. I cannot give up, but I'm stuck right now.

Yerfuni

And I'm stuck. I am having problems designing anything beyond a lander here. I keep hearing I need 3 landers AND a taxi AND a mothership. And yet I still haven't seen anything about how to actually design this, which is where I struggle. The mothership still needs to carry all 4 of these items, as well as having enough fuel to get from surface to LKO to Jool and back to LKO. And the landers need enough fuel to get to 5 different surfaces, and the taxi needs enough fuel to shuttle everything around Jool's system. How are people accomplishing this? Am I just really that bad at rocket design that I can't do it? I know - I thought I couldn't do anything earlier, and I got around it. Which made several other planets easier. But this? I'm stuck, and need some serious help with design. The reason I asked about Spaceplanes to begin with was that I keep seeing all these posts about SSTO planes to hop all over the place easily, and yet I can't seem to find anything that shows how to actually build one. I keep running out of height in the VAB, or I don't have enough fuel to make the full trip, or I don't have enough TWR to get off Kerbin's surface. Where am I going wrong? What am I missing here? Whenever I design something, I can't seem to figure out where to put the rest of the stuff. For example, I've got the following 2 different designs going, neither of which is very useful: The first shot was a design I thought would work, using a different lander for each moon in the Jool system. The top lander is for Tylo, and the others are for, well, the other 4. The thought was that after each lander was finished, I would transfer the remaining fuel out of its tanks and back into the main tanks for the mothership and then jettison the lander; this would save on weight traveling to the next moon, as well as conserving fuel. Unfortunately, the height and TWR become an issue; the VAB isn't tall enough to accommodate this, and I cannot put enough engines on this thing to get off the ground. Like, seriously, I cannot put enough engines on this thing. The second shot is a simplified design, using only a single lander that has enough fuel capacity to get on and off Tylo. I added the parachutes because I keep hearing that you can use chutes on Laythe much like you use them on Duna. The thought here was that I'd have to carry enough fuel on the mothership itself to continue refueling the lander until you hit all 5 moons, but I cannot put enough tanks on the mothership to refuel the lander appropriately and move about the Kerbol system. Or get off Kerbin, for that matter. Weight becomes a major issue here. The design I used to do a lot of the other landings simply won't work here; that design is predicated primarily on the nuclear engine to get around the system, and that won't work because I need oxidizer to refuel the lander tanks. The nuclear engine only uses liquid fuel, which means if I try that design I have to have both tanks for the nuclear engines and tanks to refuel the lander. Again, too much weight and not enough TWR to do anything effectively. What am I missing here? I cannot wrap my head around the taxi idea; I cannot visualize it in this challenge. I get 1 launch; I cannot launch something into orbit and then send a second ship up to go dock with it. This has to be a single launch. And before anyone says "ISRU", that is simply not an option at the moment. I don't know how to do ISRU, and having to do that then adds more complexity and weight to this that I simply don't have the capacity to add. Help?

So, we can either get minor updates all the time, or the devs can make use of that time to actually code the game. I'd rather they spend time working on the game as opposed to telling us "Look at the texture we created this week". When there is an update worthy of showing off, they will show it. Until then, we just have to be patient.

9/10 I've seen you around the forums. And you crash SSTO.

Banned for being plural.

I am going to have a lander that is capable of working on Tylo, and then use that for the other 4 as well. I figure that, if it can get off Tylo, it will get off the others. And it won't need as much fuel for the others, so if I refuel it once...maybe twice...that should be good. I do need to learn mining and such, and I dont want to do that on the fly. I am going to try completing Jool without it at level 1, and then probably do a level 3 with ISRU.

I have never done ISRU before. Not that this is a deterrent; I had never done interplanetary, or docking, or EVA maneuvers before either. I've also never had this much of the tech tree unlocked before, so I have the parts to play with. I have all but the final tier unlocked, so I do have mining capabilities available. But adding this to any launch adds a whole new host of problems and concerns, as well as parts needed to deal with this. Ore containers, and drills, and survey scanners, just to name a few. And I have to read up on how to do it, which again isn't a deterrent...but it will slow me down. My issue in design right now is height. As in, the rocket is too tall for the VAB, which means I am out of vertical space to build. I have scrapped my original idea of multiple landers, as well as landing different Kerbals on every moon. I built a Tylo lander that has ~6000 total m/s of dV, so that should work. The issue beyond that, and apart from height, then simply becomes fuel. I need probably twice that to do all 5 landings, and then at least 12000 to get to Jool and back and get into orbit of every moon. And then 3400 minimum to get into LKO. That is ~28000 m/s of total dV. That is a lot of fuel. I am going to go read up on ISRU now. I really want to do this without having to be marked as ISRU in the attempt...but I may have no choice.

Heserfuni

@king of nowhere You need enough fuel for the motheship to get to Jool and back, and you need enough fuel to land on every moon. You also need enough fuel for the taxi to get to every moon. I dont see how that is any different than not using a taxi at all? I'm also currently struggling with ship design to just get to Jool and back; fuel is becoming an issue as I need enough for all 5 moons...and Tylo has serious fuel requirements. Isn't adding a taxi just increasing complexity unnecessarily?

Heisiermon

I put this in my Las Kerbas Kerpollo Challenge thread, but here is the lander I used for Duna and Ike in a single launch: And for context, my tech tree at the time so you can see what parts I did have available to me:

1/10, because humans know that Kerbals are not part of nightmares. You are therefore a machine. I am human because i enjoy watching some group sports-related activities on television.

Tigerman

Tigermunks