Mister Dilsby

Docking a test lander to the mothership in Tylo orbit, with Vall, Laythe and Jool lined up in the background:

First suggestion is never mod to fix a piloting problem There's no reason you should not be able to get a Mun orbit in demo, and learning how will make you a better player and help you have more fun. The basic procedure is to adjust your orbit around Kerbin, making it high enough and timing it right so that your ship will enter the Mun's SOI. Then, burn to decelerate near Mun periapsis, and before long you will have an orbit. So to start, where are you going wrong? --are you able to get your ship to intercept the Mun's sphere of influence? (SOI) --once in Mun's SOI, what is your Mun periapsis?

I'm spending my time prior to V1 testing out some concepts for a Jool-5 attempt. Here's a recent sandbox test of a Tylo lander that may be of interest. Ignore the transport craft in the images below, it's just a stand-in and I hyperedited it to Tylo orbit. In the actual Jool-5 mission I intend to put all my landers in Mk3 cargo bays on a large cruiser. Here's my plan for the Laythe lander. Design Notes: Loaded Mass: 26.8t Crew: One Main Engines: 3x LV-N TWR: 0.95 (Tylo orbit) An Incomplete List of Thing I Hate About This Ship: Mk1 lander can on top of Rocko-32 tank is ugly and disproportionate Landing legs stuck on girders to clear giant LV-N bells Ladders are a complete kludge (needed to get down/around the landing legs) It's ugly. Did I mention it's ugly? It will get even uglier when I put a Science Jr. on it. A Complete List of Things I Like About this Ship: It fits in a Mk3 cargo bay. It lands on Tylo and returns to orbit in one stage. Much praise for the Constant Altitude descent method, without which this POS would not have a snowball's chance on Moho of landing. Enjoy!

Might be able to help you with that if you give dV and TWR information, per my earlier post.

I like that there are two games going on here: (1) solve the puzzles knowing the numerical answer in advance, (2) guess what riddle Kasper will pick for the next number. With (2) there's always something to play in the Hype Train lounge car even if (1) is sorted.

I suppose the shorter answer to your direct question is, "no, here use this ship instead and fly it like this", but if you let me and others walk you through the design process you will not only know how to land on Tylo, you will gain some skills that will help you do a lot of other things in the game as well. First, do you know how much delta V you have in the lander when it's fully fueled? If not, post the mass with full tanks, mass with empty tanks, and we can show you how to calculate the dV you will get with your Poodle descent engine. A perfect descent from orbit to Tylo surface costs about 3000 m/s delta V, and the same is true for the ascent. I suggest we start with the numbers and go from there. Depending on the dV of your craft and its thrust to weight ratio (TWR) we can make some suggestions of landing technique (i.e. vertical descent vs. constant altitude) ETA: thanks Yukon for correcting, we need TWR not TMR when in Tylo SOI

Interesting, I like that Guidoni made Paddywroks's version... and there are probably several more solutions for 14D and 21A besides the equally valid ones he and RogueMason came up with. @kasper, any chance you can post your version now that we have at least two legal solutions?

I don't believe in the no-win scenario either, and I think everything but 12d works without question. All that remains is which mistake was made: do we shift up two spaces, or make Garneau an honorary ESA member? - - - Updated - - - YES! SOLVED!!!

Doesn't match Gagarin in 16A... Garneau, a Canadian fits there... mais il est Quebecois, donc peut etre Kasper le considere comme un européen?

You're right, Rocx's version is more correct with Gagarin in 16A, and Glenn in 16d.

Here's mine so far. I know we were thinking Glenn for 16D, but I can't corroborate with a 16A. For 2D I didn't think any Russian in history ever had a name as short as four letters I even checked the dogs and didn't come up with a match.

If we take Eisele for 15d, Leonov does nicely for 19a.

Thanks for the update-- that makes 8d Shepard, not the more obscure Shepherd

1d Tereshkova! 3a Carpenter! I wonder if they made a mistake and 12d should in fact be a Russian, Gagarin... there does not seem to be an ESA astronaut that fits. All mistakes on the puzzle forgiven, it means they're spending their QA time on the game.

If 7 down is Aldrin, 7 across could be Armstrong.. 9 down Ride... 10 across Lu... 8 down Shepherd (not Shepard)... ok if it's all astronaut names this should be straightforward.

Canadian Chris 'Hadfield' fits for 11-across.

Why not crewed? 2,046 kg on the runway, turbojet+RCS, SSTO with propellant to spare. Keys to the design: --two ROUND-8 with oxidant drained and the monopropellant tank between them, for stiffness. --Oscar-B tank in front to mount the seat (no oxidant) --OM-10 massless RCS thrusters for circularization --wing strakes are the best lift/weight ratio in 0.90. --no control surfaces, just a small inline gyro and battery I could make it quite a bit lighter by taking the seat off and reducing fuel appropriately, but kerbals like to fly

At first glance Luizo this may not qualify allthough it is a really good video. Unfortunately the rules state that you must use an enclosed capsule or lander--no "seat only" lifters. Also while the mission is certainly 100% genuine with no cheats, the judging procedure requires the resource window to be visible so we can see how much fuel you are using. That aside, I really enjoyed watching the video, your craft is very well made and congratulations on getting two Kerbals home from Eve!

All right, we are still basking in the golden glow of victory and here are a few more for the leaderboard. BoobyTrap, you go to #1 in the Kerbal Coast (Koast?) Guard category for saving Jeb from drowning (though 'drowning', like 'starving' or 'asphixyating', are not generally things Kebals worry about.) Hon. mention to Kerdinand for making it fly. That can't be Jeb in the picture though, I have never seen that sad face on him Mallock, you go to #1 in the Satellite Swarm category--congrats!

Thanks so much, really appreciate the review, the kind words, and the sound advice! Yeah, at one point in the ascent I recall seeing shockwaves forming around the big Kerbodyne, looked over at KER and saw that my TMR was over 7 and throttled WAY back--sorry should have snapped a picture there, but the tank was running dry and I was more concerned at that moment with staging. I think I have a quicksave right before ascent, I may run that again and throttle down earlier to see how much more dV I can save. Am applying these lessons learned towards my next big cruiser the KSS Gojira Maru, bound for the moons of Jool sometime after V1 hits!

Talk about a close call! Brilliant maneuvers, aerobraking from Jool straight to Laythe, and I think you would never have made it back without that Tylo assist. To the top of the Layther leaderboard you go!

After a bunch of tries i finally managed a decent landing/ascent in one stage using the Constant Altitude method. I don't have a picture of the ship, but it's easy to describe: Mk1 lander can, Rocko-32 18 ton fuel tank, a little RCS and a medium gyro, 3x LV-N, and a few I-beams between the engines to allow the landing legs to mount low enough. Total dV is over 7000, TMR a bit less than 0.9 fully fueled. Descent profile: Begin 20km orbit Burn retro to 2000m/s orbital velocity Fall to ~12km Begin firing engines to reduce vertical speed Vertical velocity ~0 at 5km Continue burning at 30 to 60 degree angle to horizon, keeping vertical velocity near zero while reducing horizontal With horizontal velocity ~200-400 m/s and not seeing large mountains in the way, allow ship to begin falling Continue reducing horizontal velocity while allowing vertical velocity of up to 50 m/s At <1000m from ground, kill horizontal velocity and finish descent Got to ground this way using about 2600m/s dV, no trouble ascending. I did have to practice the landing method several times though, it was a new skill for me.

Aha, the whole ROUND-8 thing was just to distract us from their REAL purpose, giving us crappy fairing separation! ...well, it worked on me. I too would prefer two-piece separation but I'm not ready to blow up the forum over it. The Great ROUND-8 Revolt was over a functional part; this is over the nature of a cloud of non-persistent debris. I'll put this in the category of "gee I really wish the cargo bay doors wouldn't clip through my wings when they open" and play on.

Congrats Norcalplanner and Tiaga, and thanks Norcalplanner for a great start to the peer reviews! I just clicked through Lou's mission and WOW--he got ALL! THE! SCIENCE! Two Kerbals, three biomes, a perfect landing location and a very intricate ship to pull it off. His mission report is very easy to follow, with the resource window always open. I found myself in suspense wondering "what's he gonna do with that xenon?" until the end Amazingly, he pulls the whole thing off without a single orbital rendezvous. One ship leaves, same ship comes back with the science--just WOW.

Badsector, that is, well, amazeballs! Thanks for showing the construction method, and go to #1 on the Eve Ascent leaderboard! Love that shot of Happy Jeb at end.