UmbralRaptor

Going by the info pulled out of the game, Duna's eccentricity is only ~0.05. That's not easily visible.

Try retuning the ASAS? It requires editing the Ki/Kd/Kp values in the CFG, and restarting KSP, but it might give a smoother ascent.

You want the rocket equation: ÃŽâ€V == Ve * ln(Initial mass/Final mass) [Ve is specific impulse, or more accurately effective exhaust velocity in m/s] or ÃŽâ€V == 9.81 * Isp * ln(Initial mass/Final mass) [isp is specific impulse in s] You'll need to calculate it separately for each stage.

It's been there for a while. Note this announcement from 6 months ago.

Either the Mün is shrinking, or Kerbol is getting bigger. >_> Shiny! (Lower TWR than the big LV-909, and yet it'll likely still be useful. Interesting...)

Desktop only. Something about not having had a laptop since spring 2003...

Okay, using those for mass figures. Moho 3.38e22 kg (0.64 Kerbins) Eve 1.14e23 kg (2.16 Kerbins) Duna 4.56e21 kg (0.086 Kerbins) Mars-like. Jool 4.41e24 kg (83 Kerbins) Saturn-like. Also, the scaled distances are quite close to those of Mercury/Venus/Earth/Mars/Jupiter in the real world. Hm... I'm really more of a Bill than a Bob or a Jebediah...edit: That's what I got. Because I'm using an equation with mass proportional to (semi-major axis)^-2.5, small errors in distance get multiplied by a fair amount, though. (See the differences between these numbers and the previous ones. Also, none of these are definitive.)

It's from a series of solid core nuclear-thermal rocket (that is, a rocket that uses a nuclear reactor to heat up the propellant, rather than burning it) projects, mainly in the 1950s-1960s. Some of the earlier engines were tested, but none actually flew. Expected Isp seems to have slowly increased from 800 to 925 s. Astronautix has lots of info about half way down this page Edit: Huh, merged threads.

Those orbit and SOI pics are very interesting. Moho -- 0.4 KU (5.4e9 m), 2.5e22 kg (0.46 Kerbins) Eve -- 0.8 KU (1.1e10 m), 9.47e22 kg (1.8 Kerbins) Duna -- 1.4 KU (1.9e10 m), 5.56e21 kg (0.1 Kerbins) Jool -- 5 KU (6.8e10 m), 4.34e24 kg (80 Kerbins) Better figures will wait for someone with a ruler. Or 0.17, when they'll get much easier to work out.

They're all side mounts. Let me throw together some mockups. Like I said, the exact tankage amounts aren't always achievable. Also, some of the numbers were just to see how bad the diminishing returns for more/smaller droptanks got. These might not be the best way of going about this. edit: ...and I have some of the parts (eg: the engine) in the wrong stages. That'll need to be changed...

The main reason for frequent staging would be a better mass ratio. 0.16 parts don't have the limited TWR or poor single stage mass ratios of 0.7.3 - 0.15.2 ones. So, I made a spreadsheet to look at various drop tank configurations. The 'lander' is assumed to have a 1-kerbal pod, 1 ASAS, 7 parachutes, 8 landing legs, and an aerospike. The nominal 16 FL-T200 tanks is equivalent to one FL-T32, or 3200 fuel units. Each staging is assumed to require 0.05 tonnes in decouplers. The results are useful, but not overwhelming: (This is the most efficient staging, though it's not always possible while keeping the ship symmetrical) Bigger rockets benefit more -- with 1600 fuel units, drop tanks were rather pointless.

Apoapsis -- The highest point in any orbit. Variants on this term will be used for orbits around specific bodies. Eccentricity -- How far your orbit is from a perfect circle. 0 is a circle, 1 < e < 0 is an ellipse, 1 is a parabola, and >1 is a hyperbola. If e >= 1, your ship is on an escape trajectory from the current body (assuming that it doesn't crash into anything first). Inclination -- how 'tilted' your orbit is. An orbit around the equator has an inclination of 0° or 180°, depending on which way you're going. One over the poles will be 90° or 270°. Isp -- Specific impulse (amount of impulse provided per unit mass of fuel). Essentially how efficient a propulsion system is. Technically this should only be in seconds, but many people (myself included) will use it interchangeably with the m/s version (see below). LFE -- Liquid Fuel Engine. Compare with LFR in the post above mine. Periapsis -- The lowest point in any orbit. Variants on this term will be used for orbits around specific bodies. Prograde -- The direction that an object is moving in. Retrograde -- The opposite direction from where an object is moving. Non-obviously, something will be described as having a retrograde orbit if it's moving the opposite way from most other bodies. Semi-major axis -- the overall size of an orbit, sort of. With circular orbits, this is the same as the radius. For elliptical ones, this is half the distance of the longest axis (hence the name), or (Ap+Pe)/2. For circular/elliptical orbits, The semi-major axis is directly related to the orbital period via Kepler's Third Law. The semi-major axis of a hyperbolic orbit is negative, though. TWR -- Thrust Weight Ratio, how much thrust something puts out compared with its weight. If this is below 1, the rocket will be unable to land/takeoff safely. Ve -- Effective exhaust velocity, effectively how fast the propellant is moving when it exits your rocket. Like Specific Impulse, a measure of rocket efficiency. Typically measured in m/s. Ve == Isp * 9.81 edit: Hohmann ellipse/Hohmann transfer -- an elliptical orbit to get between two circular orbits. Generally the simplest way to get from the Mün to Minmus, from a low Kerbin orbit to the Mün, etc. Typically one of the lowest energy approaches. Bi-elliptic orbit/bi-elliptic transfer -- a slightly more complicated way of getting between two orbits that is in some situations lower ÃŽâ€V than the Hohmann approach.

I'm guessing its the same thinking that made people want to do Apollo-style missions to the Mün -- not realizing why different designs may make sense in real life and KSP. It's not enormously difficult to build a stock rocket with 10+ km/s of ÃŽâ€V. I expect that to be enough for a (carefully flow) mission to/from Duna or Ike. Said rocket can be kept below 300 tonnes on the pad. Possibly below 200.

There's enough misinformation/poorly thought out advice, and correct but highly limited tutorials that I'm not sure any such thread exists. The most comprehensive approach would be grabbing a textbook on orbital mechanics, or poking through wikipedia so you can learn the math/physics and judge each case for yourself. Hohmann vs Bi-elliptic transfers, the value of either vs gravitational slingshots, direct ascent vs rendezvous, etc all involve tradeoffs, so which is best is situationally dependent.

Since there's no fuel fixes option, the new planets. It also seems sort of silly that the new planets and moons are separate categories, though.

For beginners? Go simple, and stay close to stock. Big complicated designs with tons of mods make it hard to tell what's going wrong, and harder for people to help you. It's possible to get to orbit with a relatively small single stage vehicle, and land on Kerbin's moons with a two stage one. You also might want to avoid the size 2 parts (especially the big engine and decoupler), given their fragility. Oh, and about 4), there are some mods (eg: ZOxygen, Kethane) that partially provide it.

That would be the navball. It work similarly to the artifical horizons that you see in flight sims. The blue area represents the sky (area above the horizon), and orange the ground (area below the horizon). The orange dot faces out the front of your craft, typically out the nosecone (if applicable). The green/yellow markers show what direction your ship is traveling to/from, with the "x" being the from. prograde marker retrograde marker The purple markers point to/from KSC in the demo, and to/from the second space center in the paid version.

Vectored thrust has better pitch and yaw control (especially at higher altitudes), but no roll control last I checked. Winglets do offer roll control, so may be of use below 30 km, depending on rocket stability.

I like what this person did with the Spirit comic.

It partly depends on if Orbiter's actual-sized Mercury/Venus/Earth/Mars/various moons count, despite their lack of terrain. Also, I think Minecraft worlds are larger?

Just the area around you goes dark. You'll likely be able to see spots that should be dark but are actually light because of the limitations of Unity.

Eh, the RT-10 now has better Isp than the size 1 LV-909.

Yes, though given the limitations of Unity, the results are less impressive than you'd expect. The Mün's orbit is in the same plane as Kerbin's so, I would expect the time between eclipses to be ~39 hours, 12 minutes. Duration would be approximately 12 minutes. Seeing them at KSC might be a bit rarer.

I like the use of vectored thrust for control authority. Did you have any issues with uncontrolled rolls?

I'm partial to direct ascent missions for simplicity, and stock as I'm unsure what mods will be working when 0.17 is released. With that in mind, the Des-Explorer series [working name] was designed with a mission ÃŽâ€V of 8-10 km/s. I expect this to be sufficient for most-all single-stop interplanetary trips. (.craft not included, as I'm still messing with the design, but I'll add it if anyone wants.) Despite the horrible appearance it offers decent stability and maneuverability. GLOW is approximately 187 tonnes. I'd like to keep this below 200 tonnes, but I would also like to get 3 untouched tanks into a 70 km x 70 km orbit. Adding additional parachutes (on separate stages) might be useful for landing on the Mars analog, or the watery moon. Or Eve, if I don't mind the one-way trip. Surprisingly, I may need additional landing legs. Also, for taking off from Eve, a reworked final stage or two. (I expect the aerospike to be the only functional stock LFE at the bottom of its atmosphere)