lump

No joke i actually landed on the Mun before i hit orbit, when i first got kspit was at my friends, and we played together and kept on building bigger and bigger rockets till we got onto intercepting the Mun, then we built ones to slow down and land as well, i didnt even think about orbiting or whatnot till the next day, when on the way back from the mun we ran out of fuel and was stuck forever in space, oh it did feel so good the first time for anything in ksp, landing on the mun resulted in cheering and high fives, twas so good back then , thinking back now where i can land in a heartbeat, looking for the next chance of that awesome feeling i got.

oh yeah I've only got the one to prevent total blackouts, solar still powers the whole thing. I found that indeed the 40 minute burns were not at all a problem, most of them were in fact around 30 max which isn't that long at 4x, and after a whole mission you are wholly used to it, it comes naturally, i do love ion engines.

Ok i got a prototype going to eve, its funny i've been wanting to use ion engines more and this challenge gave me the push. As you can see i'm using mechjeb to go to eve right now but this is the prototype, the official mk I will have mechjeb only for readouts and a nuclear generator to allow more dark side functions as well, and probably a docking port as well, it has 8000 or so m/s, Im going to call it the pOINeer : Edit: ok orbiting eve now, gilly here i come Edit Edit: i love ION engines, they are amazing, gilly intercept achieved Ok landed on gilly Time to create the official Ion craft

then remove the wings...

yep, we have reached the limit here, there is almost nill way of improving this. this challenge is over.

why not both, i'm sure people could make a texture to fix your woes, like a ksp texture pack.

Yeah i was thinking a spore type idea, where say you had the Atlas 1,the game would make a separate area for the atlas rocket, in the "Atlas" subdivision, then if you tweaked it in career mode with some new boosters and 4 solids round the side and called it atlas 2 it would be saved in the same atlas area, and the history would be like spores, as in, it would show the progression and evolution of the rocket into the current atlas you would be using, and all the science it collected in between ans stat about its most successful mission (how much science collected or how many bodies landed on or how little kerbals died or got stranded e.c.t.)

yeah my thoughts exactly, every little helps, i think the easiest thing to do here is price the cheapest essentials, (probe core, solar panel, battery, science e.c.t.) and then there's a base price every person can follow and all that matters is the rocket.

look at the prices, 2 FL-T100 is actualy cheaper by 5 than 1 FL-T200, it's not much but it's still cheaper

Ok i have my entry: I'll call it cheap-sat 1 it doesn't have a fairing because it is a fairing, so i added a nosecone which costs a lot actually IT has 4 science experiments but i'm only pricing it on one because science experiments are really expensive( the gravioli detector costing 8800!), with all the uless gak that i thought would make it mroe convenient it costs a grand total of 4185, with it being minimalism i can get it down to 2575 which is considerably cheaper, Edit: managed to land a probe on the mun for 4550 if that counts for anything

He he no it's fine, i wasn't technically entering anyway, i just wanted to see if i could out SSTO tavert, i hope one day we will out SSTO each other into higher and higher delta-V values, driving development and all, on the pad it says something like 6000 anyway because i just use good old turning off engines over what tavert uses, which does it automatically. Edit: ok can get a probe SSTO to orbit with 4500m/s now 5000 here i come.

He he thanks, it's been a while, and yeah probably. In other news my duna SSTO craft fell a tad short, turns out on the surface it still had a TWR of only 0.78 so i couldn't lift of without the inefficient engines, o now i got it stuck in orbit with 370 m/s fuel. should be an easy fix though, just change some things around. Edit: ok i can get an improved one to orbit with 3700m/s delta-V, godam heavy parachutes. Edit Edit: ok got one with 4000m/s orbiting now, should be enough hopefully.

Well its got one nerva in the middle, and 8 48-7s rockets on each fuel tank, and no fuel lines, it was really really simple and easy to make, no complicated fuel flow shizzle here. Edit: i think i can make a manned one with parachutes and whatnot to make a round trip to duna. Edit Edit: yeah ok this is going to work fine, i have got this craft up to orbit with 3600m/s delta-V to spare, thats: -1100 for transfer to Duna =2500 -1700 for going up to duna orbit =800 -800 for transfer to kerbin =0 these values are very rough and a but too pessimistic but its's more than possible some pics:

I'm finaly back frommy half a year vacation from the forums, and tavert, awesome rocket, although it's beatable: i made it too fast to give it a name but it only uses 77 parts and has over 4100m/s delta-V once in orbit, there are plenty of things i could do to improve this i'm sure but it's still simply awesome.

ok so should i do it, it is a rocket but you said they were OK, i think i will take it to laythe then or maybe a smaller Joolian moon so i can actually land.

is there bonuses for going to other planets because i think i a ready to take my best SSTO to eve and duna in the same flight with no refueling, it has the delta V but i am not sure landing after will be possible.

no i can see what you are doing to do, that is a bad FirstyB.No causing explosions to separate your craft

wow, people are seriously over designing these craft. Guys, you can so it in 5 maybe 6 parts. nice one robertordf though, i do like your craft, and it got pretty much all of the achievements, although nw i see it i am going to have to try to land on the launch pad, i foresee reloads.

"To think, we are going to be the first men to crap on mars"

ok, now that i don' have t have rcs or those heavy pods i should be able to do it much closer to the limit with alot more fuel to spare i will post pics tomorrow guys. EDIT:considering that those pods took up so much of the mass this new ship should eb able to carry rcs anyway, or any other features needed for the flight

it is ok, i will try again tomorrow, but this time i ill bother to add landing legs

I went for the rocket approach , it is 25 tonnes that is only because i assumed you wanted rcs, if you don't i can get it much closer to 18 tonnes. here is a pic of it: it can get to orbit, but if you are not against seats it could get much further, SDIR could you please define some basic needs other than the ones you said, e.g. rcs or not so i can optimize it. in fact if you are not against seats it would have a massive performance boost. Edit: Nao did you see my 4000/5000 m/s delta-V once in orbit SSTO, it is my most powerful yet and could probable land on moho (but not return)

OK SDIR, i have the design but cannot post it just yet, later tonight i will be able to though so stick around, at launch it is between 17 and 19 tonnes so pretty good overall

SDIR i will get on it right away

you are right, it would take a big SSTO, a staged rocket can do it easily but not one person, not me or tavart or nao or anyone else could do it without a f-ck off great rocket, my main problem is the gravity, to get into orbit on eve you need 8000m/s at least, to get that on a staged vehicle it is easy, but it is actually the closest to impossible i have ever seen in ksp.