Luuko

Hrm. Well that gives me a few points to consider at least. To clarify, work has me doing some geopositioning big data stuff and I saw a possibility to try to understand how one might handle such in KSP. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Out of morbid curiosity, we know the altimeter provided in stock KSP is Mean Sea Level MSL, not above terrain. To get Above Ground Level (AGL), how would we go about doing this? Do we calculate AGL akin to how we convert between earth's MSL and AGL via comparing them against the WGS84 model (A rough geoid measurement of earth's surface) or are should we measure from the center of mass of the vehicle and straight to the center of the sphereoid and note just where it stops and how far/long the distance is? Thoughts?

Found this earlier and figured I'd post it for others to enjoy. Helped me get a better handle of the environment they're in. Funnily enough, it kind of reminded me of being back on an LA-class submarine when I was Active Duty. Anywho, maybe someone can draw inspiration from such or something.

@Bob (Calisker) - Take a gander at http://lacy.timduru.org/ for costuming and such. They're well reputed within some of the circles I sometimes circulate in.

An amusing side-note that might make for a fun quote somewhere... We burned O2 candles on a couple subs for extended durations while I was in the Navy. They stink. Very memorable smell.

It's been awhile since my last doing so, but yes. http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/22230-Rite-of-Passage-Functional-Shuttle-ExcaliburShuttle-1-%28Stock-17%29

Not really no. Once you get them up there, the small probe fuel tank and tiny engine or the 1m rcs tank and thrusters are generally more than sufficient to get into proper orbit.

I tend to favor getting all my sats up at once with a single launch vehicle. Usually an RCS tank, 4x RCS thrusters, 2x solar panels, 1x 1m battery, a probe core, a sat dish and 2-4x omni antennas. Usually 4-6 sats in a single launch. I'll launch, get my parent taxi craft into orbit, detach all the sats and send the taxi craft back for recovery. Then it's childs play to use the RCS to get the sats into differing orbits to adjust their orbital period before bringing them back down into a single orbit, spaced out. I'll do the same when I send craft to other planetary bodies - each ship is multi-purpose and usually carries a sat network with it. Examples: Early Multi-Mission Craft Recent Duna Mission

Havn't posted in awhile, so I thought I'd share a project I've been working on. (Update-1: Replaced the drive-unit assembly and added in a series of drop-tanks along the spine. Also added 4x Comms Sattelites, 2x probe landers, and 2x probe tugs. In addition, added in a lander unit for the CommandModule/Heavy Tug.) This is the core craft and posted specs. At 90+ tonnes in the displayed configuration it's on the heavy side, but is liftable as a single unit using stock parts. There are some non-stock parts displayed, but they can be swapped for comparable stock parts fairly easily. The core, stock config has 4200+ Delta V available on the drive-units, enough to bet most places one-way in the Kerbal System. It is designed to utilize a drop-tank(s) docked behind the drive-unit between the nacelles to extend this range. This 4200 m/s deltav is not taking into account the additional delta-v gained by utilizing dropp-tanks or modules that are jettisoned. Mission modules, landers, sattelites and rovers are to be attached in orbit to the available docking nodes. Once in orbit and mission modules are detached, the craft becomes a space-station for the associated planetoid. If refueled, the drive section can serve as either a fuel depot or the craft can be reuitlized for other missions. Intended for an 11 man crew. (3 in the detachable tug/cockpit, 8 in the escape pods docked alongside) but again mission modules can adjust this accordingly. I'm most proud of the comms and the power modules. Comms because I like the design (even if it is mostly wasted mass) and the power module because it allows retracting the main solar panels to within the diameter of the craft itself while having plenty of storage. All modules are reconfigurable and detachable. Modules (Fore to aft): * Command Module/Orbital Tug - Large and standard sized docking ports and a ton of RCS fuel. If a lander mission module is provided, can also serve as a reusable lander. * CrewTank - Crew storage and work facilities. If a lander mission module is provided this can be utilized as a ground unit. * Hull - Main point of docking mission modules. * Escape Pods - These are currently a mod-item, but a stock 1-man command pod + parachute + a couple sepratrons attached to a docking port would suffice for the same. * Main Power. 10x 1M batteries, 2x large folding solar arrays, and ancillary stationary arrays. Allows solar arrays to be retracted and protected by the bulk of the craft. * Comms Array - 2x dishes on dorsal and ventral of the craft plus 2x ancillary docking nodes and ancillary comms antennas. * Main Drive Module - Fuel tank + 4x Nuclear Nacelles attached radially. Capability for adding additional modules aft - intended for drop-tanks, though others could be utilized. * Lander Module for Command Module/Tug - Added in lander capabilities for the command-module. Also serves as small drop-tank for the main-drive if needed to extend range. Current issues: * Design for the Core lifter likes to have the last booster stage collide and explode against the drive unit. This destroyed the drive section and the comms module immediately before it, necessitating achieving an stable, but ecliptic orbit with just RCS which had to be later circularized. Suspect I need to reinforce the last booster stage with struts to maintain structural integrity post achieving Apoapsis, and pre-Periapsis. * Mechjeb was tested for this craft, and was found wanting in fuel-efficiency using RCS for maneuvering and docking. Burning through 3x large RCS tanks is not acceptable just to attach a new drive and comms section. Will be performing future maneuvers manually and regulating mechjeb to only an informational display as clearly the system is not ready for main-stream general usage. * Docking the drop-tanks aft will prove to be... interesting. The nacelles in their current iteration extend beyond the main fuel tank. Future revisions of the craft will need to consider shortening the nacelles and perhaps reducing them to less than 4 engines for a variety of reasons. * May look into adding quantum fuel transfer nodes - still debating if that addon helps with the main-craft or would be best utilized on ground vehicles and craft where docking is difficult for refueling and fuel-xfer. Will look to reduce mass while retaining multi-mission capabilities and increasing fuel efficiency for future revisions. (Update 1 Notes: Craft is at minimum mission status. Debating launching now as adding additional modules at this stage is questionable due to system performance. Already down to a few frames per second to the point where I don't dare leave too much else orbiting nearby or unnecessary modules attached. Next edition of this class of craft will likely combine the power module with the comms section, reduce the number of engines, change the drop-tank module to a single large tank, remove the escape pods, and in general reduce parts across the board. Also will be needing to rethink my staging for parts - lander section for the command-pod may be stuck up towards the bow rather than attached at the stern. Determining destination now - will launch this evening as-is depending on what the next launch window is... probably Moho, though Duna is also a possibility.) Thoughts are always welcome. R/ Luuko

Ah - thank you daj148! I'm afraid my PC took a bit of a nose-dive and I just got it back up and running so was unable to respond to this.

Hrm... Depends on how much Drag really affects things. As-is, it's a capable glider, if a bit nose-heavy if one jettisons the main engine on final approach. I was mostly playing with thrust-to-centre of mass with it, hense the odd fueling arrangement, while trying to keep the mass down. I'll look into it - thanks for the thought!

Next stop - Duna. Should be a bit harder with it's thin atmosphere, which means parachute landings are certainly out for the moment.

Update on ExcaliburShuttle-1. It's Interplanetary capable, as proven by a Eve Splashdown. Getting back is another matter, but it can get there! Thread: ExcaliburShuttle-1

Oh! Right-click and 'save-as'. Otherwise your browser may try to open it as a text file.

Interesting - in the standard configuration or the shuttle's main engine changed to a nuclear or torid spike?

Shuttle: Munar Craft + Orbiter. May be able to land with it on Mun or Minmus if skilled. (I seem to be good at crash landings mostly with this...) Thread: ExcaliburShuttle-1

Everyone does one of these at one point or another I'm sure... Spent the better part of the week working on one design/modification or another searching for a viable design. Quite proud of the end result. Would love some feedback from others whom have made a functional shuttle design before. Also... anyone else getting 'The Last Starfighter' vibe from this? I know I did after I finished adding the main stage boosters. This was the result: Notes: -Orbits and landings performed manually with stock install - no addons. -Craft is stable in Atmo for landings and in transition. Throttle will have to be watched while cargo is in the small bay there as prior to jettisoning the craft is a little heavy on the dorsal side. payload bay is reconfigurable to suit task. Maximum size - approximately 1x FL-T400. -Config used to reach + return from Minmus orbit: Displayed + 1x FL-T400 in payload bay. Remaining fuel suggests the canister in the payload bay could be swapped for a small satellite to place in Minmus orbit or closer. -Determined a classic space-shuttle external tank and booster config is not really viable with stock parts. -Mun landing possible... but difficult. Shuttle really performs best in Atmo. Same with Minmus landing. -Parachutes on dorsal side fore and aft are not required for safe landing., but are there just in case. Fairly easy to glide/land on Kerbin. -Only SAS is the Avionics package, so some light monitoring is required. -May be possible to extend range by swapping the LV-T45 for a Toroidal Aerospike or a Nuclear Engine and/or reconfiguring the fuel routings. And finally... the .craft file: ( Right-click and 'save-as'. Otherwise your browser may try to open it as a text file. ) ExcaliburShuttle-1.craft Edit: Apparently this design is inter-planetary capable! Eve Splashdown! (Addon utilized to figure out proper angle for intercept with Eve. Not included in .craft file nor affects the shuttle's performance.)

Munar Landing and returncraft. Confirmed to Mun. Plenty of spare fuel to make Minmus. Possible to other planets, though one may want to swap the current design's transfer stage's engines for the nuclear ones to achieve this. Untested. Thread: HeavyLander-3c

If I'm not mistaken, asparagus staging is when the outer stages fuel the inner ones and peal off as they use up their fuel. Don't hold me to that though. All my stages do this, though I don't have any rockets on some of them as they're just fuel tanks along for the ride. Glad to hear others are making progress as well! Let me know when you hit Minmus - I'll be interested to take a look at your design. :3 I think mine can make it there as is, but am going to hold off on that... my rescue mission just crashed-landed next to two of my early Heavy Lander designs (within 100m of the other crash-site). Now I have /3/ crews up there to retrieve. *groans* I have no problem with a general landing... it's when trying to hop around and hit specific landing zones I have issues. ... Or when I miss my queue with the time-warp. Oops.

Not sure? Just uploaded version 3b where I fixed the lander/return module fuel configuration. I did notice the old file jumbled the staging a bit... See if it shows up in the new file.

Purchased the game in .16 and amused myself mostly with putting up satellites and making passes around Mun. Landing was out of the question aside from a few tests in and around KSC, which were... lackluster to say the least. .17 came out and decided to give landing on Mun a shot. Stock parts only. Several crashes later, 3 crews stranded from botched landings I finally managed to land. There was much rejoicing. Decided I needed to redesign my landing craft and use large command pods in the process to allow for rescue of those stranded crew. (Extra crew were accidentally 'left' at the launchpad...) Also needed to work on reducing the craft being so dratted top-heavy and tipping over on landing. Another goal was to leave part of the lander on the surface of Mun as a sort of memorial. Further wanted to have a better fuel management system than just stacks of stages, and went with a drop-tank solution. Final goal was to get as much mass and fuel as possible to Mun without too severely adversely impacting performance. This was the result, HeavyLander-3. Big craft - for me at least. Central philosophy - fuel goes from the outside, inwards towards the core of each stage, allowing for stages to jettison empty tanks without having extra needless engines and decouplers. Staging + some pics. Loose the large SRB's at about 6000m, with a vertical speed of 680m/s. Loose the 4 empty external large liquid boosters at about 30000m, vertical speed 934m/s. (These are assisted with the new Sepatron-rockets to ensure they blow away cleanly.) Rollover and begin gaining transverse velocity once chosen apoapsis is achieved. Loose the final launch stage. There will be an explosion as the trio of decouplers fail during transition - this is normal. The engines work fine. Usually. 90% of the time. Continue transverse burn to achieve an orbit. As the first stage of fuel tanks empty, jettison them. (Sepatron assisted to ensure they blow clear.) The LV-909's will engage at this point and also begin drawing fuel from the drop-tanks. This is normal and expected. Didn't engage previously due to prior drop tanks being in the way of the engines. Achieve Kerbin orbit and begin burn towards moon at right point. (I aimed for about 80* ahead of Mun and got within 50km of the surface no sweat.) This will leave between 1/2 to 1/4 of your fuel in your drop tanks. Plenty for maneuvering and achieving orbit. Once at Mun's Periapsis Burn till you achieve an orbit. (I didn't care too much about it being circular as I was landing in one cycle.) At Apoapsis, retroburn for a landing approach. As fuel reserves allow (and there is plenty left) choose a landing site. Enroute, jettison the second set of drop tanks, leaving the core 2 fuel tanks and the main engines. Continue deceleration burn. I usually hit it about 60k up, then about 20k. Once at about 10k, jettison the engines and empty stage, leaving just the lander. Keep descent below 100m/s. 5000m, deploy landing struts. Keep burning. About 50 m/s descent. Use your best judgement to slow to below 15m/s depending on terrain. Land successfully. Celebrate. Do EVA's, etc. Reposition if you want, should have plenty of fuel in the lander for such. Detach and head home. Limited fuel in the return module so be careful. Use RCS if you have to to get home. All in all, a successful build/launch. Some thoughts for modifications... The lander/return module fuel-tanks probably need to be reversed. Usually end up landing with at least 2/3rds fuel left in the lander as is and seem to be skimping on the return module's fuel. Swapping the small and large tanks around may alleviate this and improve quality. - Fixed in HeavyLander-3a It is entirely possible to get the entire transfer stage to land on Mun and not eject anything. Bit of a bear to land with all that dead-weight, but the fuel is there for it. Tested it once and got a partial recovery (core stage fell over and a few tanks popped off). May be the basis for building a Munbase. Separation of the transfer stage from the launch stages proved troublesome - redesigned and reinforced with struts and works much better now. With this design, I suspect it may be possible to reach Minmus and land/return. May have to try that after I reconfigure the return module/lander as mentioned above. Swapping the main engines for the transfer stage for the nuclear ones may allow for interplanetary exploration using the heavy lander. Will have to research this. Weight... will look into saving some, but not sure how much I can successfully cut out. Will have to ping other more experienced KSP members for their thoughts. The parachutes on the initial stage (I like trying to recover as much of that as I can for 'reuse' in my head.) may be a starting point, but certainly open for suggestion. Final Notes: Am looking for feedback and thoughts from more experienced players - Would love to hear about design or approach changes to improve efficiency and such. I've provided the .craft file towards that goal. Also... anyone have a clue how to setup the spoiler tag for this forum so I can clean up this thread a bit? The Craft: HeavyLander-3a.craft And the pics:

Thanks! Any chance you can move this from the 'how to' forum to the 'welcome aboard' forum? I think I posted it in the wrong spot.

First off - Hi there! Name's Luuko. Former US Navy Sailor, current Senior at Radford University, Virginia, USA. (I'll work on my profile after I post this.) Just found and purchased this yesterday after Lord_Stimpy's Campaign Mode vid series caught my eye on Youtube and made me aware of the game. I figured what better way to make an introduction than to say hello and to offer up a video of play (warts and all) of my first successful circular orbit, satellite deployment and landing. (Hopefully no-one will bite me for posting this in the wrong thread!) http://www.livestream.com/luuschannel/video?clipId=pla_4dfc0bda-570f-4052-8f2f-d319e43617ba 4 total launches in that video. 2 fun failures, 2 successful launches. No crew losses (very proud there!). Decided to make it interesting and as a hats-off to Stimpy to play on this vid by his posted rules. At least, as close as one can get with just vanilla game mechanics and no mods anyways. If I calculated things right... Achievements: 30km sub-orbit, 60km sub-orbit, 80km sub-orbit, 100km sub-orbit, orbit, Satellite Ending Budget: 108,649 Kiribans Satellite deployed in circular orbit at just short of 150km near the equator (a little wobble of a few degrees I think). (Time in video is at aprox 1 hour 25 minutes.) I'm going to apologize for the quality of the video in advance - livestream's quality is terri-bad. I may try FRAPs and youtube if I do this again. Anywho, good meeting y'all and to the creators keep up the good work! ~Luuko