DerekL1963

The rules allow the maintainer to ban mads that are overpowered - there's no loophole there. No offense, but save yourself the grief, plenty of folks have completed the challenge without "cheat" mods.

The AS-4 Norge conducts her first long range cruise.

Expedition III - Long Range Cruising - Fly to the East Peninsula, place a Navigation Beacon, and return to KSC. - Validate long range cruising ability. - Validate landing and overnighting capability. After Expedition II, the Norge's gondola was rebuilt to better distribute the positions of ladders and ramps. The science team protest loudly about being moved all the way aft - far from the bunks and snacks. (But between themselves, they were quite pleased - now once their instruments were calibrated, they could nap without being caught by the Commander.) Airborne - and the mission is underway! Though the crew chafed at the safety requirement that they remain overland, they enjoyed the scenery Despite being only 20km short of their destination, as the sun began to set, the crew searched for a landing site... as they approached touchdown, Emery made an unpleasant discovery - the ship's RCS system was not operating. After conferring between themselves, Commander Hugo and Emery decided to proceed with the landing. Emery skillfully used the ship's reaction wheels to point her in the proper direction, and carefully jockeyed the throttles to null her ground velocity. Though the slope of the landing site was less than ideal, she touched down well within velocity limits. As the engineering team began to troubleshoot the problem, the science team prepared snacks for dinner. Afterwards, the science team and Pilot Emery headed to their bunks... where Pilot Emery found a ten dollar bill in an envelope under his pillow. Shortly after midnight, the engineers discovered the problem - the main pressure regulator had failed, resulting in low flow to the RCS. They replaced it with a spare, and conducted a ground test to verify operations before they and Commander Hugo headed to bed. (Honestly I don't know what happened - the RCS didn't work, but after I saved the game and went to the Space Center to timewarp through the night they started working again.) The next morning Mission Control awoke the crew - and gave them very welcome news: Vehicle Engineering had worked through the night, and after reviewing the telemetry data from the engines, Mission Control lifted the requirement that Norge remain over land - and authorized a direct overwater return to KSC. After breakfast, the crew lifted off and made the short hop to their designated landing site. Unfortunately, they were unable to locate completely level ground. (Lesson learned: When I know I'm going to land, slow down, drop altitude, and open the ScanSat instrument window... I passed several flat spots while sill high and fast, but couldn't find them again. Finally, I just got disgusted with myself and set her down.) Rather than risk unloading Rover-I, Mission Control authorized placing the beacon at the landing site rather than walking to higher ground. As Commander Hugo watched, Scientists Umberto and Henri quickly checked their instruments and planted the beacon. (Though in retrospect, I probably could have unloaded it safely.) The crew wasted no time in getting back aboard, lifting off, and setting course for home. Feet wet! Leaving the East Peninsula behind and heading out over the open ocean. Passing over Observation Island... (Observation Island is that big island east of KSC well out into the bay... I've looked at it from above many times while climbing into orbit, and thought to myself that if KSP was 'real' then KASA would certainly have a tracking and communications station there. (In the same way NASA and the USAF had stations located on islands in the Caribbean.) The real USS/USNS Observation Island played an important role in developing and supporting the Polaris weapons system and SSBNs.) Fifty kilometers out - and the KSC complex is clearly visible. Pilot Emery begins his descent. But misses his mark while landing... Sheepishly he passes a ten dollar bill to Commander Hugo as they disembark.

+3 on Science mode... That lets you learn the tech tree and the parts without being swamped right out of the starting gate (as in Sandbox) or having to deal with the additional hassles of Contracts and funding (as in Career).

Good luck on your next try!

Thanks much!

Spiffy images are progress of a sort I guess... (I kid, I kid... this looks awesome.)

Is there a mod that shows EC generation v. EC consumption? (Double points if it details sources and sinks.)

Just curious... Why does the authority limiter on the HL-10 rudder go into negative numbers?

Apollo - Charles Murray and Catherine Cox Focuses on the engineers and Mission Control. Roving Mars & Carrying the Fire- seconding TenKey's recommendations.

Case for Mars is as much speculative fiction as it is science fact - a great deal of what Zubrin presents a given, isn't. He routinely treats laboratory curiosities and benchtop proofs of concept as mature technologies ready to integrate into flight hardware and ship off to the launch facility.

It's improbable, but not impossible - we simply know nothing about the substance created. (Presuming that contrary to the critics something actually was created.)

No. Over the decades Soyuz has been pretty well optimized for used as an LEO taxi.

Well, even if it is stable (or metastable) - the sample is microscopic in size and thus pretty hard to find among the debris

That's as much about streamlining the process of disseminating [tactical] intelligence information (I.E. the USAF wants assets that it controls rather than relying on three letter agencies or DoD bureaucracy) as anything else. (So does the USN, the USMC, and the Army - but they're looking to smaller subsonic drones as they lack the business case for expensive hypersonic drones.) The DoD itself is taking a different tack, their goal for about the last twenty years has been quick reaction launches sending a bird (or birds) to orbits chosen to concentrate on a given area. Though really, as the SR-72 emerged from an "unsolicited" proposal, and thus smells less like any kind of widespread interest and more like pork or a pet project to me. (With the caveat that it's often hard to discern what's going on from the outside...)

This is something worth emphasizing - WRT to space vehicles, FAA is (currently) charged with protecting public safety and has no authority over mission assurance. This schism is deliberate, as theory is (was) that the nascent commercial launch industry would be killed in it's cradle if subjected to 'normal' regulatory oversight. It's also based on the presumption that private spaceflight participants are willing and informed as to the risks.

Your reference designs weren't available when I started working on Norge, and I didn't really study them until today... Either Norge is going to be heavily rebuilt, or retired in favor of a new craft after she's re-created her namesake's flight and before my circumnavigation attempt. I've learned a great deal on her shakedown cruises. They seemed a better choice at the time for the rough field landings contemplated as part of my operational concept.

In their currently crowded schedule, that's going to be a pretty tall order even without their habitual rightward slippage. Either way, my original point stands - CatastrophicFailure is way out to lunch... SpaceX's current hardware experience (to say nothing of their operational experience) is in no way comparable to where NASA stood when they first started considering a circumlunar mission in August of '68. Granted, SpaceX "stands on the shoulders of giants", but NASA had a tons of experience (Mercury, Gemini, all the Apollo engineering tests and flights cited above) when they started to even consider the possibility - and then had Apollo 7 under their belts when they committed to it. In another group (which includes actual, NASA and commercial, rocket scientists) the general opinion is that 2018 is aggressive even by the standards of SpaceX's normally extraordinarily optimistic PR outlook.

Respectfully, you missed kerbiloids point - which is that, as of today (when the announcement was made), all of the requisite hardware is unflown and largely untested. Complete and utter nonsense. When the Apollo 8 mission was proposed to go around the moon (in August of 1968), the Saturn V had already flown twice. F9H hasn't flown even once. While the Apollo CSM hadn't been flown manned yet, it had flown the Little Joe 2 mission, two suborbital flights, and one orbital flight. (Not to mention the thermal vac testing - including two manned runs, culminating in the 177 hour long 2TV-1 test.) Dragon 2 has flown exactly one flight - the pad abort test.

The same way they were confident that Falcon Heavy would fly in 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017? The history of SpaceX is a tale of big pronouncements accompanied by a steady and ever increasing slip to the right.

I use a ton of mods... Relevant here though: Kerbal Joint Reinforcement, MechJeb, Near Future Solar, Firespitter, TAC Life Support, and Airpark.

Landing gear/landing legs... People have made adjustable gear/legs before, but haven't needed 'em before and haven't kept up. That was mostly tongue-in-cheek though, in reality Airpark would (AIUI/AFAIK) would actually lock it into place. Though, more seriously, absorbing landing shock someday would be nice, especially when your vehicle spawns a meter or two above the runway.

When I was in the Submarine Force, we didn't roll upside down, but right after we left port we did dive and ascend at steep angles and put the rudder into the stops at random times to see what shook loose. We called it "angles and dangles". I may or may not have once nearly broken a bone riding the length of the missile compartment on a piece of cardboard during angles and dangles. Anyhow, now that DSEV is released and Angel has copious amounts of free time ( ), a suggestion - self leveling landing gear.

The key word in his post is "make" - One Playstyle To Rule Them All.

The Norge and her crew conducted a difficult practice landing in the mountains West of KSC. Many lessons were learned, not the least of which... there were a couple of significant design errors. (Details in the mission reports thread.)