iEvermore

Thanks for the replies. I am pointing at the center or mass. I keep the pivot locked once I'm aligned. I'll try pulling instead of pushing the roid tonight to see if that changes the outcome. Thx

Good day all. To start, I'm really enjoying this new patch. Loving all the new parts !! So last night I was able to build a ship, get myself off to an asteroid, and grapple it with relative ease. However, after I realized my 3 nuke setup was not enough to move the rock into orbit within a reasonable amount of time, I sent up another less efficient powerful one. Once I got everything setup, I realized that each time I engage the engine, the rock slowly starts to spin. (Same thing happens with nukes, just on a much slower scale that I didn't noticed right away.) I targeted the center of mass and made sure I was dead on the pink dot, (Like in docking) but it still spins. After I realized I could warp time to stop the spin, I kept trying to pivot my ship bit by bit to counter but no luck. Anyone have any suggestions? I see people have been doing it successfully with smaller rocks but the principals much be the same. I'm cannot remember the size of the asteroid right now, but it's much much larger than the large tanks we just got. I'm using the new large single engine we just got since the nukes were not powerful enough. I'm pushing, not pulling the asteroid. Thanks for your time.

I have a similar design and had a similar problem. (That's a lot of payload fuel mind you...) What I did was set up a scaffold system coming from the top of the top lifter tanks and then strut the scaffold girders to the payload and lifter at multiple points. Once you get high enough you lose the scaffolding due to stage asparagus separation you should be ok because the lifting thrust will no longer be as powerful. If by chance that doesn't work. Add two midsize engines with small tanks to the payload with a fuel line to the lifting stage to save your fuel in the payload. If all else fails, you can share your craft file and I'l fiddle with it for you or you bring that puppy up in 2 parts and assemble in orbit. Docking ports are much stronger yes, However I prefer the clean look of separators, especially on ships I have no desire to dock. It's just personal preference.

I have a few lifters that I can use for most payloads. However in some cases it's better to build your lifting stage around your payload instead of under as rryy mentioned. Sometimes too tall is your problem.

Throttle down. That's the problem. Hit "X"

Pics please. Also, seems your doing this manually, just confirm you are not using Mecheb. Make sure you check where your center of mass is. If it's above the half way mark that's your problem. In VAB, take off the stages up to where you normally get the problem, (ie: if stage 3 is your problem, click and drag off only stages 1 and 2), then check your center of mass, it will be different than checking your craft as a whole. If so, adjust the ship to bring the center of mass below the half way mark of the ship. Also, try some winglets. I'm sure COM is your problem though. Happened to me enough.

Docking 2 ships together was certainly one of the hardest things for me in the beginning. The first successful one I jumped out of my chair in excitement ! I enjoyed landing on the moon but the docking overshadowed it a little. I was much more thrilled with Duna landing since it was the first ship I built from the ground up on my own and got it to another planet. I went a little crazy with the F1 button on that mission.

Awesome!! That's what it was! I engaged all engines and it had no problem!!! Thanks for ur help guys!

Ok so having the 40's inactive during the landing is messing it up?

Oh yes spins at least 3-4 times around before I have to take over. Could it be because I have engines on it that aren't being used? I have 4 nukes and 4 l 40's. I only use the 40's when I'm going to take off full of kethane. Perhaps that is what's confusing it? I have the no problems landing this ship manually. Just the specific targets are hard to do.

Just replaced my files with those. Attempted it again with no luck. Same problems.

I'm using 2.0.7. I got it off space port.

Hello all, I seem to be having trouble with mechjeb. I can land my ship on duna no problem manually and the "land somewhere" function works. Problem I have is with land at target, it seem to under cut the landing prediction, tries to correct, and then sends the craft into a spin in 100km orbit. I abort and re engage it but it does the same. Any ideas what it could be? My ship is in 100 km orbit when I star and the target in almost on my orbitable path. Should I try from a higher or lower orbit? Not sure what the problem is....

Sweet!! Nicely done! Have fun.

Worked perfectly. Only cost me 450m/s to adjust pernapsis. Much better! I'll work on minimizing it. Thanks for all your help.