Xeldrak

Well, in this case... I hope you had a great time playing KSP. Bye!

I'm thinking "Terminator 2"...

@PakledHostage Yeah, I read that to while looking up blunted reentry vehicles. However, I was remembering the Curiosity EDL trailer They also hat an offset center of mass, but were actually using thrusters aswell. Might be, that this is only needed on mars, due to the thinner athmosphere (wildly guessing)

Hm...you should post some goals beyong "how long can you go". Maybe dv or altitude....

As fas as I know, a regular capsule is actually quite stable during reentry - although I think in some cases they have thrusters on the upper side for corrections. Well, a radiator has to be on the outside of the ship, wich would be a problem if you have an allround heat shield However after reading a bit on wikipedia, it seems that you can keep a sphere aligned by moving its center of mass out of the geometry center of the sphere.

I five 50 cent to some poor, homeless guy... $0.5 remains

Yes, I'd go with a rescue mission. And while you are at it, try to alter its orbit, so the ship reenters the atmosphere - and don't forget to make pictures of the reentry!

Well, I can come up with three problems: 1. I'd say reentry is a problem - a sphere would have to stable position while entering the atmosphere, it could start to rotate along any axis. 2. Also, because of this, you would have to cover the whole thing in a heat shield - no place for windows, docking ports or hatches. 3. A sphere IS the most efficient geometry body in term of much space inside/least surface. And in space your main problem is usually to get rid of heat - you need surface to radiate it off. A spaceshuttle that can't open it's cargo bay would have to abort mission, because the radiators are on the inside of the bay doors.

Well, as the other have allready told you, it realy depends on the size of your lander. When landing on the Mün, the LV-909s are usualy a good choice. They are very efficient, only nuclear engines are more efficient in vaccum (the are on par with aerospikes and poodle). They are also very short, which is great when trying to build a lander. Here is a picture of one of my really basic landers that should get you to the surface and back to orbit:

Allright, I've come up with my own Orbiter, the Chemrock Orbiter 1b. It comes with an action group to deploy it's solar panels and satellite dish. It also has Chutes, a docking Port, light for docking in the darkness and quite a lot of RCS fuel, since I think with .21 RCS has become much better. I tired to make it simple and good looking, also the sat-dish marks the ventral side of the Orbiter wich correlates with the RCS-controls. I hope this make docking a bit more intuitive. ~2500 m/s dV with a powerfull engine It comes with it own two-stage launch vehicle, with a fully functional abort-button. It's the most simplistic design I could come up with, that is powerfull enough to get the orbiter reliable into space. ChemRock 1b orbiter I realized that one week of building, one week of voting might be a bit long. I'm thinking about cutting it down to 4 Days building, 3 Days voting or something like that. Also I hope a craft that is more interesting than the orbiter might get more attention.

Geh auf imgur.com - da kannst ganz einfach deine Bilder hochladen. Wenn du dich nicht anmeldest, musst dir halt die url merken, wenn du dich anmeldest, kannst auch alle bilder ganz einfach organisieren.

I'd go with the usual. -Get over 30 km -Get over 100km -Get into Orbit -Get into circular orbit -Get into non-inclined, circular orbit Then maybe Mün, maybe docking. I think 15 years is old enough that you should not tune down your expectations Long term target should be the mün. The first week, I startet very KSP-session by shouting "Mün or bust!"

Have a Tzar

While I think they are (probably) misguided, this Nuclear-Munch-Symbol is awesome!

Well, you can't slow down without changing you apoapsis or periapis. They are directly determined by you velocity. That is also why when you completely kill target speed, you are on basicaly the same orbit.

Also, so eine Mission hab ich schonmal gemacht, mit 100% stock, zwei rovern, vier science packages und satelliten. Zu aller anomalien fahren ist extrem nervig, ist aber durchaus machbar. Die satelliten bräuchten noch ne mapsat-schüssel dran um zu kartografieren. Eine Trägerrakete für dein Ding da sollte also problemlos machbar sein - meine war sogar ohne aspagus....

I never heard "onion staging" before, but it'd differentiate between the style it describes and aspargus. When aspargussing you try to seperate as fast as possible, i.e. when you have burned enough fuel to empty two tanks, you drop em. Anyways, here is my contribution, the Kerpollo D - 912.17 metric tons at liftof, capable of a rather extensive duna mission.

Could you describe more what you had in mind?

It does however have a very cool name

How does baby sherlock possibly trump Data? ...anyways...

Well I feel almost honored that someone would make an hour of commented video just because I dared him to go to the mün. Still, please post screenshots, by now we have over 20 entries - I can't spend one hour on youtube, checking if your calculated your points correctly. And while I trust you guys, I feel bad if I just copy and paste your stuff, it feels careless. So, considering that your mission didn't went so well, Calvin, do you want to try again with pictures for us or shall I just add your 83 points to our list?

I'd go with John P. Stapp Riding a rocket sled, experiencing up to 45 G, when the common knowledge was, that you would die at 18 G. Suffering broken ribs, retina detatchments and all kinds of trauma - all voluntarily.

Just making sure noone is asleep...

Submissions are closed! Start voting here! Please post your vote here! Since it seems like Bob's Guardian Angel abandoned his thread, I will pick up the challenge. As some of you might have noticed, the stock crafts in KSP are horrible for the most part. So I challenge you to come up with a replacement craft. There are a few things required for you submission: You craft MUST NOT use any mods - 100% stock You need to show us at least one Screenshot You need to make you .craft file available Otherwise your submission will not be accepted. And there are a few things you should consider -Your craft should be easy to use, simple and safe - stock craft are mostly for new players, they should not be overwhelmed by 10 action groups that must be used at the right time. -Your craft should be an example new players can emulate. It should demonstrate design techniques. What ARE action groups? What's aspargus? Can linear RCS boosters be of some use? These are questions new players could be able to answer by testing your craft. -If you use Action Groups of have any special commentary to make, use that neat, new description field in the VAB. It's a fine line between encouraging a new player with something new and overwhelming him - try to walk it. How is this going to work? You will have exactly one week to build your craft and post it here, this way even the working people of us should have enough time. Post your entry here with at least one screenshot and its .craft file. Also be so kind to drop us a few lines, about your craft? What were your thoughts on the design? Why is it a good stock craft? Sumissions will be closed at Saturday, 4 August 11:59:59 p.m. (GMT+0) (in 7 days) After submissions are closed I will set up a poll somewhere (since I can't edit a poll to this thread). Should we have 8 or less entries, you can vote for one week for you final winner. Should we have more than 8 entries, we will hold a three day pre-election. The top six of this election will then go into a four day final election. The winner will have bragging rights and...maybe I'll come up with something, who knows. What craft are we doing this Week? This week we will take a look at the stock orbiter: You will notice, that the engine assembly is...creative at best. They are hold in place by tailfins (!) which realy is nothing to emulate. Also, this orbiter hat six landing legs?! RCS is all over the place. Try to come up with something better. Contenders ThePsuedoMonkey - Improved Stock Orbiter Bean - Orbiter 2b Xeldrak - ChemRock Orbiter 1b Spartwo - k-3 John FX - Orbiter_2 Grim187 - Orbiter 1B JamesClonk - Dragonfly Orbiter 2A AmpsterMan - Dargon CTV Poll You can find the poll here. Please vote! Also be so kind, to post who you've voted for - so the threat gets bumped up once in a while. The poll will close on Sunday, 11th August 11:59:59 p.m. (GMT+0)