Torham234

The idea was that you would not need to complete a full circle, because by the time you were approaching KSC, it would have closed the gap by some. It should work, since we always need to travel more that the kerbin equator, because the KSC keeps moving away from you. ( around 170 km per hour, by my calculations). That would give you roughly 340 Km extra free distance per 1 hour of flight time. Since the challenge is to land at KSC after going around the planet, that would still qualify, but you would be travelling physically shorter distance. I did do some tests this afternoon, and I was getting higher surface speeds going 270°. The snag would be that you said the atmosphere moves with Kerbin surface, that would mean any advantage gained from going counter rotation would be obliterated by the increased drag ( although if that was the case, I shouldn't have observed increased surface speed going 270°). But I think this point is moot by now, since Teirusu managed to do the trip on less than 300 fuel. ( witch is what I was trying to do).

more science parts like cameras, more antennas and satellite dishes, measuring instruments, telescopes

I simply failed to remove the alarm clock plugin before doing the challenge. I have not even touched it (and I cant see any way how it would have aided my attempt ), I promise I was just thinking. If you went in the opposite direction to the rotation of the Kerbin, wouldn't you have to travel shorter distance ( since the KSC would be travelling to meet you, rather that moving away from you). If you do the challenge at 90° you need to do around 3900 km. the equator of Kerbin is 3770 km, so travelling towards 270° heading, you would only need to do around 3640 km (depending on your average speed)...

Do I still qualify with my old entry?

I don't see the point here. We are lucky to have access to the Alpha version anyway. As far as I am concerned we are all beta testers (or indeed alpha testers).

I am by far most excited by the 2 new RC probe cores and the map filtering function.

Only on Mün.

That will take at least 10 000 000 years, that is if you are a super advanced thinking computer...

TLDR the whole thread, but I did read one interesting article the other day... http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/09/warp-drive-plausible/

Kerbal engineer redux gives you handy readout on the costs of each of the stages, making the task of working out the total price of the craft much easier.

One I can think of is Larry Niven's Protector. The missile skirmish between 2 ships took several months.

Congrats. I think the wandering albatros has got a bit too much wing, but if it flies, now you have a working prototype to iterate on. I think the reason that you couldn't pitch up with the previous model is that the control surfaces couldn't keep you pointed upwards. If your nose goes down in high altitude no matter how hard you pitch, there are usually 2 remedies. - more speed. This one is difficult, since you would need more engines, and that would mean more weight and that means more fuel and rinse and repeat. - more control surfaces at the front. I see you don't actually have any control surface in the front half of the aircraft. This is my lightweight SSTO . I have the rotating canards at the very tip to help me pitch in high altitude ( the satellite at the front is the payload, disregard that) And this is my regular jet. Notice you can mount the winglets on the front of the wings as well, and they work just fine. The game automatically inverts the function so they pitch in the appropriate direction.

I love spaceplanes, and planes in general. I think I have spend more time building and flying planes than I did building and flying rockets in KSP. Edit: And to help you out a bit: - Start small. Smaller SSTO are much easier to make than big ones. - Use robot probes for control to keep the weight down. - use 1 centralized turbojet - 1 turbojet can get anything up to 18 - 20 ton spacecraft into orbit. - Aerospike is very heavy. You can get away with 2x LV909, if your craft is light enough. You can mount the to the sides of the 1 turbojet for very balanced thrust. - with 1 turbojet, you do not need dedicated jet fuel tanks. It can happily sip a little of the fuel from the main rocket tanks. - you do not need ram intake spam. I can get a small SSTO to orbit with just 2. every intake is essentially a huge aero brake, the more you have, the bigger problem you have flying fast. Efficiency is the key. After you get a small SSTO to orbit, you pick up a lot of the tricks and the bigger ones will be much easier to design/fly. Happy flying.

You mean you can actually drive THROUGH them??!! I always considered them solid objects and I never even tried to bump one of them....

witch part mod are you guys using for the cool looking satellite dish arrays/ more satellite parts?

I don't think that is the problem, as the stuttering occurs for me in everything - engines, ambient sounds, music, it even stutters in the VAB. It does not seem to be dependant on the complexity of the rocket, as it stutters even with super simple craft ( 3 parts), at least for me...

I finally understand this mysterious setting!! Hopefully it will get rid of the constant sound stutter I am experiencing... Edit: No, stuttering is still there...

This is quite a cluster F%^$ bomb. Aren't these forums minor friendly?

The biggest problem for me is figuring the exact delta v for each stage, so that I use the least amount of fuel and not create any debris in orbit. Just recently I have managed to send a probe to eve, with an automated lander module, and the whole rocket was 17.9 tons at the launchpad. It must have took me about 5 "simulated" launches just to get the exact ratio of lower - upper stage correctly as not to leave debris in LKO.

shelve them until the career mode is implemented

My mission to Eve. I like to play as efficient as I can, and I thought this mission went very well. Mass at launchpad : 17.96 t Cost: 17.97 M$ TWR: 1.93 A detail of the packed probe and the rocket before launch Staging went exactly according to plan, attained stable LKO and ready for escape burn Aerobrake manuver at 66 km, took 4 orbits to attain 150 km circular orbit. Lander probe detached from the main satellite and de-orbited using 4 separatrons. The main satellite stayed in orbit to relay the information from the lander probe. Surface probe landed intact and is sending data back to Kerbin. Overall I was very pleased with the whole mission. It didn't create any discarded debris at all ( all of it burned in the atmosphere ) and the weight at the launchpad was very reasonable.

The range depends on how many landings you do, as it takes a decent amount of fuel to climb to the cruising speed. On paper, The total range of jet is around 2050 km + another 900 km with the fuel tanks, so if you just fly in a straight line you could do somewhere in around 3000 km. The Circumference of Kerbin in 3769 km, so the jet can potentially fly 3/4 around the Kerbin.

I like to stage at strategic points, so that no jettisoned piece stays in stable orbit. Its like a minigame for me - how to design a good rocket and a probe AND make sure no derbis is left floating anywhere on the course of the journey. The only thing that slightly irks me is that some of my satellites do not have the capability to deorbit themselves when they become obsolete.

It also helps to pack avionics package on the plane. If you have a good yaw control (bigger planes can use 2 -3 vertical stabilizers) the autopilot can usually save the plane from uncontrolled spin, if you throttle down fast enough. It will start to veer from side to side, but the autopilot will stabilize it to give you enough time to react.

They don't usually do that, try checking if every part has symmetry, its easy to forget one small strut that imbalances the aircraft, if you have multiple jet engines, one always flames out first, make sure to throttle down when the engine sounds like its going to die, I also used only one punctuation.