capi3101

Not much last night; landed the Raven 7 with a crew of 4 successfully at the KSC Runway (after about half a dozen attempts, of course - I should probably work on a better passenger ferry). Took on a satellite contract over Minmus; launched a Ballista 7 from the KSC Runway to fulfill that and sent the payload on its way while the plane began its cold soak prior to re-entry. Probably going to land that sucker tonight. Might get to work on that better passenger ferry tonight...been thinking about re-purposing the Vulture 7 resupply ferry design for that...

Docking, as has been repeated ad nauseum on this thread already, is essential to the success of a space station. Two mods to consider (if you're not adverse to mods) are RCS Build Aid (useful for setting up RCS systems so they don't produce adverse torque - and incidentally helpful if/when you decide to start using spaceplanes) and the big one: Navyfish's Docking Port Alignment Indicator (which you can use as your sole instrumentation for the final alignment, approach and docking - it's that good). I dock a lot (my space station around Kerbin is used as a staging area), I use both, and I rarely have problems with the actual docking bit. That said, I did earn my stripes with stock docking first... I would definitely recommend a modular station design. If you're in career, get to the Clamp-O-Tron (not the Jr) before you launch your first part, then launch a core module with ports on all six axes (port, starboard, fore, aft, zenith, nadir). A training guide that is dated but still potentially useful is the Salyut Programme tutorial on the wiki, in particular its steps in building a replica of the Mir space station (does a good job of it except for the antenna assembly on the Kvant-I module). The Mir tutorial was written before the MPL was added to KSP (like I said, it's dated), so you might try swapping out Hitchhikers with a lab or two every now and again, should you decide to build a replica of your own. A lab with science parts is a potentially quite beneficial use of a space station.

You're preaching to the choir there...got the exact same reaction from my wife the first time I put Kerbals down on Ike......

I've seen this - turn SAS off and your craft will sit there and spin like a top until you turn it back on again. Very annoying right after you've undocked something and it starts spinning. Could be a related bug.

Okay...so it's not that you can't steer, but that for some reason the standard attitude autopilots for the OKTO2 aren't working at all, right? You can steer manually, so you've got electrical power, you're not in timewarp and your craft is not too heavy for the amount of thrusters you're using; we can cross all of those off the list ipso facto. SAS on, RCS on, won't steer automatically... Might be a bug with your local instance of KSP. I haven't heard of Squad changing SAS functionality to where it wouldn't use RCS on its own.

Brought the passengers and crew of Straight Flush 7 back to the New Horizons space station over Kerbin safely. I then did an assessment of where my KSC staff was experience-wise, with the goal of getting as much of them up to 3-star status as quickly as could be managed. I came to the determination that Straight Flush's crew needed to come back down to KSC to get their certifications updated. There were no craft available at New Horizons, however, that could bring the crew back to KSC, so to that end I did a re-design job on both the Condor 7 and Raven 7a spaceplane designs to include a probe core for unmanned operations (there being nobody on the ground at KSC at the moment). The Condor, an old Twitch/Whiplash design, didn't fare so well, but the upgraded Raven made orbit and a successful rendezvous with the space station easily, offloading some of its excess oxidizer and monopropellant and the station while taking on a little more LF. At this point I've performed the craft's de-orbit burn and she's ready to attempt re-entry and landing, which is where I plan to pick things up later today.

Making sure I understand the problem: you've got a craft with an OKTO2 probe core, SAS on, RCS off, and can't steer, is that right? If so, then you should be advised that the reaction wheels were removed from the OKTO2 probe core in 0.90...you can't steer with one-of-thems alone. You'll either need to add one of the SAS parts to your craft or pick a different probe core to get it to work the way you want to. Irked me the first time I tried to use an OKTO2 by itself in 0.90...

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/47863-0-90-0-Precise-Node-1-1-2-Precisely-edit-your-maneuver-nodes It's a mod that lets you key in exactly how much delta-V you want to devote along the three axes (prograde/retrograde - radial-in/radial out - normal/anti-normal), giving you a tighter level of control over the maneuver nodes than you ordinarily have. It helps lower the amount of fuss involved in pulling one of the maneuver widgets "just right" to get the maneuver you want to make planned out. It's still up to you to make the burn as planned (unless you've got a very precise autopilot - read: Mechjeb - to do the burn for you as well).

Had one of those ninety-minute nights last night; used it to land a Vulture 7 resupply plane after it had delivered a load of fuel to the New Horizons space station, and then launched a new habitat module for New Horizons. Not much to be said about either flight, though I was very happy to land the Vulture. The first three Vulture missions didn't end all that well; I at least managed to save the plane on the third mission, which was then that I had the notion that what the design really needed was larger landing gear. I'd futzed around with the design and launched it to re-supply the station. Night before last I went to land it and FAR underflowed, plowing the craft into the ocean after a nice, beautiful arcing ballistic dive. Fortunately I'd quicksaved prior to the de-orbit burn; last night I did the de-orbit first thing, and this time around she felt like flying. Overshot KSC 09 on the first approach but I was able to get turned around and made a successful landing on KSC 27; first time in a while that nothing broke either during takeoff, during re-entry, or upon landing, so I was quite happy with the design changes overall. Probably going to keep that plane as my main resupply craft until I gain access to Mk3 parts.

Aw crap...what's this "ducted" area ruling business? In other news, the design I mentioned in my last post turned out to have dynamic lateral instability up in the Mach 2-4 regime when it was low on fuel - something I suspected. But, I did have a Reaction Stabilizer installed and it turned out to be sufficient to keep attitude control until the plane regained stability closer to the trans-sonic regime. Shuttle-style (i.e. high AoA) re-entry also helped, I think. I'll have to post some screenies for y'all next opportunity to see if there's anything else y'all think I might be able to improve.

I'll second the use of PreciseNode - I use it my own self. Key thing about it is that the minimal amount you can adjust a node by is .01 m/s of delta-V; depending on the target, that can still cause wild fluctuations in the final altitude of an Apoapsis/Periapsis/whatever. I hear that it works best when you've got another mod capable of making those kinds of precise maneuvers automatically - and the only one of those I know about is Mechjeb.

Wanderfound had one the other day - I believe it went something like "pod, probe core, solar panels, nuke...Mk3 Liquid Fuel tank. Produces a ship with 13k delta-V, which is reasonable for a sun-dive. Alternatively, you can get a ship with about 7-8k of delta-V and use a bi-elliptic transfer; leave Kerbin heading for an apoapsis out towards the orbit of Jool. A year later when you get there, burn retrograde until you're rewarded for the contract. Then get back into a stable orbit and figure out what kind of burn you need in order to get back to Kerbin - a mod like Protractor will help with this last bit. Doable? Yes. Worth it? Not ruddy likely...

I've been away from where I could answer these last few days...my apologies. Okay - I'd say right after a fresh reload of the craft as a rule. You're also right - the CoL indicator does not work with FAR installed, which is a real shame; to be honest it's the only thing I don't like about FAR, though if you know how to interpret the data FAR gives you then you don't really need it. That said, it'd be a nice thing to have; I have a design right now that I suspect is going unstable when the craft is out of fuel (and I need to test it to see if that is indeed the case). Alright, thanks. Okay...so when I go to design a FAR spaceplane, I usually try to shoot for ~1800 in rocket delta-V. That's usually just enough to get me into orbit with some wiggle room in case I botch my ascent profile - which probably happens more often than it should. Based on these numbers, your plane has got 1,581.59 m/s of delta-V, about 220 short. So yes, that'll get you sub-orbital; you need just a little more to make the final transition to orbit. Your options - either add another four tonnes worth of LF+O (the equivalent of an FL-T800) or use a different rocket with a vacuum Isp of no less than 335. Myself, I'd shoot for the higher Isp rocket; it's generally easier to swap out an engine for one that's more efficient. And by easier I mean that it usually causes less of a change to your overall drag profile. Of course, your options would be quite limited if you're picking between stock rockets...Terriers, Poodles, Nervs, Rhinos and Aerospikes are the only stock rockets with a vacuum Isp that high, and the ones that are the same size as the one you've got aren't renowned for their overall levels of thrust (the Aerospike, maybe - but it still only gives 175 kN of thrust and it doesn't gimbal, two big downgripes). I don't know if B9 would have another option available or not.

Had a reasonably busy weekend; Jeb arrived in Minmus orbit (finally) aboard Free Bird 7 with Bob and a group of tourists along for the ride. With an extra seat aboard Free Bird, Jeb went ahead and conducted a rescue of Burris Kerman, a pilot who had managed to get himself stuck up there. While Jeb was undergoing the orbital rendezvous ops, Berris and her group of tourists and KSC engineering staff visited the surface of the Mun, having docked Straight Flush 7 at Munport 7 and taken the station's Buggy on down for flag-planting ops. They likewise had an extra seat so they went ahead and picked up Lucilla from the Mute City 7 base; contrary to expectations a great deal of Mun surface and flag planting contracts had not been received and Lucilla was begin to show signs of dementia from her extended stay on Mun, so it was time for her to come on back. The Buggy was re-docked at Munport and then Straight Flush un-docked from the station. Straight Flush did not have enough fuel to head back to Kerbin so a fuel pod for the station was sent up, extending the ship's visit there by an extra day. Orbital rendezvous ops for the fuel pod was ongoing at the same time that Jeb was making his final rendezvous with Burris's pod, which made for a busy evening. Burris was successfully rescued and Jeb went ahead and steered Free Bird in for docking ops at the Minmusport 7 base; Bob joined Kacella in operation of the base's science lab there and meanwhile Jeb is awaiting the arrival of Minmusport's Buggy, after which he'll take some of his tourists down. Straight Flush, meanwhile, is headed back to Kerbin at this point, the emptied fuel pod having been delivered to Munport. On top of all of this is Valentina's history-making sun-dive attempt aboard Sundiver 7. She and her crew of two scientists and two tourists successfully left Kerbin's SOI, becoming the first Kerbals to do so, headed out towards a bi-elliptical transfer near the orbit of Jool. They will reach periapsis in 27 days and make the final boost out to Jool's orbit at that point, and then in a year or so they'll be making the sundiving attempt. I'm concerned that I may not have given them sufficient delta-V to return to Kerbin afterwards...and Val has not had much luck with tourists in this career save...but I'm still somewhat hopeful for success. As long as I don't blow up that nuclear engine they're using...

I fly FAR my own self, and I do a fair number of rocket launches in addition to planes (my tech is still low end, so I can lift light stuff via plane but still rely on rockets for payloads much above ten tonnes). I pretty much agree with Streetwind's assessment of your rocket. I'll add that those AV-1Rs on the upper stage don't steer, so they don't help you keep your heading at all, and then I've found that the Delta-Deluxe Winglets aren't really the best choice for steering fins since it's only a little piece of the fin that actually steers. My suggestion would be to go with Tail Fins, or (barring that) AV-R8s, both of which are fully-deflecting surfaces. Those will help your steering out. FAR these days voxelizes your craft and analyzes its drag profile from that data; a long, skinny craft will generate less cross-sectional drag than a wider, shorter craft. From that, I might suggest losing the SRBs entirely in favor of another lower inline stage, but before I'd do that I'll ask how far up the tech tree you are - do you have access to any 2.5 meter parts? You'll have Modular Girder Segments for sure (as they're Starting Tech), and can use those to make engine clusters for moar power on the lowest stage if necessary. Your flight profile might also need some work - here's what I do: launch and stay vertical to 5 kilometers, then turn eastward only by about 5 degrees. Hold that until 7 kilometers, then turn another five degrees. At 9 kilometers, slowly pitch at 5 degree increments until 15 kilometers, when you should be at 45 degrees or so. Now, if you've maintained stability - and a slow pitchover is the key there - check your time to Apoapsis. If it's 35 seconds or more, slowly proceed to pitch down to 25 degrees above the horizon; at 45 seconds or more, pitch to 10 degrees above the horizon; at 55 seconds or more, pitch to the horizon and keep burning until you reach your desired Apoapsis height. Suggested mods - Procedural Fairings (much nicer than the stock ones; using those here would compensate for the un-evenness of the Mk1 Inline Cockpit's Canopy) and TAC Fuel Balancer (this one would help with the idea of shifting fuel back into the upper stage tank; you just set it to "Transfer In" on both Oxidizer and Liquid Fuel and set the pump rate to maximum, and fly. TAC will take care of the fuel handling for you for as long as you need it).

The old rule of thumb used to be 15 tonnes per Turbojet (a.k.a. Whiplash engine) for the souposphere at takeoff; to the best of my knowledge, it still applies. If you can't get above 300-400 m/s within that limit, it's definitely time to look at how much drag you've got going on. Can we take a look at some screenies of your craft, purdy please (preferably a side shot, top down shot and aft shoft in the SPH)? We might be able to give you more specific advice if you do.

Okay......hmm. I'll admit I'm not familiar with the B9 engine parts. What can you tell me about the rocket engine you're using? Specifically - *What's the takeoff mass of the plane? *How much of that mass is dedicated to rocket fuel? *What is the vacuum thrust of your rockets? *What is the vacuum Isp of your rockets? And while we're at it, what does a typical ascent profile look like for you?

Last night I finished making preparations to launch the Sundiver 7 with Val at the helm. After a successful launch, the craft was docked to New Horizons with its core booster stage still attached; its excess fuel was drained into the station's fuel storage tanks and then it was decoupled and de-orbited for later retrieval. Val picked up the three sun-diving tourists waiting at the station as well as two of the newly hired scientists and decoupled from the station. At this point I need to read up on how to do a sun-dive (i.e. get into a suborbital trajectory around Kerbol) for less than 4000 m/s of delta-V...the ship has just shy of 7,000 delta-V but I have to be sure I can get everybody back before I mash go on the button. I know it generally involves a bi-elliptic transfer but I don't know the particulars. And Val has not had a good history with tourists in my career game thus far.

The Wikipedia article on them is pretty short though - I'll just copy and paste it in: Here's an article on Dutch Roll, also from Wikipedia, and then the page I linked in my last post also talks a lot about the Dutch Roll mode in particular. That's if you're interested in more on that subject. I guess I called it the wrong thing - its yaw damper, not yaw dampener. But it's basically a flight computer system that sends the necessary signals to the control surface to counteract unwanted oscillatory motion, which is what the SAS modules do in KSP (hence my prior recommendation). I've added SAS to my planes that have had static stability/dynamic instability, and can confirm that it does help matters (with a minimal amount of change to an overall design to boot).

Finished my docking and rendezvous of the Raven with the New Horizons space station last night; crew transfer was successful. Re-entry of the Raven was generally uneventful. Landing sure as hell was - Val tore the engine off the back; I've come to the determination that I should really just be using larger landing gear with the Raven, and I'll be swapping them out prior to the next flight. Meantime, Jeb's Free Bird (a Raven) will probably just have to stay up there as one of my ferry fleet. I'll want to bring him back down eventually, of course... I realized after I'd landed that I'd loaded a spare flight computer into the Raven to install on the Straight Flush, Berris's ship docked at New Horizons. Guess what I forgot to do. #facepalm. Meantime, Val did bring down a bunch of tourists safely and rounded out many contracts, putting my program well into the black again. I went ahead and launched an unmanned Mun Buggy to head to Minmusport so the crew there could make surface excursions if they needed to; I also have a Minmus outpost contract that the craft should be able to fulfill on its first landing, and temperature surveys to run. Val being the only Kerbal left at KSC at this point, I spent the rest of my night designing the Sundiver 7, the craft that should be capable of taking some of last batch of tourists into a suborbital trajectory with Kerbol (knock on wood). I'm hesitant to send Val up with a group of tourists at this point though...things have not gone well the last three times she's acted as a tour guide...

What were the conditions under which you took that simulation screenie (#14)? Speed and altitude. In any event, here's the deal: you've got a plane that has got positive lateral static stability but negative lateral dynamic stability. You can read about this here; those "Oscillatory Dynamic Stability" graphs about a third of the way down the page is what FAR simulation study shows you. The actual values of the graphs don't matter nearly as much as the tendencies. The closest equivalent to a "yaw dampener" in KSP? I hate to say it, but either a PID controlling mod, or (barring that) a SAS module as a last resort. The other option is to increase the vertical tail moment (put those Cessna Starship wingtips back on - completely ignore what I said before - but make them as thin as you can, and see what that does).

Loss of yaw stability is generally a sign that you need more tail, but I'll defer offering that up as advice until I see the revised design; I seem to recall saying something about "having enough tail" in just my last post...which, since you're now having yaw issues, is kinda embarrassing. Stability analysis then - do a set of graphs and derivatives for Mach 2.5 at 17.5 k. Also run a simulation once you've got your numbers, plugging in "5" as your initial value for beta for the same altitude and speed. Post the results as screenies; let's see what's going on. Make sure to run the numbers wheels up.

Didn't have time for much of anything last night owing to weather in my part of the world. I proceeded with my plans to do a crew transfer at the New Horizons space station, sending Valentina and Bill up along with Cerya (a tourist) and three newly hired scientists aboard a Raven 7 spaceplane. Got as far as orbital insertion before I had to call it a night, though I was delighted to find my ascending node with the station coincided with the apoapsis and I was able to do both insertion and plane alignment as a single burn. The Raven has a tendency to guzzle gas on the way up leaving little left for orbital ops, so this was a fortunate occurrence indeed. The plan now is to let the plane and station orbit around Kerbin a few times to close up some distance, then make a final small burn for rendezvous and docking. Once the plane has docked with the station, Val will offload Bill and the passengers and pick up a group of four tourists whose itineraries are complete to take them back down to KSC. I did manage to collect on an orbital station contract through the Raven's launch; replaced it with a contract to do some surface scans on Mun. Munar mining operations have not yet begun; once they do, though, and I can keep Munport supplied with relatively inexpensive amounts of fuel, I should be able to fulfill the terms of that contract easily. Meanwhile, Jeb is still on his way out to Minmus, Kercella's still processing science at the Minmusport lab, and things in general are ongoing. Program's got about √300k after hiring the three scientists, who I need to get trained so I can send them on to Minmusport at the earliest possibility.

Busy weekend - began by making some adjustments to the Vulture 7 design for more fuel loading missions to New Horizons. The de-orbit of the first of two missions was disastrous, though I'm certain what happened there was a noted bug occurring between B9 Procedural Wings and FAR (I'm still in 1.0.2 just yet) where FAR throws daggers at B9 and decides its wings suddenly can't generate any lift whatsoever. The plane went into a steep dive; I had full engine power and was pointed prograde, yet couldn't pull up. The same thing happened on the third mission on Saturday, and yet I was able to pull that one out without tweaking the plane's design. I did manage to cook the rudders off the plane on the third mission during re-entry, but I was able to successfully land the plane (sans sufficient yaw authority) on the plains next to the KSC Runway with no other damage. To save fuel during the refuel missions, I went ahead and let the planes orbit as many times as necessary to catch up with New Horizons, which effectively bled off the time remaining for my ongoing Minmus-bound missions. Straight Flush 7 with Berris and her group of tourists arrived first and performed a maneuver to put them sub-orbital around Minmus, fulfilling the itineraries of her passengers. Bill arrived next to begin his rescue mission of the Bad Idea 7e, with Minmusport 7 arriving last; the space station achieved orbit and Straight Flush became its first visiting spacecraft, dropping off Kacella (who'd hitched a ride aboard) to begin running the station's laboratory. Meanwhile Bill began his rescue op - which involved attaching a KAS Connector Port to the outside of the stranded Bad Idea 7e and a winch to the exterior of his own craft. The op was a success, the winch cable connected to the port in docked mode and the tourists were offloaded from 7e (I've heard about folks "liquefying" their Kerbals to pipe them around ground bases...not sure if anybody's ever pseudo-beamed them over a "fiber-optic" cable before...). Valentina collected her crew reports and a surface sample before boarding the rescue craft and Bill went ahead and collected his own surface sample, storing it in the hitch-hiker with the tourists. Before launching, Bill went ahead and drained the remaining fuel from the 7e, the cable was unplugged and Bill removed the winch from the outside of his craft. The ship was then sent to rendezvous with Minmusport. There were no docking capabilities with Bill's craft, so he EVA'd the winch on over and dropped off one of the surface samples for the station's lab prior to departure. Bill's craft and Straight Flush then departed Minmus for Kerbin, with Straight Flush headed back to New Horizons and Bill heading straight in. Both retreival missions were successful, and the fulfillment of the contracts raked in about √500,000; I used the proceeds to hire three new scientists, which I plan to send to Minmusport once I've got them trained up a bit. I do need to haul one of the tourists back up to New Horizons from KSC, Valentina's available for missions again and four tourists have finished out their itineraries and are ready to come back down, so a Condor or Raven flight is on the agenda for this evening.

You've gotten good advice from tetryds and FourGreenFields already, so I'll be brief. I'd start by moving the nacelle and main wings forward if you can do so without compromising the stability of your craft - you want to start by trying to smooth out the green curve there between the end of the cockpit and the leading edge of the wing. If that makes your craft unstable, I might suggest losing the Cessna Starship wingtips; it looks like you've got plenty of tail as is. You might also try adding a bit of strake from behind the cockpit up to the leading edge of the wing, something that will give you a bit of cranked arrow. Finally, since you're using B9, I'll ask what you're doing with the wing thickness. If you've left it as default, I might suggest leaving it thicker at the root but thinning it out towards the tip (you'd have to adjust the control surfaces to match as closely as possible). You'd be amazed at how much just doing that will reduce your wave drag area. Best of luck.