Raptor9

In 1.1+ some parts do appear overly washed out from the VAB/SPH lighting, like the AV-R8 Winglet. But otherwise this is still running good. If you play with the orientation and the viewpoint, you can find a perspective where the parts aren't washed out.

No need. The lift fans have tweakable buttons in the VAB/SPH that allow you to toggle wing segments on and off around them. Nertea thought of everything! And I agree, it does blow everything else out the water.

In a word: Genius

@Zawmbbeh published a pretty-good-looking B-52 on KerbalX yesterday. Might be something to look at.

While this is true, it will also, more importantly, reduce your delta-V as well. A high Isp engine won't necessarily mean high delta-V. This is where the mass of the nuke engines and associated liquid fuel will hurt the Ion engine's performance. The 'Dawn' will still move a large & heavy ship really efficiently, but it will move it very little. That depends on the fuel cell output rate as well . You would need 6 Fuel Cells to continuously power a single Dawn engine at full throttle, or a single Fuel Cell Array to power 2 Dawns under the same conditions. While a Fuel Cell Array's Elec Charge rate per ton is only 92% that of the Gigantor XL solar arrays, that doesn't include the mass of the fuel tanks and LF+O needed to power the Fuel Cell Array. A single Gigantor XL powering 2 Dawn's IMO would be way less mass for the same effect, and wouldn't have a finite fuel source. If you were trying to go to the outer planets, than solar energy drop-off would be an issue of course... Generally, my rule of thumb is Ion engines are good for small payloads in the inner planets (maybe even Dres if you have enough additional solar arrays), and nukes are for large payloads and/or outer planets (due to solar energy drop-off). Not saying everyone should adhere to this, but it's how I manage all the variables of interplanetary craft design (mass, delta-V, solar energy, power consumption) between nukes/ions. Play however it's most fun for you. Why put nukes and ions on the same ship? Because you can.

That's an interesting chapter, telling it in 1st Person from a Kerbal's log. I think it's fitting that you used the 'Skyhawk' to deliver the missile, the fact that it's based on the F-5/T-38; and DCS: F-5 Tiger is supposed to be out this month.

That is awesome! I like how the drop-away gantries become flush with the launch tower. We don't steal ideas around here; we borrow and sometimes improve upon.

The truss is actually two sections, with the third section being the Habitation/Laboratory module. Forward truss launched first, aft truss launched second. The truss joins together via a quad of small docking ports, and is rock solid. The solar array arms do flex a little bit when the kick stage is at full throttle, but they hold steady. The Hab/Lab section is launched via a 'Thunder 4' rocket since it's a lot less mass than the rest of the EV-5. Technically, the Hab/Lab module could be considered a payload of the EV-5, since the 'Drifter' can autonomously move payloads to Duna ahead of the crewed missions. But I still consider it part of the EV-5 ship itself, in crewed mission configuration.

Just so no one thinks I've stopped concept development...I've been alternating between development/testing and my career save. In my career save, I have four major mission programs ongoing: 1) constructing 'Pioneer Station' (ISS-alike in LKO); 2) Serial Minmus landings for contract and scientific objectives using my LV-2A reusable lander to/from 'Wernher Station' in Minmus orbit; 3) Establishing 'Frontier Outpost', my first Munar surface base; 4) Building an EV-3 'Clipper' in LKO for my first Duna expedition. I know most of you don't care about my career save, but undertaking these large-scale operations is revealing some previous unknown deficiencies in some of my craft that I will fix in the near future and republish to KerbalX. On the actual development side of my house, my major project is bringing my HLV-6 'Warthog' Duna landers to publish-ready status. Early prototypes of these Constellation-inspired landers were first seen in my Red Planet Rivals video, but weren't very practical at the time due to high part counts and poor building techniques on my part. If you've been frequenting the Constellation Mission Packs Discussion thread of late, you may have seen the following preview images, but the craft themselves are already slightly different in appearance after refinements I've made. The first image is the HLV-6A cargo lander, which includes the Duna Ascent Vehicle and an assortment of rovers. The current version I'm testing contains an SRTG (Surface RTG) RTG-powered rover, MPC (Mobile Power Cart) solar-powered rover, ER-2 'Ferret' rover, and an ER-3 'Mongoose' rover. The embedded ISRU equipment generates propellant for the DAV, which will transport the three-Kerbal surface expedition crew back to the waiting EV-4 'Longship' transfer vehicle. The second image is the HLV-6B habitation lander, which will be what the crew rides down to the Duna surface, and live and work during their stay. It includes an airlock, research lab, and several upper deck dining areas/hangout cabins with a balcony type common area for downtime. Both landers have space for KIS containers if a player chooses to utilize that mod for bring additional equipment. EDIT: I should note that I'm concurrently looking at ways to tweak/improve my EV-4 line of craft files to ensure those are also brought up to currency. As I conduct a Constellation-style test mission using these landers, this will be an additional point of refinement I'll be looking into to ensure the EV-4 'Longship' is brought up-to-date with the rest of the interplanetary architectures.

I'm aware of that. What I was pointing out to Majorjim is that I have an "Orion" capsule analogue, but only the crew vehicle itself is analogous to an element of the Constellation program. The launcher I have it mounted to for LKO launches is closest in appearance to an Atlas (or maybe even a medium Delta). It's not intended to be a replica, but something that works well and is relatively economical in career mode for LKO altitude orbits. I should clarify that any Constellation-inspired craft I build are not intended to be 100% accurate in appearance or function. I do imitate and replicate general concepts and mission architectures, which leads to a lot of similarities.

I've had the Mun fling a few unattended/unfocused satellites outside the Kerbin SOI into solar orbit. Now, before anybody makes the obligatory remark, I know how to plot orbits that don't encounter other SOI's (like the Mun's); the satellites were placed there due to contracts requiring their orbits to be at those orbital planes. I knew eventually the satellite would have an encounter with the Mun's SOI, but if the contracting agency wanted their satellite there and they paid a lot of funds for it, who am I to argue...I have a space program to fund, right?

I agree. As we discussed, a fairing-based aeroshell is too aerodynamic (even with drogues and airbrakes) and the lander just can't bleed enough speed before it hits the ground. But I really don't want to deal with the additional part count of something like a radiator panel-based aeroshell. What I've started doing is testing an EDL without any aeroshell. The fairing/aeroshell on the HLV-6's are retained during transit for any aerobrake captures, but after the deorbit burn, the entire aeroshell assembly is jettisoned. The lander is stabilized by a drogue chute in the back, and without an aeroshell, it has enough total drag to slow itself down enough that it won't start tumbling in the lower atmosphere, and the Duna atmo is thin enough not to encounter any heating. Are you talking about the rest of the Constellation program? I already have a series of craft analogous to most Constellation elements. EV-2C 'Runabout' = Orion crew vehicle (although it's not launched on an Ares I, something more akin to an Atlas) LV-3A 'Bullfrog' = Altair Moon lander and Earth Departure Stage (early version) EV-4 'Longship' Block 1 = Mars Transfer Vehicle and associated NTR propulsion stages (needs a long-overdue update/refinement pass after Duna landers are finished) 'Titan 4C' = Closest thing to Ares V, but actually modeled like the SLS Block 2 Cargo HLV-6A/B 'Warthog' = Mars Cargo/Habitat landers (testing/unreleased obviously) The one element I'm not really interested in doing is the Ares I.

Now that my new cargo lander is pretty much done, I constructed the new habitation lander tonight. It comes with an airlock module borrowed from my Mun base infrastructure, plenty of research and habitation space, and even an upper deck dining and hangout area complete with a "porch" or balcony of sorts to enjoy the Duna landscape. What you see in the picture is 217 parts, but I still need to add a few items such as science experiments and power generation equipment like solar panels and/or fuel cells. Of special note is an embedded fuel distribution system using fuel ducts. I have 5 fuel tanks (3 in the back, 2 in the front) feeding six engines, with a slightly asymmetric center-of-mass. The fuel system allows the forward and aft engine clusters to run at different limiter settings for CoT/CoM balance, but still flame-out at the same time. Further, if a couple heavy KIS containers were added to the forward cargo platform, the forward engine cluster thrust would need to be increased to compensate for the center-of-mass shift. No problem there, all engines still have access to all fuel.

Your designs always have a "cool" factor in them. I like the look of that plane at 21:00 (the XanaduStar Mk5 I think?). Airframe layout looks sort of like the bombers from Independence Day 2.

I have to admit, Dres is becoming an increasingly attractive prospect to set up a large-scale mining, refueling and research infrastructure. Especially since it's gravity is slightly less than the Mun, meaning one could easily adapt any Mun mission architectures to Dres operations with practically no changes; you just have to get them there. Heck, Ike's gravity is almost identical to Dres, meaning the same could be said for Ike. Ohhhh, the possibilities...

To reiterate what @FullMetalMachinist, @Dedjal and @MircoMars said, try the in-game tutorials, click on the book-looking "KSPedia" app button and read some info in there, and if all that doesn't help you, check out Scott Manley on youtube. I've been playing flight sims since F-19 Stealth Fighter on MS-DOS, and I have to say orbital mechanics are not intuitive at all when compared to previous flight sim experience. But once it "clicks", you'll be stranding Kerbals on Duna in no time.

@KerrMü I remember that lander from the first photo, the DC-X looking rocket, from your old signature. Nice to see it's still around. Does that XKS Bellafonte have 84 ion engines?? Or am I losing my mind? Good lord! EDIT: I need to go to Moho, I've never even attempted it.

1. ~285 when fully assembled as in the graphic; if you add an LV-3D crew lander (which has two surface rovers), it doubles it to about 570. 2. Yes. 3. I don't use reaction wheels except to keep space stations stabilized. Even though the truss is sturdy thanks to a quad of small docking ports multidocked together, any craft this long is going to flex somewhat. Even with a completely symmetrical craft at low thrust-to-weight ratios, the center-of-mass is going to flex slightly off center. This requires a very slight but constant monopropellant to keep the craft on course. That consumption adds up after a series of long ion "burns". Having said that, when I did a test mission with a LV-3D lander and EV-5 Hab/Lab on the front, I made it all the way to Duna in back with only half of my mono used up. But I don't know how other people may control their vessels (aggressively, lots of maneuvers, etc), so I wanted plenty of reserve to control the EV-5's attitude. 4. Kronal Vessel Viewer. I think it's still only rated as 1.0.4 compatible, but it's mostly usable through 1.1.2. A few parts like the AV-R8 winglet don't render properly in 1.1+ however.

I like that version of Altair better, that's what I modeled my LV-3A 'Bullfrog' after. In other news, I've made a lot of progress on my 2.0 version of my HLV-6A 'Warthog' Duna cargo lander. What you see in the picture is 316 parts, but that will fluctuate as I tweak and refine it. The SRTG is the analogue to the FSPS, and the MPC is the analogue to the DIPS. Even though the FSPS was supposed to be a proper fission reactor and the DIPS was supposed to be RTG-powered, the SRTG is RTG-powered and the MPC is purely solar. The aft ramp drops and the SRTG repositions and plugs into the cargo lander to power the ISRU process, and the MPC can also do the same thing on the other side of the lander.

I actually just finished this design last week and posted it on KerbalX. It's completely usable (and buildable in orbit), but is pretty expensive when used in career. However, it is reusable, so that mitigates the cost somewhat; refueling it with more xenon is still pricey. It was designed as a payload tug to support Duna expeditions, but I'm sure it can be used for other missions (asteroid missions as @DMSP suggested in my thread).

Nice. I'm building mine in my Career save now. It's not following the order the ISS was assembled because I'm letting contract requirements dictate what I send up next (the "Expand Station" contract type). I only have the inner truss segments at the moment, the ones with the large radiators. But it'll get there eventually. I'm also learning I need to change some of the modules' external attachment points to allow better assembly with the EMU's.

Oh I see, I actually deleted that image from my photobucket (and after a search, my actual computer as well) when I made the new one. I wanted to make a fresh one after I made some updates to the Station Module series. Didn't realize anybody actually wanted to use it as an assembly roadmap. Even so, the one that exists now provides the same information at pretty much the same orientation...just without gaps between the modules.

Not sure I know what you're referring too. The graphic of "Pioneer Station" has all the modules listed to assemble it as such.

Already posted, on the first page OP (VAB>Space Stations expandable section). Really, you can build a station however you want. The station graphics are only there as examples if you wanted to build a KSP version of a real-life-inspired station.

Thanks. That would certainly be an application to test out in the future. Meanwhile, I'm building 'Frontier Outpost' in my Career save, the first time ever doing something like this outside of a simple test mission. In doing so, I've found a few deficiencies to tweak to make these base modules and LV-3C cargo landers work better. Namely, I had so much fuel left over in the LV-3C's, I'm thinking each could make another trip to low Munar orbit and back again without refueling. That being the case, I'm retrofitting each LV-3C to a common standard (BM-H Hab and BM-PL Lab LV-3C's had different docking port configs than the smaller modules on the lift racks), and putting a docking port on the bottom of the BM-H and BM-PL's. This will enable the LV-3C's to be reused in more ways. The architecture would go something like this: 1) 1st base module selected will launch on an LV-3C cargo lander on top of a Titan 3M rocket. (very expensive) 2) LV-3C returns to low Munar orbit after dropping off 1st module on Munar surface 3) 2nd module will launch on a LITE reusable upper stage on top of a "Lightning" medium rocket (less expensive) 4) LITE upper stage delivers 2nd module to low Munar orbit and rendezvouses with LV-3C 5) LV-3C delivers 2nd module to surface base while LITE upper stage returns to low Kerbin orbit 6) Simple payload rocket ('Thunder 3' most likely) launches 3rd module with over-fueled upper stage to vicinity of LITE upper stage's orbit (relatively cheap) 7) LITE rendezvouses and docks with 3rd module, tops off fuel supply, and then returns to low Munar orbit to rendezvous with LV-3C again (If ISRU system is in place on Munar surface, LV-3C is refueled and reused as many times as necessary) -----or----- 7) If LV-3C doesn't have enough fuel remaining for another round trip to Munar orbit and back, and ISRU doesn't exist to refuel it, 3rd module is launched on a fresh LV-3C/Titan 3M and process begins over again I'm still working on a Mun surface ISRU infrastructure in the form of a family of interconnecting rovers. The previous effort was just too high in part count to be practical. Even so, I'm planning on having a mining/refinery site 5km away from the surface outpost to keep the part counts low in each physics bubble. Fortunately, since the existing LV-3A/LV-3C landers have small docking ports already on them, they're already set up to support refueling operations.