blizzy78

Step three will be quite a challenge if your lateral velocity is high and thrust is low. You can't always kill your lateral velocity in an instant.

I wonder what the point of calculating the maximum payload capability of a lifter is. Wouldn't you just build your payload as usual, then design a lifter capable enough and put it underneath?

must... resist... the urge... ah well, here goes. Let's hope I have it right this time Assuming asparagus staging, your thrust will be lower than before when a stage burns out. Given enough drag, it will slow you down, thus lowering your velocity. TWR doesn't necessarily have to be below 1 at this point.

It's rather Gigameters.

Err. Somehow I must have been confused and been mixing things up. Guess I need more coffee.

Monkeh, just a minor correction: I think you are talking about acceleration instead of velocity. If your actual velocity is dropping during ascent, then you have bigger problems. Edit: Nevermind this post. As others have stated correctly, velocity may drop just fine when staging. Shouldn't be dropping too much, though

When I figured out how to do rendezvous and docking (separately at that time), that was quite an a-ha moment for me. Obviously that was before I created my in-game tutorials (see signature.)

While it's unlikely that I will have any use for the mod, I do think it looks pretty slick. Also this is a good way to make the game more accessible. Great job!

That would depend entirely on his roll orientation.

Well the 90 degrees is only in the up/down direction. Since orbiting Gilly needs only a very low velocity, you have lots of time to decide your ascent angle, then rotate another 90 degrees by pitching up/down. If all goes wrong, there's still quicksave

First of all, Gilly has a ridiculously low gravity, so you can go straight down instead of a more angled landing without using too much fuel. You can use this fact to your advantage: Since your craft thinks it is a rover, pointing the nav ball exactly at the horizon will position it so that the top is at the top and the bottom is at the bottom. In other words: The 90 degrees you need to rotate lands you exactly on the horizon on the nav ball. You should be able to figure out how to rotate so that up is up and not down Edit: In your screenshot you're rotated almost correctly. Just pitch up by about 35 degrees and you're all set.

ohhh, Gadget looks really awesome... I love him!

Kerbal Crew Manifest can do it when you transfer crom from one part to another. Perhaps the same can be done here when targeting a docking port.

Embrace failure, it is essential to learning.

I'd suggest you try and see for yourself what you can do with using only RCS. It's quite capable.

Nope, it's Fustek's.

But is that a realistic trajectory you'd normally use to land?

No. It is only about your velocity. Orbiting at higher altitudes just means your orbital velocity is lower.

Wouldn't you rather go and design a lifter that is able to lift a specific payload, given its mass? I'm curious as to why you need to find out how much mass your lifter can lift after it's being designed.

I've added a tutorial about how to build a complete rocket using a calculated cluster layout.

I have some problems with the RD-0146-N2. For testing, I've used a simple craft: - RC-001S Remote Guidance Unit - 2x FL-T800 Fuel Tank - RD-0146-N2 On launch, I've activated SAS and launched straight up. No touching the controls. This is what happened: - Liftoff as usual. Specfic impulse of the engine starts to rise. - At 200 m, specific impulse starts to drop from about 190. - Until 5400 m, specific impulse drops dramatically to about 56. - Specific impulse starts to go up again. - At about 8700 m, the engines goes out because the fuel tanks are empty. The problem seems to be in the engine's atmosphere curve: atmosphereCurve { key = 0 451 key = 0.05 300 key = 1 188 } If I comment out the line with 0.05 atmospheric pressure, the craft performs MUCH better and continues to climb until flameout at 260 km. Is the engine supposed to work that way? If so, it is not really suitable for ascent because of the sharp drop in the middle of the curve. Also, the RD-0146 has a similar curve, but the increase at the end is not as steep, so the drop in the middle should not be as much.

Great, thanks.

I haven't tried renaming using the mod yet, but it would be cool if you could use it to change the vessel type, too. Paired with the queued renaming that would be really helpful.

I've just updated the calculator to allow for radial engines. Those can help to squeeze out the last bits of thrust to match desired TWR. Of course they are optional and the maximum amount can be set to zero if so desired.

Cool. And you can edit your thread starter to indicate that your question has been answered. :-)