Xraybroadcasterfromvenus

Indeed ASnogarD, start small! Get those satellites up around Kerbin. Then, try getting a satellite around Minmus or Mun. Then, a Kerbal in orbit... and so on. If you take small steps and follow a natural evolution, you'll get there! As for large things in general, not just fuel tanks: yes, the kerbals don't seem to be very good welders. In fact- their metal seems to be the equivalent of butter-soaked waffles. To give you an idea- that one-piece fuel depot was so heavy at launch, it was JUST holding together on the platform. As soon as I fired the engines, the central column would collapse- I had to install a few boosters around the top tanks just to take the weight off of the second stage, until some fuel was spent.

Being a relative newbie, I've not advanced very far yet- sticking to LKO. After a mun landing and return, I'm constructing a big station in preparation for further trips. One part of it however, is a refuelling node with 7 large tanks, which I brought up in one piece, stock only. One tank as a central column (with a small tank and an RCS tank sticking out on each side) and 6 around that. For logistical reasons however, I did use most of the contained fuel to actually get it up there; It arrived with only the central tank filled. I can tell you, the logistics of all the fuel lines needed to feed the launch vehicle was quite something. Once all was docked and dandy, I realised I didn't actually have a tanker yet. So currently I have a lovely empty refuelling station that I can't fill yet

You'll know they have been playing KSP too much when you see them repeatedly pressing F5 during launch.

Procyon- you are indeed correct, the quads did have struts, making a single dock worth 17 parts. I'd say your conclusion would be correct, if it weren't for my actions today: I've now hooked on an additional few modules, surpassing the parts count lost by the ports. The original lag really was very, very bad- enough to wonder if something was wrong. I can only suppose the quads developed minor differences during installation and subsequent loads, thus causing significant stress. It matters little now though, I've switched to using the big ports, and am using a little mechjeb trickery to get the connection angle right. Endlesswaves- that would be great. One can only dream of the fun it'd be to put together a 300-part mothership and taking it to the stars.

Made an astonishing discovery- there was in fact a construction on the station that was CAUSING the lag. For some strange reason, the quad docking ports were the culprit! I've modified all the sections of the station by replacing the quad ports with the new big port, lobbed 'em all into space, put them together, and the lag is back to normal levels. Very odd indeed, as the quad ports were perfectly identical and should've docked up properly. The question still stands though.

Found an option in mechjeb, under the smartass/surf section, that allows rotational angles. So if both ships do this, one can somewhat reliably dictate the docking angle. Is there any other way though?

Greetings! I've been putting some objects of non-descript scientific value up in space, and have been docking them together with the intent of it looking like a space station. However, as the docking ports do not seem to lock at a certain angle, I've been using quad docks, so I can at least choose how to rotate the parts at 90 degree intervals. However, using this quad port setup is quite a hassle, and with the release of the big docking ports I thought I'd ask for some advice from the professionals. Should I stick to my quads, or switch to the big ones? -Is there a way to get the two objects perfectly lined up on the ROTATIONAL axis? I'm not talking about lining them up for docking, I'm talking about getting them both to have their bellies in the same direction, if you will. -I've seen a lot of gorgeous space stations out here. How did you guys line it up properly? -Is mechjeb capable of doing this somehow?

Greetings and salutations, fellow kerbonauts! I've purchased KSP a few days ago, after gleefully launching my kerbals up into space in the demo for a full day. I think I've passed the tests, as I've managed to land a terrified Bob on the mun and got him back home in one piece, and I managed to dock a bunch of awkwardly shaped objects of non-descript scientific purpose together while orbiting our lovely mudball. Being the ambitious lobber of things into orbit that I am, I now started construction of a multi-piece space station- using quad docking ports as my OCD does not allow angles smaller than 90 degrees. Also I felt the need to reinforce the main structures with struts. I've docked three parts so far, and the whole thing is starting to lag as soon as I approach visual range. This, of course, not only reduces fun, but also makes it quite difficult to dock anything else. I'm assuming this is due to an increasingly large parts count- I roughly estimate it reaching 1000 parts, and I'm not even halfway yet. My workaround so far is using mechjeb to handle some of the docking, although he struggles with the quad ports. My question is twofold: 1. What can I currently do about this large parts count lag, aside from, obviously, keeping part count down? I've tried decreasing graphics settings but this has little effect- as physics and parts are CPU-based. 2. What has the future of KSP got in store for large part count lag? Will it be drastically improved, or am I best to forget about my ambitious plans and stick to smaller ships for now? For the record- core is 4GHz, 8GB of ram, using a Gforce GTX 560 TI, running windows 7 64bit. Thanks in advance for your feedback, I'm looking forward to contributing my bit of insanity to this community.