Patupi

Wow, a lot to think about. Right now my Tylo lander is, like yours, a standard High Gravity Lander for Laythe (no planes in my ship More due to my poor history with them), Duna, Eeloo etc... but it gets one of the main mothership boosters docked on the underside for the descent. The High Gravity Lander on it's own has a Kerbin TWR of 2, 4267 delta V, and it's engines can just see around the nuke engines of the mothership booster when attached, so the combined ship has a TWR of 1.58. Should get it down OK. Have to use TAC fuel balancer as since it's assembled in orbit normal fuel lines aren't an option to make sure the booster is used up first. HGL: HGL with Booster attached: I have three of those boosters on the mothership as part of the fuel stack, the stack able to be dumped one tank at a time (it's arranged with seven in each layer, so one dumped from the center, then pairs around the outside 'hexagon'). Each tank has it's own ASAS to minimize wobble during turning this beast. It's still slow. But I'm using one of those boosters to slow the Tylo ship down, one to slow the Eve lander during descent, and the other will be used as a tug during various missions. I'll have to gradually rearrange the stack as I go and the boosters, as they have a probe core and RCS, can be used to do that job too. Here's a snap of the final ship assembled in high orbit around Kerbin. As you can see, the Eve lander... that ungainly mess on the front... is a lot to deal with. Much more so than the HGL tucked in behind it that I'll use for Tylo. I'll take a look at the savings of coming from Jool to other bodies, but honestly, I'm going to save so much dumping the Eve lander first I think I'll stick with that. (EDIT: Oh, and as to aerobraking... well, I'm not sure it's going to do well in that. I don't think I'll be aerobraking at Eve, instead doing an insertion burn. Leaving Jool till later means less drop tanks in the main stack and less wobble, thus less chance for spontaneous unplanned dissembly during such an aerobrake. )

I still don't think any aerobraking is a good idea. Is there any way to make an aerobrake 'light'? Plus the way they're set up they can't burn during the aerobrake, right? The shield is on the front. Thus they won't get as good a use of the oberth effect anyway. I still say a slow burn with minimal stress on the frame is best.

So you're doing a Grand Tour with no kethane refueling? Cool, I've been designing a ship for the past couple of weeks for that. My current rough estimate is a total of maybe 20,000 dv total, less with small craft doing some of the shuttling. IE send the mothership to Jool orbit, then shuttle landers from there to moons with a small nuke tug. Have you estimated Delta V for your ship yet? I mean with staging drop tanks included in the maximal design you listed. I'd be interested to see what you've come up with. Do you have a schedule for where you're going and in what order yet? I haven't planned mine out other than going to Eve first so I can loose that mass! The Eve lander weighs a hundred tons on it's own! Right now my ship has 9000 dv without allowing for drop tanks being ditched and loosing the Eve lander early on. Me, I'm trying to be purist and attempting to carry everything with me and no refueling from Kerbin. Gonna be tricky certainly! (EDIT: I like the idea of the multi-purpose SSTOs, with the rapier engine able to get off Laythe on jet mode, and Duna on rocket mode. What is it's Delta-v on rocket mode only? I'd have thought it'd waste a fair bit on take off on Duna, but then I'm notoriously bad at planes in KSP )

You're welcome. I'm a bit late, but here's a pic of the assembly I've used in my AAR, managing to connect girders to that probe body under the LP2 so the girders extend sideways out of the nice, handy slots in the base when unfolded. Had to do a dogleg with the girders to get my ground docking to work for the two things you see docked to it in that pic. A little convoluted, but it works.

To be honest it wasn't the 'hollywood' feel lacking. It was more an odd style of the flow. In hollywood movies you get used to flashbacks, sometimes the whole movie in flashback, starting at the ending. This was jumping around a lot in the first half, sometimes to the point where you couldn't tell what had happened when. Plus I seriously think they over did the radiation induced 'flickering' and monitors jumping in and out. But yes, overall the basics (script, acting, special effects, and continuity) were well carried though. That's what I meant by 'not living up to it's promise'. It seems that with their budget, with the script they had, they did really well... then kind of went weird with it. *shrugs* It was very thought provocing though. Thought a lot on it afterwards, which is always a good sign.

1100tons? In one shot. Cool. I've just finished assembling a 1200ton ship in orbit for an attempt at a grand tour (long delayed) but to do that all from the ground? Yikes! Mine is over 800 parts and is currently doing about 4 to 5 frames a sec. With all those wings how slow is that thing? EDIT: Here's a quick couple of pics of the assembled 'Titan-1 Mothership' Even with no staging it has nearly 9000 Delta V, but with ditching the huge Eve Lander on the front, and with ditching drop tanks I'm pretty sure this thing can do the grand tour without kethane or other refueling methods. It has One Eve lander, two small Low Gravity Vacuum Landers (LGVLs), One High Gravity Lander (for Duna, Laythe, and with a booster for landing, Tylo), four small drop tanks on the front for either LGVL or HGL, three boosters in the main stack that will get used for descent and as ferries (they have nuke engines that are used in the main ship when attached) to take smaller craft around to moons so the Mothership doesn't have to jump around as much. Apart from Mechjeb it has no non-stock parts, but I am using Editor extensions, AGM, alarm clock, crew manifest, enhanced Navball, select root, texture replacer (with pimp my kerbals mod), and the clouds and citylights mod. Not using any autopilot functions in Mechjeb, just using the display screens, especially the landing predictions! In testing my Eve Lander is rather prone to slight slopes so I need to pinpoint the landing spot precisely. I've managed to get within 100m of target fairly reliably now at least using Mechjeb's landing predictions.

Maybe he means jamming? IE, alternate writing chapters?

Flicking back and forwards between the two? Landing must have been tricky, watching the one up in the air while you were landing the first one to make sure it didn't drift into something... oh wait... that last picture

Weird. We watched it last night. It was... very well done. Wouldn't say it was 'very good' overall. The jumping back and forth in time early on, the constant static (and most of it was viewed through the ship's on-board cameras) got really annoying. Yes, it tried to represent things realistically, and did that very well, but it seemed odd, and (I won't go into details. No spoilers) the ending seemed abrupt and they didn't seem to finalize things, even with Mission Controls few post commentaries at the end. A lot of stuff left hanging for me. Worth watching? I'd say yes, but I don't think it lived up to it's promise quite.

Looks good, thanks. That's more understandable. I have tons of trouble sometimes wrapping my head around describing some stuff in space. Lack of definition of 'front' or 'rear' when you've got multiple things docked. Confusion between what you're talking about sometimes when everything is 'ship' *chuckles* Find myself re-writing things a lot to make it more understandable. It's damned tricky.

My suggestion was to minimize the burn. IE, go with a long, slow burn, with the reactors at 10%. You won't get the advantage of the Oberth effect as much, but as long as the fuel ship gets there OK they'll be fine... IE, as Czokltemuss just said, they really should check on it again

Let me guess. Thermal blanket/micrometerite shield ripped off and tore the solar panel off with it? Love the detail you put into this KSK, the feel of tension in mission control is palpable One thing, when she was flipping around to dock with the module in the bay I got confused. Nothing suggests she actually docked with the port, so when it says 'Then, with all four thruster blocks firing majestically against the starry blackness, she pulled away from the empty booster' I wondered why she was pulling away, rather than going towards it. Maybe say something like 'A thunk transferred through the craft as contact was made' ? Just to suggest a division between forward then reverse movement?

I'm not sure I agree with partial. Any aerobraking is going to do quite a bit of stress on the hull, and with the ship in the state it's in... I'm not sure it could take it. I say minimize the stress as much as possible.

Thanks for putting in my completed episodes and kudos on you for keeping up with this. I mean, this is a heck of a thing to keep up with. Just looking through the list you have now, let alone all the uncompleted tales... that's a lot to keep tabs on! Thanks on behalf of all us budding writers! We really appreciate it.

Love the way this is progressing Czokltemuss! As to the poll, I say go with an insertion burn, but plan it for a long, slow burn. Forget max utilization of the Oberth effect. As long as their refueller arrives fuel isn't too much of a problem. If they use the engines at 10% thrust for a longer burn there is less stress on the hull, less risk of overloading the engines, and less stress on the crew! The Ike intercept idea is cool, but given what they've been through another tricky maneuver, with the planners of said maneuver already stressed out... I'd say stick with simple, even if it does use more fuel. Of course this all assumes the fueller is still on course. I assume they'll check on it's status before the burn, right? (EDIT: Oh, and as to sending a lander down ahead of Proteus then letting the main ship sling shot around and then pick up the lander... You'd have to be really picky. Just a standard de-orbit would be a quicker route because it would be sliding deeper into the gravity well, but it depends on the altitude Proteus is going to slingshot past is. My guess you wouldn't have enough time to land and take off again for a rendezvous. Another option is a powered orbit down. IE accelerating downwards as you go in, then aerobrake. That would need a lot of fuel during descent, but would mean you could pull ahead of the Proteus' orbit as she swings past.)

He's Chocolate Mouse? Does that make me Deja Vous? 'Av we not met somewhere before Monsieur?' We'll be getting Omar Sherif next!

No, they find an alien space saucer, strap it between the fusion drives, and then warp to Eeloo. Duuh!

"About to pull a Czok"... That sounds painful. Dental procedure or a description of a hernia? Though not sure either of those could kill someone! Seriously, you don't think I'm going to do something despicable like... spoilers?... Me? Naahhhh! Never happen.

I think it was more the stability triangle. Three legs sounds as if it should be stable, but generally isn't that good. I usually go with a minimum of four, and more usually six landing legs spread wide. With three the distance from center of mass to the edge of the flat on the triangle formed by the legs isn't that far. It can be easy to tip if a nudge comes from the wrong direction.

1926 AD: Koddard test fires first liquid fueled rocket. 1978 AD: Wernher Von Kerman finally invents wheel! All Kerbin rejoices! 1979 AD: Wernher Von Kerman already worried over polution from automobiles.

Journey Home When the engines had died down the crew sighed. True, acceleration had barely topped a fifth of Kerbin gravity, but they were used to free fall conditions. As Jedwig stretched and unbuckled Rodsy got the tools out again to unlock, flip around, then rebolt the acceleration couches. Jeb looked at his tablet and pondered. Currently the course they and KSC had worked out, and they had just performed, would get them home in a little under two hundred and forty days. But... "Hold off on that Rodsy." Jeb said as he checked his data on the tablet. "First, we're gonna need them like this for braking at Kerbin. Even aerobraking will be better to put the EFT in tail first rather than us, so the g's will be in the same direction. However..." Jedwig came over and peered at Jeb's calculations on the tablet. "Oh, really? Thinking of a deviation are we?" He said with a grin. Rodsy quirked an eyebrow at the pair and Jeb sighed. "Well, we have a fair bit of fuel left. I know, I know!" He said, holding hand up to forestall Rodsy's retort. "We'll be in hibernation the whole time. What does it matter, huh? Well frankly I don't trust the things and want to stay in them for the least possible time. Plus, this minimizes the time difference. Right now we're more than five hundred days out of sinc with Kerbin's time frame and I'd just as soon not get much more out of touch. Even a year or so difference will make a difference when we get back." "Worried you'll be out of style Jeb?" Jedwig cut in with a smirk. "I can see the headlines now. Jebediah returns to Kerbin after successful KSC rescue mission... but what's this? Oh NO! Shock horror, he's wearing last years ties! Someone call the police!" "Ha ha, very funny." Jeb said dryly. "Still, I'd prefer we get home as fast as possible. Don't worry, I'll leave some spare for LKO maneuvering, but I plan on shifting our Kerbolar orbit down to intersect Kerbin on the other side of it's orbit. Actually, from these plots I reckon we can get an intersect a little over a third of the way round Kerbin's orbit, so, maybe shave thirty to forty days off our trip. Hang on, let me do some calculations." He put his plot through the computer and watched it calculate time of intercept. "Hmm, not bad, shaved forty seven days off. ETA is now 195 days. I plotted it just after we leave Jool's SOI so we'll be awake a tad longer." Jedwig chuckled. "Of course that is purely accidental, right Jeb?" Jeb looked up, and saw genuine humor in Jedwig's face. He paused, but eventually smiled back. "Oh definitely. Pure luck. 'Any similarity to other kerbals living or dead is purely accidental'. " Rodsy looked back and forth between Jeb and Jedwig. OK, half an hour ago Jeb was furious with Jedwig, hit him and threatened him... now they were joking as if it had never happened. And they were joking about Jeb's fear of Hibernation?!? Rodsy would never understand those two! *** Jedwig blurrily awakened, at first thinking they were home. Then he remembered the plans they'd made just prior to going in hibernation at Jool. He shuddered a few times involuntarily (hibernation was nasty, there was no two ways about it!) and looked over at the wall displays opposite his pod. Yup, they were still twelve days away from Kerbin intercept. Trusting the computers to get it right was a bit much out here so they'd agreed at least one of them should awaken far enough away from Kerbin to make a course correction if necessary. He'd volunteered. Of course he was commander, it was his right. Besides, he seemed the least affected by hibernation of the three of them. It took him a little under an hour this time to get out, get some stimulants in him and get all the medical gear stripped off him. Since Wernher had warned against going back into hibernation in under an hour he'd be up for at least a little while, even if nothing was wrong, so he'd be damned if he was going to wander round with that body stocking of medical sensors on the whole time! Mentally he went over the statistics for the orbital flight and correlated it with the numbers visible on the wall screen before heading to the command chair. He glanced at Rodsy and Jeb still in their pods and smiled. Jeb truely had accepted him as commander for this mission. So far he'd done everything he'd been ordered to do. Jedwig had been very careful not to do any ordering when he was joking with Jeb. That whole business with him and the aliens... ah, maybe he had gone a little far with the airlock thing? Hmm. Sitting down with a push, having to strap in to avoid bouncing out of the chair in free fall, he started reading the computer's orbital predictions. So far it was all very close to the plot. He was going to fine tune the orbit to get closer to the ideal aerobrake height though. Better now that to do it while in Kerbin's SOI. Gazing out at the stars while mentally recalculating the course he marvelled at it all. That he really was out here. He'd been out on the first vessel to leave Kerbin's little system of moons, and now he was here on the second. For one second there he did ponder the familiar refrain 'But of course. I'm Jedwig!'... But then Jedwig rubbed his cheek. Memories of various incidents with Jeb had shown that Jedwig was the only one who thought that... Perhaps, just perhaps, it wasn't quite an accurate statement. He'd always been the fastest, the brightest, the best, in almost every educational establishment he'd been in. It was only natural to assume this happened entirely due to his brilliance. But. Yes, but... Jeb had forced him to review his past, and he did wonder how many times he'd stepped on others in his assumptions of his own perfection. Well, can't have been many, but realistically one person, even him, can't be best at everything. Jeb had shown him there were other qualities beside mathematics that could understand the universe. Jeb did it purely instinctively, and for him it worked. Jedwig couldn't work like that and that had really thrown him at the time. Smiling he sat back in his chair and pondered while idly tapping on the controls, absently performing complex calculus that the computer could have done easily but he just automatically did in his head. In minutes, while thinking of entirely different things, he'd made the course correction and had the ship's projected flight dip nicely into Kerbin's blanket of air. Stretching he looked back at the medical body suit and sighed. Maybe he could stay awake a little longer. Do some close Kerbol observations. Kerbal's had never been this close to their sun before.

Shouldn't it be BK and AD? (Oh, and you have 1910 and 1950 AD before 1200 AD! *Fights... instinct... to... re-arrange... dates... sequentially...*) Though there are many variations on the forum on the who, when and why, you might want to add in the ancients who made the various extra kerbestrial monoliths somewhere in antiquity. Katlantians? Ancient space Druids? Kraken worshippers? Who knows?

For me I just connect something under the Landpad 2, usually something small like one of the thin probe bodies. Bear in mind this means the exhaust from LP2's own engines will be hitting whatever you stick on the bottom, and thus not provide any useful thrust! I had to add extra engines on the outside and remember to turn off LP2's own engines.

I've heard the query on variable power input on the microwave receivers before. Fractal (I think, it could have been someone else who sait this) said it isn't really realistic to do this. If you don't receive it all your ship could get fried by the remainder. How about saying the 'beam' being transmitted is a given size and have a special 'variable width' receiver? It changes to a larger size to get more power, reduces it's radius for a smaller power input. You could even have multiple fixed receivers of different sizes at lower techs to give smaller vessels a chance to use a smaller receiver.

Love that one! Oh, six words: Bob... Jeb... Bill.. Mission's a go! Fuel... Check, Engines.... Check, Copilot... Oops!