HeadHunter67

I don't expect everyone to play my way - I just want to see Kerbals have an actual use in orbital construction, rather than just sending them out and pretending they fix it. Pete Conrad didn't fix Skylab from inside the station - and he certainly didn't do it from the ground while it remained unmanned.

I'm still not clear on how to use the interstage fairing adapter. Specifically, I am trying to convert the NP Captain Morgan launcher to work without the NP fairings. Using the regular procedural fairing bases above and below the lunar module payload, it looks nice, but shakes like a hula girl on the launch pad. From what I read, it sounds like the interstage part is intended to help, but damned if I can figure out exactly how to use it or where to put it on this rocket. I looked over the pictorial PF tutorial but it didn't shed any light on the issue.

That's fine - some people prefer to play that way and it's cool. I just prefer the immersion that Chatterer adds. I feel more like a participant and less like a remote observer. Indeed - the 45 degree RCS is wonderful for builds that require ports not at zenith/nadir/port/starboard. I also like the 5-way RCS, as it is more fuel-efficient and produces less unnecessary torque.

Of course. Understand that right now, I'm simply addressing the topic - which was "how to get a lot of fuel into orbit". Sure, Snarfster's lifter may only deliver one Jumbo to 125km, but it still does so more efficiently than a design that may lift two Jumbos but require more than 16 Jumbos to do it. When we are talking about Tsiolkovsky's Rocket Equation, diminishing returns aren't simply a possibility - they are an inevitability. Consider the size difference between a Saturn V and a 1-B, and then consider that all the fuel below the third stage exists solely just to get the S-IVB into Earth orbit, and that the entire S-IVB stage was simply to push the CSM/LEM into TLI. The 1-B does a fine job of delivering a CSM into orbit by itself. Yes, if you want to put a dozen jumbos in orbit at once, you'll need a lot of lifter below it - but it might be more efficient to send up smaller payloads with smaller rockets. When a budget becomes a concern, a lot of these monstrous lifters will become extinct. I'm not trying to tell anyone else how to play, just pointing out that bigger ISN'T always better.

Chatterer doesn't change "stock". It's not like it requires or adds any new parts or changes your craft. It's just for the ambience. I've got a stock build that uses Chatterer, RCS Build Aid, Part Catalog, Crew Manifest, NavyFish DPAI, SelectRoot and Subassembly Manager.

Snarfster, that looks pretty similar to the test rocket I cobbled together this morning in an attempt to answer this same question. As stock goes, that's a pretty good way of doing it. Basically, it's a payload fraction of about 12% to a 125km orbit, and the part count and mass are reasonable for the task. I don't understand why some people overdo it - if all you're doing is adding more fuel and mass to loft the unnecessary fuel and mass you already have, what's the point? I prefer the most minimal approach that can do the job, regardless of an unlimited budget.

If you have multiple command-capable components on a craft, you can select one and "control from here". The navball will then display as if that component is the "front" of the craft. Also, translation won't necessarily match the orientation of your screen unless you are in chase mode - that's the whole purpose of that view.

I think you're going to drop the first stage well before a 300km apoapsis... but I could be wrong. Regardless, the Dragon is the coolest capsule in the history of the human space program, so it's no wonder that it's also the coolest in KSP.

I finally finished my latest space station. Behold, the KSS Largo: It is the result of 10 separate launches and at least 17 docking operations. The pods on the left are 3-person escape pods, with sepatrons and RCS thrusters to deorbit safely. Evacuation capacity is 12 crew (plus whatever docked auxiliary craft). The station's normal capacity is 8 crew (A set of four Mk2 lander cans aft serve as dormitories, with a hitchhiker can as a lounge/galley) but the station could conceivably accommodate up to 32 personnel - not that one would ever want to pack every available slot with a Kerbal. The station has a considerable amount of monopropellant and fuel to support interplanetary operations. It orbits at an altitude of 120km, is 232 parts and 160.3 tons fully fuelled.

Probably Windows ME, so it can crash like everything else they use.

I just got a Munbles Kerman. I'll bet he's even harder to understand than the rest of them.

It's called RCS Build Aid. I highly recommend it for construction of ships with balanced thrusters.

Well done, Jacob! It's such a satisfying feeling when rendezvous and docking become understandable. A whole new experience opens up once one learns how to do these things unaided.

A pair of docking ports for each section isn't likely to be the main cause of high parts counts on any station - especially since lifting the whole thing at once probably means you have dozens of struts instead...that will be up there still. Either use a construction tug, or a small maneuvering pre-stage like the MOMS OAM. My big stations don't have thrusters on each section - just a set at the core. To keep this on-topic, here's a picture of the station I've nearly completed. KSS Largo is the result of seven launches and over a dozen docking operations (dock the tug to the arriving module and dock that to the station). The tug I mentioned is in the foreground, and I'll soon be sending up another copy of the fuel tank to which it's docked, to complete construction of the station. Aside from the thrusters on the hub, there are no extraneous maneuvering parts anywhere. So far, the part count is 326, 42 of which are the tug. I'd say the tower of one-man escape pods probably is the biggest culprit on part count (141 parts there), as they do of course require maneuvering thrusters and sepatrons to evacuate the crew. I think I'll do that differently on my next station - it's likely that a few 3-man escape pods would be more economical from a parts-count perspective, though heavier per person.

There were four modules that had it correct, the others had the misspelling. I'm not trying to accuse anyone of anything - I'm simply saying that dismissing a reported issue as user error won't ever solve a problem that actually exists. I've seen the same thing happen in the MJ thread - people who reported problems with the docking autopilot were being told it was due to unbalanced craft and other problems, until Sarbian actually found code that could account for the flopping around. This is an easy enough fix on the user side, but it is a real issue with the files and hopefully sumghai can do a hotfix like last time this came up. Sorry if my response seemed offensive, I just want people to give the same benefit of the doubt that they ask of others.

Is this the one? http://kerbalspaceprogram.com/mechjeb-and-remotetech-for-all/ Sounds similar to the issue I was having - since that download didn't have configs for the LazTek SpaceX pack, for instance, I tried to make a ModuleManager config for it but wound up with the same issue. If there was a stealth hotfix to either or both of those plugins, I'll replace them with the ones you linked. Thanks.

I take it all that's required is to remove the lines for "INTERNAL"? The only reason I'm reluctant to do this is because I enjoy watching their little faces during a mission, even if I never go IVA. I expect that removing the internals means their faces won't be shown on the screen, either.

I can guarantee you that any time you split a larger assembly into sections, the two docking ports you need will be fewer parts than whatever you'd need to make the lifter carry the larger, undivided assembly. It's also a lot easier to make a subsection symmetrical than an entire station. As for assembly? NavyFish's Docking Port Alignment Indicator plugin makes it pretty simple to get things lined up properly on the roll axis. I've built a few big stations and never had a part that was off-angle.

Also, it kind of moves too fast for someone to learn from it. I know what I'm doing, so I can recognize the steps you are taking, but I can't imagine someone would find it instructional. I don't mean to sound negative or critical, I just think the video moves at too fast of a pace in the wrong places to be recommending it as a learning tool.

You honestly won't need the nearly 14,000-dV the Heavy has for a Mün rescue... the regular Dragon/Falcon has almost 11,000 dV and should suffice. No point in all the extra mass to haul all the extra fuel you won't need - especially as the Heavy doesn't torque so easily until lower stages have dropped. I like the idea behind the reusable boosters with landing legs, but in practice the game really won't let me make the best use of them - since you can't switch craft while in atmosphere, you either have to let your command module coast and hope you get back to it in time, or leave it in a parking orbit (by which time the booster has probably crashed). If anyone can honestly pull it off as intended, I'd love to see a video.

I apologize for going slightly off-topic, but the CSM and LM are beautiful - especially that service module! May I ask what mods you are using there?

Shooty is right - it would be best if people would check for themselves before making pat answers. We had this issue before - sumghai fixed it in a previous release and somehow it seems to have crept back in.

I was using the current version of Extensions, but the problem I had was that the configs that add MJ to pods (even the stock ones) weren't loading at all. I didn't have this problem with versions prior to Sarbian's "all in one" release. Ultimately, I wound up just adding the line manually to each pod I wanted MJ in. It was a PITA but quicker than reloading the game each time to see if my changes worked (Alt-F12 kills Module Manager). Did you write your configs yourself, or did you use ones that were already available? I'd be interested in using them if it meant not having to edit each pod.

From my own experience, any more than 1.4-1.5GB in the GameData folder is entering crash territory. Remember that a 32-bit application can only utilize a little less than 4GB, and there's more to KSP than just the GameData folder. Also, about half of that 1.5GB is going to be taken up by the Squad subfolder, unless you are comfortable deleting stock parts or the IVAs (which take up a lot of space)

I agree with the last two posts - left hand on WASDQE, right on HIJKLN. Set camera to chase mode, and with the DPAI plugin you won't need to move the mouse or toggle anything. You don't need to go into docking mode, you can orient your nose and translate without needing to switch.