Oddible

Uh oh, why is Jool so much higher on the list than Dres? I have a Dres mission in the works now because I had a launcher with the dV to get there but not yet to Jool, perhaps I've underestimated something? No atmosphere I guess?

A few suggestions. First, you can recover without going to the tracking station by just hovering over the altimeter at the top of the screen and clicking the pop-up Recover button. Second, do all the science you can on each trip. Collect science on the launch pad (EVA and get a soil sample and an EVA report), recover. When you land, do an EVA and get a soil sample (even from the water). Keep doing these over and over until you're getting almost nothing from the samples.

You do realize that you can do plenty within Kerbin's SoI to get you the science for solar panels without having to go interplanetary. Remember that when you send a probe to orbit the Mun, do your science and transmit many times in high Mun orbit, then again in low Mun orbit. Same with Minimus. Hell, same with Kerbin!

Why circularize in a destination orbit? Aesthetics? Will an elliptical orbit eventually decay or decay faster than a circular orbit? Do orbits in KSP actually decay if they're above the atmosphere?

Awesome, thanks guys, nailed it and salvaged this Eve trip. I brought 2 probes, one with parachutes one without. Kept the one without in orbit and dropped the one with chutes onto the surface!

Nice, so I tried aerobraking - using the wiki's guidance and this thread and 70K didn't get my circular, and 20K was splashdown. Thanks for the tips - this will work, now to find out if I can find the sweet spot and circularize with my scant remaining fuel.

Thanks, this is exactly what I'm doing. I have zero problems getting an encounter. This thread is asking how to ensure that the encounter isn't a screaming high speed fly by. I get the encounter just fine, but I am struggling with how to know whether I'll be able to slow down into an insertion orbit when I get there.

No atmosphere on Eve.

My Eve arrival went badly. It seemed to be lined up fine, the arc of my arrival lined up with Eve's orbit just fine. Got an encounter while en route. But when I arrived it took nearly 3K to get an orbit (which I didn't have available so collected science all the way down to a crash instead). How can I plan my insertion better? How can I tell if things are so wrong that they'll require that much dV to slow down?

The very first thing you should do (and someone should make a guide) is this: Select a command pod, click launch. EVA and drop Jeb onto the platform, collect a soil sample, get an EVA report, get back into the pod, get a crew report. Slide your mouse up to the top middle of the screen over the altimeter and click Recover Vessel. Boom SCIENCE! That should be enough to unlock your next stuff. Next, get a command pod, a parachute, and a solid rocket. Launch to lower atmosphere. While there, do a crew report, at the Apo if you're feeling brave, do a quick EVA, get an EVA report, get back in, fire your parachute, land. When you land, get out and get another soil sample, get back in. Recover Vessel. Boom SCIENCE! There are 8 biomes on Kerbin, try to land your lower atmo orbits in each of them so you can collect samples and do EVA reports from all. Put an antenna on your ship (and a battery), transmit a couple times before you recover. Baby steps man. Baby steps. You don't need decouplers, you don't need to land on Jool, just science mine the platform first!

You can only recover ships on Kerbin. You can abort the mission in the tracking station but that will just blow up everything.

Try turning the gimbals off on your outer rockets.

Do Kerbins cry when they sleep? So sad. My next space station with a habitation module I will name Wet Pillows.

For scientific efficiency, maybe pick up all the science mods first, and fly all over Kerbin collecting data in planes I guess. Personally planes annoy me so I went for the BIG numbers and started collections from Mun and Minimus and started getting probes out to all of the other planets with a pretty small amount of science (just the ones I mentioned earlier actually - well, I went one step further in the electric tree to get some 1x6 panels). When you get that return from Minimus and it says 360 science gained (plus all that you transmitted), you won't be thinking about the 10 science here, 10 there stuff. Oh and just get MechJeb if you don't like the interplanetary transfer planning. Don't use it for anything but setting up your transfer node - works like a charm.

This is a great question. While you would certainly get the highest value from returning your first sample, you'd have to make another trip to collect all the data. At what point in the diminishing returns for sample data should you stop transmitting and just return the sample for the highest rate of return for a single trip to a planet? So as KerbMav recommended, transmitting 2-3 times then saving your 4th to bring home?

So I never noticed it before, but sitting on the launch pad waiting for my launch window and Kerbol passes over head 4x in each 24 hour period. Is the Kerbin day really 3 hours long? Why is it set up on the 24 hour clock then? It is all very confusing, we need more beds.

Great answer, and I really wanted it to be the case, but I don't think it is correct. I just tested my probe orbiting Duna which has 4 goo pods. I examined each of the 4 goo pods and selected Keep Data. Then I went to my antenna and selected Transmit Data. Instead of transmitting all at once, it just did what it normally does when you transmit for each goo pod. It transmitted 4 times in succession. Would be a really great thing to implement!

This suggestion is not to implement something artificial, it is to resolve something that is completely unrealistic and artificial. Imagine if the ISS reported the same exact results for the same experiments 100 times each day. If you examine the goo then examine it 2 seconds later not much is going to have changed. Another option would be a significantly diminished return if unless you wait a specific amount of time. So for instance you get 40pts for examining it, if you examine it again 1 minute later you get 2pts. If you wait an hour or two you get 4pts. If you wait a day you get 20pts. etc.

This would a) reduce the grinding feeling of repeatedly running experiments in succession on long journeys when trying to maximize science, and would encourage longitudinal types of studies, space stations.

So I've been loading up my ships with multiple science containers and it occurred to me that this doesn't really have any positive effect (except maybe balance). I open two Science Jrs and transmit, it is the same as when I just open one twice. Same for goo. I'm adjusting all my non-returning probes now and scaling back their science multiples.

I'd recommend Electrics soonish so you get a basic solar panel. This will let you do transmissions from orbit without running completely out of power. Then make a bee line for Fuel Systems (though General Construction). Fuel Systems have the fuel lines which let you do Asparagus Staging and for your most efficient rocket construction. With those two you can get to Duna.

Ion engines aren't really meant for planetary missions (just around Kerbin). They're ideal and VERY efficient when you are already in motion and need to stay in motion over a long haul.

What he said, you need a Radial Decoupler. This rocket won't be flyable though - very hard to keep stable with your center of mass all to one side. Put that little pod ship on top of your middle rocket (get rid of the cone on the middle one) and put a decoupler there and you'll be golden. I tend to use subassemblies when I have a successful lifter that I've put a lot of work into to make it stable. I name it with the approx amount of weight it can lift or its dV. I also use subassemblies for successful science probes (when I've added a bunch of stuff to a probe and have it balanced and tuned). I haven't gotten to subassemblies for middle stages yet.

You do realize that you can't line up your inclination with another planet while in orbit around Kerbin right? Even if you get your inclination identical you'd be on a different plane. Both Kerbin and your target, say Duna, are on planes relative to the sun, Kerbol. Until you get out of Kerbin's SOI you can't align your inclination to the sun.

A few things. One, your life will get MUCH easier once you get to the tech Fuel Systems - it lets you run fuel lines between your tanks to do Asparagus Staging (making for horizontal staging rather than vertical and much more stable, less wiggly ships, also much more efficient). Two, keep it simple. For your first trip, don't bother trying to take a Science Jr, just bring a Goo pod. In fact, if you don't have that much science, just orbit and come home, don't even try to land. You do not need any docking to go to the Mun and back - you're going for a one shot deal (docking is much later science anyway). You do however need staging. Of the two Kerbin moons, Mun is the easier one to get to because of its inclination and its gravity. Minimus is FAR easier to land on and if you can get to both, I'd recommend trying your landing on Minimus first. I've been spamming this in a lot of threads but this is the Mun lander that got me to the Mun on my first try (note the yellow lines are fuel lines). Last but not least, check out Scott Manley's videos - great tutorials (all in sandbox of course but he uses basic parts and simple ships).