Galane

I and K reel in and let out.

The only way to not use any fuel, is not to play? (Apologies to "War Games".)

Something like one of those 6S Tubes with a balloon that comes out the side would be a nice part to have. Would make my Eve lander better looking instead of having six rays stuck around it on radial decouplers. Edit: Double sided ones would also be good, perhaps 3 or 4 popping out of a Rockomax size one.

http://partsbyemc.com/pub/Eve-pack.zip The lander is on a launcher, though as-is it'll need fuel balancer on after the big boost stage drops or it drops the four orange tank stage, which is intended to have four more stacks of two orange tanks docked, each with an engine. Included mainly to show how the lander mounts to a launcher. (And because I haven't had time to change the RCS tanks or anything else.) The rovers are in ready to stack configuration, with ports ready to jettison. Launchers not included, adjust staging as needed. The drill rover should have the two Kethane scanning satellites and a small Kethane mining and converting rover for Gilly to refuel the return ship. The intended mission plan is to first launch the lander, keeping it on the upper parts of the launcher to serve as the core ship. Next step is to launch then dock the Kethane converting rover on top of the lander, then the drilling rover on top of the converting rover. Finish up by docking four sidesaddle boosters to the core. Somewhere in among all that, tankers will be needed to top off all the tanks. (Wouldn't do to run out of fuel on the way to Eve.) Also, on the converting rover, ensure control is set to the RGU or the top docking port, never one of the two OKTO2 pods to be used for Eve landing beacons, it doesn't land too well on end... Also included are cfg files for 2 and 3 way omni docking ports and AARP's mashup of the Rockomax Brand Decoupler, OKTO2 probe body systems and the standard Clampotron. That enables a Rockomax size part to be stacked on a launcher then come back and dock. It also provides the same control, reaction wheel torque and electric capacity as the OKTO2, enabling launcher stages to be deorbited - if you provide power or initiate the burn before those 10 measly units of power get used. (Just toss those three files anywhere under GameData.) The Gilly lander is likely ridiculously tiny for refueling, goes down slow, pops back to orbit in a few seconds, can make several trips between refuelings. It's what I could fit into the space available. To get the lander and a satellite to Gilly will require either a rather high Eve orbit or good timing with an elliptical orbit. They can't get there from a 100KM circular orbit. Mods needed by these include quantum struts, Hooligan Labs airship parts, KAS, ReStock, probably KSPX too. I don't think I used the Kommit Stockalike girder cube, that's a one part "pack" which is just a cube version the same size as the two stock girders. I've used that on other rovers, from whence came the girder and wheel arrangements for these rovers. Stretchy tanks/SRBs? Mayyyybe. Don't recall if I left those on the Gilly lander. Kerbal Joint Reinforcement will most likely be required to keep that launcher together. It predates the first release of KJR but I did remove *some* of the strut spam when pulling it out of storage. This download is provided without warranty or expression or admission or denial of its fitness for any purpose other than killing Kerbals. Not ready for sale to the public, but oh well. At the least it'll leave behind quite a collection of debris on the way to and around and on Eve. Should you somehow make it to Eve and back with this lot, AARP's engineering department would be happy to steal see your research results. (They already got a huge boost on the lander by working with someone else's design, then extensively modifying it to shed unneeded items and lift a 2-man can instead of a single command chair.) Will be safest to try out in a separate install of KSP in case I've forgotten some mod part I used...

Hyperedit can be used to refill all resources after you put your ship on the pad or runway.

LOL! Another ride for the Kerbal amusement park. The Kerbal , though it's also a bit like the ride too.

Control direction is fine. I always make sure it's aimed the right direction and I never put command parts on upside down, but in some cases I have stuck an OKTO2 on its side when I need remote control for testing or to drop one for a landing beacon. In those cases it's done because I need the docking port on top clear, and set as control. That's not the case with this small Eve lander remnant or any other ship as it idles merrily away, shifting the orbit off center instead of making it circular and centered. Here's a case of it doing that around Ike. Circular but off center. If Ike had an atmosphere, that orbit would be a bit of a problem. I got fed up with it failing to center the orbit and used Hyprtedit to knock it into place. It would do the proper burn, then change direction and start moving the orbit off center. IIRC this was with the dev build that fixed the bug where it would only use active engines at one end of a pair of ships docked nose to nose.

This little ship is having issues with circularizing. It's what's left of my (finally!) successful Eve lander by the time it gets back to orbit. (There's an OKTO2 on top of the docking port for unmanned test flights.)http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/67575-Take-a-Chance-on-Eve-A-lander-that-gets-you-down-and-back-up! I haven't tweaked tf or other things in MechJeb, just the ascent profile for the gas bag assisted ascent. What happens is it does the circularization burn, overshoots the node a little then points the engine at Eve with a low throttle setting and will not stop until I manually disengage. Same thing with maneuver planner's circularization. Whether I have it do it right now or at apoapsis, same thing, does the burn then aims the engine down and idles. And it does it when I try raising the periapsis. Does the burn correctly, then aims down and idle instead of quitting. In all those cases the periapsis raises to where it's supposed to be, then drops. Build 168 does this with just about everything I've flown with it. I've worked around it by monitoring in map view then manually disengaging autopilot.

It's been a long and crashy road for Alan Aerospace Recycling and Packaging, developing a manned lander capable of landing on Eve then returning part of it to orbit, with enough fuel left to do a rendevous with a return ship. Here a couple of pics of Chance, part of our "Triple Play" that also includes the rovers Tinker (Kethane Drilling) and Evers (Kethane Converting) for refueling the lander on the surface of Eve. Landing configuration involves emptying the upper FL-T800 tanks on the side boosters. (Into the transfer ship's tanks, not into space!) It can land starting completely full but there's no need. Even dropping to 50% total fuel load before de-orbit is not a problem. MechJeb can take it down to the surface, even to sea level, completely hands off, but set the landing speed to 1 m/sec to ensure it doesn't go so slow the parachutes auto-cut. All landing tests have been conducted with TAC Fuel Balancer. Don't know if some engines might run out on the way down, very likely would doing landings without a full fuel load. Getting out of the lander can is a bit of an adventure. Go EVA and climb down the angled ladder. Grab the KAS winch cable, let go of the ladder and immediately hit "I" to avoid smashing into the ground. Use "K" to gently lower to the ground, then release the cable. Use the connectors and KAS winches on Evers to connect to Tinker and Chance in Docked mode. Drill for Kethane with Tinker and refuel Chance. Disconnect the cable from Chance then remove the connector and reinstall it on Evers - just in case you come back at a later time. Getting back aboard (after planting a flag, of course). Grab the winch cable and lift with "I" until you can grab the ladder. Hopefully you've found a flat spot to land or the hatch side is aimed up hill. Tweaking landing leg suspension and raising some on the high side to tilt the lander enough so the Kerbal swings close enough to the ladder to grab it is a tricky business. (In simulation it also required dumping fuel from the low side and transferring to the high side, so don't land on too steep of a slope.) Make sure to release the cable and repack the two radial chutes on the can before re-boarding! (Or repack before rappelling to the ground.) Liftoff procedure. Turn off fuel/oxidizer balancing! Edit the ascent profile to a 66% shape, leave the turn start on Auto. Stage once to jettison the six parachutes. (Ooooo! Pretty spiral-ish explosion!) Poke "0" to inflate the Hooligan Labs gas bags and up you go. At around 1,500 meters, stage again to jettison the landing gear, high enough they'll be destroyed so they won't need cleaned up later. At 20,000 meters, engage the autopilot. You haven't reached peak gas bag altitude, but you want no less than 100 m/sec upward velocity when engaging the autopilot. At around 24,000, stage again to lose the gas bags then sit back and watch asparagus staging in action. (Further testing could home in on the ideal altitude to cut the bags loose as well as optimizing ascent profile.) Note: This design is going to get a bit more tweaking. On the latest, most successful flight, I dumped the lander can's mono and the contents of one of the cylindrified tanks, then balanced what was left. Will be switching those out for the smaller, lighter, roundified tanks. The stacked asparagus staging might get modified too since two stacks drop the lower half very soon after the upper half so there's likely little advantage. On the latest ascent, two lower halves ran dry an instant prior to the upper halves. Could need some (more) pipe re-routing. The first upper half pair to go is on top of the last lower half. If only there were fuel pipes that could cross decouplers and separators straight up or down! Chance landed on Eve. The probes were dropped by an Evers rover. What makes it back to orbit. Mission landing procedure will be Evers first to locate a flat enough area within a Kethane deposit, deploy the beacons (a pair of OKTO2) then drive to a safe distance. Next down will be Tinker, then Chance. The rovers are equipped with landing legs but don't have parachutes. (A fact which has somewhat mollified our chief engineer and janitor, who keeps mumbling about "flimsy pieces of cloth".) Before raising the legs it is essential to dump all remaining fuel then jettison the tanks and engines, which fly away so nicely on sepratrons then kaboom into the surface. Raising the legs before doing that has caused damaged wheels and breaking off the KAS winches and ports. Under no circumstances should the rovers be moved with deployed solar panels. Edit: Further note that the drilling and converting rovers haven't been given their names of Tinker and Evers, and that as the beacon probes are a very late addition to "Evers", its tank jettison staging hasn't been changed to put the two tanks they're mounted on into a separate stage. They could be moved elsewhere to avoid adding yet another stage, but sticking them on the tanks was most convenient. Modify as you please.

It'll be able to figure out the soonest departure time from Duna to Kerbin, with the mass and fuel available, leaving enough fuel to slow down at Kerbin? It can get back at the optimal time (according to MechJeb) with just four orange tanks with four Skippers. (IIRC it didn't even use all that in testing.) Between those and the lander are another orange and four FL-T800 tanks with a Skipper and four LV-T30 or LV-T45. I can pop loose the middle section, dock the lander to the four oranges, jettison the two power pods and get back using even less fuel. Burning 100% of those four orange tanks ought to get somewhat of an earlier departure, while leaving the other orange and FL-T800 tanks to slow down into a Kerbin orbit. Doesn't have to be circular or particularly low altitude. The lander is capable of getting down from quite high up. I overbuilt this ship sooooo much! Math? What math? Just put together *enough fuel* to be sure and get there. Didn't want a repeat of my first Minmus mission when I had to send up a little tanker to give the ship a shot of fuel to deorbit.

There's no connection between type of geography and Kethane. KSP ain't that sophisticated, yet.

Should test with two different craft and two loaded from the same file, with and without same name in both cases.

Most likely a KSP issue. When two crafts with the exact same name get within 2.5KM in orbit, most functions of command pods aren't available, docking ports' right click menus don't open and manual throttle control is locked out. However, MechJeb can still control the throttle and do all other maneuvers so a landing or orbit change can be done, but automated or manual docking isn't possible because the player cannot set ports to control nor can they be set as target. I was testing my Eve lander, finally made it back to orbit so I zapped another one over that I had parked in Kerbin orbit to see if it had enough fuel to rendezvous. Rendezvous, yes. Just enough fuel left. Then I couldn't dock. Sort of like a heterodyne situation when two people try to talk at the same time on analog radios on the same frequency.

Reducing *all* textures causes problems with textures that are already small, many of which contain text you need to be able to read or are small bits of the interface. Compressing them does little to save memory and makes the game uglier/harder to use.

Docking aligns roll between the two docking ports. Smart A.S.S. aligns roll to the SOI the ship is in. Would be nice if SASS had a second roll option to align to target so manual docking with TGT+ could also benefit from automatic roll control.

Now if this could tie into MechJeb to feed it data for how and when to make maneuvers, that would enable MechJeb to do things it can't do, such as do transfers at what may be less than optimal times, or plot a course from moon orbits to places other than the planet the moon is orbiting. A Mun orbiting station has limited utility if you can't take off directly from it to Minmus or anywhere else other than back to Kerbin orbit. It's like going from BOI to DTW by way of SEA instead of flying direct to DTW - wit Mun as Boise, Kerbin as Seattle and Minmus as Detroit. "But I need to fly EAST! Why do most flights from here go WEST first?"

In the previous release, without the toolbar, the UI windows have a collapse button. He took it out in the current release.

Are your KAS pipes just connected or are they connected as Docked? Have to be Docked for transfer to work.

Will it work without the toolbar?

Reminds me of a 3D modeling program I use. The object properties panel gets scanned every few seconds and if you are changing a number and haven't hit enter or clicked in another field when it hits the scan, it changes the field you're editing back to what it was. Can get quite annoying! A "holy grail" of user interaction is software that A. waits for user input and B. applies user input immediately. One of the worst things I've encountered (many times) is software that will run but something has gone wrong so it either soon crashes after launch or crashes when the user attempts to exit - and there's a settings change that can be made within the program which would fix the crashing - except that any such changes are only saved upon a *proper exit* of the program because no settings changes get saved until the very last thing the program does as it's quitting. Thus it's impossible to fix the problem with the in-program tools that are supposed to be able to make changes in how it works.

Use the strut guns. Does the same thing as the blue glowing ones.

I use KSPX quite a lot. The last release dropped some parts which had been added to the stock game, but other items such as the smaller reaction wheels are still very useful.

I've used the tops of the large drills to mount small Kethane scanning satellites without a problem. I also have a Kethane miner that's very integrated with its custom launcher, the bottoms of the drills have fuel tank stacks and engines hanging off them, down either side of the core stack. (Seemed logical at the time, before KJR, but it can't be yanked off and saved as a subassembly.) Is your instrument bay one of the 6S Tubes or is it a cfg file edit?

On the narrow pack you can reduce the number of polygons by 20 simply by eliminating the tiny flat ledge at the top front where those bumps are. Lose that ledge and it also removes the need for some triangles on the sides of the bumps and sides of the pack. The bumps are a nice detail but pretty much invisible in-game. Replacing them with just a simple bevel at the top front would reduce the polygon count more.

For the decoration bits to go inside, how about some repair shop equipment like milling machines and metal lathes?