whistlehead

Oops - I'll amend that... No control is what I meant... And thanks! It means a lot

My first submission to a BSC challenge; be gentle! Totally Legit Aerospace Ltd (Makers of fine aircraft, spacecraft & small household goods) is proud to present the Kerbaltross I The Kerbaltross I is a lightweight, fuel efficient, high altitude two-Kerbal aircraft. As lead design director, I'll begin with a list of criteria for what I wanted my plane to have/do/be: - Simple in design (Easily replicable) - Light - Graceful (with long wings) - Long range (efficient) - High altitude - Slow takeoffs - Unusual in design - Easy to fly (Noob proof) - Time acceleration proof (Clarification: The plane can fly an 4x time warp - controllable is not part of the criteria! Thanks gm537) - Teach the player something - An amusing description With these in mind, myself and my crack design team of invisible flying mice in party hats set to work. Note: The first image isn't of the craft I am submitting - read the description! After this, Jeb decided to do his own flight test... So, does she meet the criteria? - Is she simple in design? I think so. 56 parts. - Is she light? Yes, she is. - Is she graceful? You be the judge, but I think so. Slow takeoffs and gentle turns help. - Is she long range? She can circumnavigate with a third of her fuel left over, and that's with ME at the controls. - Is she high altitude? 30000m max. - Does she take off slowly? Yes. - Is she unusual in design? I think so. - How does she fly? Very well indeed. Roll, pitch and yaw are all slow but very easy to control, and she resists going into a spin quite strongly. I'm quite proud of her take-offs - so far as I can tell she is literally impossible to tail strike. I found that the best way to circumnavigate with her was to climb at 45 degrees until about 20000m, and then aim down to 10 degrees, 4x timewarp and balance the throttle on the intake air. When the nose hits 30 degrees, come out of timewarp and point it back down to 10 degrees. Conveniently, this is also the perfect time to hit full throttle again! She 'bounces' off about 27-28km in high-altitude flight. She is not a slow aircraft - over 1000m/s all the way around Kerbin. Landing was the easiest I've ever done - it was a pleasure. She's a very laid-back aircraft which will just keep going if you let go of everything - even with SAS off - the upswept wings take care of that. Flameouts are no problem with the single central engine. The SAS module is right in the centre of mass, so it has plenty of influence. You can slam on the brakes from 60m/s without killing the pilot - though she might tip. The wide undercarriage makes for good stability. And for final proof of her noob-proof-ness: This was my first ever circumnavigation! - Is she time acceleration proof? 4x warp with no negative impacts. Don't try to steer her though! - Does she teach the player something? I think she shows how a good, simple strut structure can hold even the most slender of aircraft together. She's also good for learning how to circumnavigate. On a more advanced level, deconstructing her the player might find the carefully angled wings and surfaces and the finely judged centres of mass/thrust/lift. - Does she have an amusing description? Judge for yourself! As to doing science: There's plenty of space for a player to add science equipment if they want to - I'm not going to spoon-feed them! Downsides: No science (read: open to modification by end user to suit specific operational requirements ) The file http://www./download/amuvb9glayno93e/Kerbaltross_I.craft Totally Legit Aerospace Ltd thanks you in advance for your upcoming vote Regards and best of luck to all of you, Chris

Stream alert: I'm currently attempting to build a BSC Albatross 3.

Turns out the thing is far too unreliable - I keep losing the connection. I'm going to tell it I'm on a mobile rather than PC connection and see if that helps.

I've been playing KSP for a little while now, and I've decided to start livestreaming my rather poor attempts to send the little green guys flying across the Kerbol system. http://www.ustream.tv/channel/whistlehead-s-stuff#itm_source=user_dropdown&itm_campaign=header&itm_medium=channel1_link&itm_content=Channel_1 The videos will, for now at least, be rather low quality, and my piloting and construction skills aren't exactly up there with the best, but I'm hoping it'll be an enjoyable thing to do. There won't be any voice commentary right now as I can't seem to figure out how to get the program to simultaneously play desktop shots and mike shots... I'm hoping this will become a semi-regular thing, perhaps developing an entire livestreamed space program - or maybe it'll fall down within a week. Who knows? It's all part of the fun! Today's episode will be launching the first part of a space station. Come along and watch if you're interested, bored or, even better, willing to pass on a few tips as I go. Today's vict... ahem... payload: It's the hub of a three-kerbal space station. Each crew member has their own luxurious cabin with panoramic full HD surround sound viewing window, and enough snacks to last for five months in case of an emergency. The central cans are For Science. The station has two large and three standard docking ports (I may add some small ones before liftoff), assuming that the cockpit will be ditched when in orbit. The little gadget on the top is the space tug - it'll be doing a LOT of work in the near future. I've built one station before, and this tug is a tried-and-tested design. I'll post here whenever I'm about to do a KSP stream. Thanks, and enjoy! Chris EDIT: Just noticed I've posted in the wrong place. Oops! Thanks, supernovy

Navyfish's docking alignment mod is your friend here. Best mod I've ever downloaded. (I don't count it as 'cheating'... ) Docking is one of the most difficult things in the game - you have to get your head around so many axis of movement, and sizes never quite seem right - doing it without a mod is pretty tough. I've had a few tries and it's taken hours every time... I got the mod and never looked back. I can dock pretty much anything in <10mins now, once they're close enough.

Keptin: That's a mighty impressive craft, well worthy of a special mention, I reckon. I'm considering nerfing the round the world flight - maybe 1000? That way it's still a bonus but not score-breaking. EDIT: Figured I'd do it now so it won't cause even more confusion later on. Sorry Zorque! (Still top of the board)

Oops. Sorry. Fixing now.

I reckon that's the He's coming this way! bonus, so your final score is 1317 points. It looks like circumnavigation is going to become absolutely necessary to have any chance of a leaderboard slot...

I think Scott Manley did a video on this a while back. I'll have a look for it. EDIT:

I'm liking the idea of simply having a cumulative total amount of science in sandbox mode. Being unable to do science in the sandbox does seem a little immersion-breaking. You could even have a sandbox science leaderboard... Maybe comparing all-time, monthly, weekly and daily amounts of science collected. Now THAT would ignite some competitive spirits!

The challenge The objective is simple - build a vehicle (plane, rocket or anything else), controlled ONLY by the cockpit reaction wheels, and fly it to the island runway. Categories & rules Twitch: Use the plane from THIS CRAFT FILE. Don't alter it! It tends to tip over backwards when standing still, it's fine while moving. You'll soon work out why I call it Twitch! Vanilla: Build your own vehicle. - Control surfaces of any variety, RCS and reaction wheels are banned. (No infiniglide for YOU!) - Engines with thrust-vectoring must have their gimbals locked. - If the craft has more than one cockpit, only one cockpit may have its torque enabled. You may, however, choose which cockpit this is. - The craft must be of your own design. Mods: In addition to the rules above: - Mods must not add any additional means of control to the craft. - All mods used must be stated within your submission. All: No infinite fuel, no gravity hacks! Scoring Primary - can be attained in all categories. Greased lightning: For every three whole seconds under 10 minutes (600 seconds), 1 point Bumblebee: Buzz the KSP tower, Island tower or VAB. 10 points Busy bee: Buzz two out of the KSP tower, Island tower and VAB. 20 points The bee's knees: Buzz the KSP tower, Island tower and VAB. 30 points High Flyer: Hit 5000m on the way. 30 points Seat of your pants: Leave the SAS off. 30 points Nailed it: Land, whole, on the runway. 30 points (Clarification: you must land and stop on the runway) Extra - If you find the main challenge a bit dull, take a shot at some of these... (These may be impossible in Twitch) Jumbo jet: For each additional Kerbal carried, 15 points (Kerbals must actually be in the pods for this to count!) VTOL: Take off and land vertically. 30 points Green machine: Only use ion engines. 50 points Was that a DeLorean? Wheels-up at 39m/s (88mph). 88 points (Will accept within 1m/s!) Timey Wimey: Do the whole flight on 4x time acceleration. 100 points Frankenstein: Use one (and no more than one) of every type of engine. 100 points Heavy lifter: Bring a rover with you. You must be able to undock the rover and drive it. 200 points* Too easy: Build, fly and land on the runway completely intact in one go. 500 points Long way round: Circumnavigate Kerbin first! 1200 points Cut from 2000 because of possible score unbalancing Not again: Circumnavigate Kerbin again! 200 points (Not a typing error. No points for doing it a third time...) Oops - If it goes wrong... Snail's pace: For every four whole seconds over 10 minutes, -1 point (Capped at -1200) What was that noise? For each component lost, -5 points Noooo! For each Kerbal lost, -20 points Well, it's something... - Consolation points So close! Land on the island, but not at the runway. 5 points Barely made it: Destroy everything but the pod(s). 5 points What happened to the brakes? Touchdown on the runway, but run off it before stopping. 10 points (Craft must be wholly intact) He's coming this way! Touchdown on the runway, but crash into the control tower. 15 points Target destroyed: Crash the craft completely inside one of the island hangars. 20 points Entries You must post: Any mods used (mods category only) The following pictures: - At least one picture showing that gimbals are off - The craft sitting on the island runway - As above, with flight log open Pictures showing other achievements would be useful, but not necessary - I'll trust you! The scores you have achieved A total score Example entry Entry for: Twitch Score: Greased lightning: 123 points Bumblebee: 10 points What happened to the brakes? 10 points Total: 143 points This is a fairly low score which I'm sure will be very quickly beaten, but it sets a benchmark! I might have another, more ambitious attempt in the future. Leaderboard Twitch 1: whistlehead, 143 points Vanilla 1: Zorque, 517 points 2: Keptin, 283 points 3: Scarecrow88, 122 points Mods 1: N/A Special mentions Highest: zorque, 34299m, vanilla Fastest: zorque, 2106m/s, vanilla Heaviest: Keptin, 21.81 tons, vanilla Furthest: zorque, 3972228m, vanilla Shortest time: whistlehead, 3min 51secs, twitch Longest time: zorque, 54mins 53secs, vanilla Best looking: Keptin, purely my opinion, vanilla On a side note, I see that most people around here embed slideshows of images into their posts, rather than individual images. I must admit that I can't find how to do this. Any help? EDIT: Thanks, MarkoeZ Regards and happy landings, Chris

First challenge I've tried - and the first time I've tried to land on the island - here goes! No, they don't touch... Works pretty well... It even landed! ...but it lost one winglet. Score: 6min 7secs 30pt This Ain't Right? 10pt Oops! 35pt More the Merrier

Update: After extensive redesign (15 MOAR engines) I'm in a stable orbit around Kerbin with three and a half tanks of fuel left. I kind of landed the last one - if your definition of 'land' is "All the components of the lander arrived on the Mun"... @SRV Ron - Thanks for the advice, and I'm sure I'll give a design such as that a shot when I update to the later demo (or the full game) - but for now, in 0.13.3, I'm going to wing it and see what happens Regards, Chris

Hello, all! First time on the forum. I downloaded the KSP 0.13.3 demo about a year ago and built a few rockets, though nothing really worked out. Well, yesterday I suddenly decided that what I really wanted to do was build a Mün rocket that could actually reach the Mün. So after a few hours of intensive testing, I ended up with this partially onion-skinned creation, which I named o he Moon (a combination of one of my favourite games To the Moon and a dodgy keyboard): And I got within 60km of the surface before... I ran out of fuel during the retroburn. Problems? Unnecessary weight of a second SAS unit and extra vertical struts, poor RCS positioning and NOT ENOUGH FUEL. The struts around the solid boosters did, surprisingly, work. However, with the increased weight of the second iteration these had to be bulked up. But not to worry - Kerbalkind shall not be deterred! I spent the rest of the evening and some of this morning (oops) developing o he Moon v2! Already in its seventh iteration! Now slightly less likely to explode! Probably. Complete with, *ahem* "landing legs"... Tried and tested and slightly less likely to blow up than landing on the engine - which I didn't quite think of in the first iteration. I thought this was genius until I found out that about 2000000 other people using 0.13.3 have also thought of it... A comparison of the two... Bigger is always better. The plan is that this evening I will launch, start to rotate at around 10000m and continue to do so until I have a stable orbit at ~100000m. I'm hoping to orbit the Mün before landing so as to be able to choose my cra... *ahem*, landing site - preferably on the light side of the Mün. After I've landed I'm hoping to take off, leaving the legs behind, enter an orbit around the Mün before burning for Kerbin, enter an orbit around Kerbin, retroburn, separate the final stage and have the capsule splashdown somewhere off the coast of the space centre. What I don't know is when it is appropriate to burn for Kerbin, as I've never exactly made it to that stage yet... 0.13.3 so no fancy nodes to play with! I think I'll stick with this version until I choose to buy the full version - I quite like the simplicity of it. I'd also be very interested to know if you think I have enough fuel or not. The last rocket, which did get me to the Mün, had three tanks fewer and a whole SAS module of extra weight, so I'm hoping this will be enough... The specs: Stage 1: 12 solid boosters Stage 2: 6 large engines with 2 tanks each. 6 winglets. Stage 3: 1 large engine with 3 tanks. 1 RCS tank, 6 RCS motors. Stage 4: 1 thrust vectoring engine with 2 tanks. Stage 5: 1 thrust vectoring engine with 1 tank, 1 RCS tank, 6 RCS motors (3 top, 3 bottom), 1 advanced SAS module. Stage 6: 1 capsule, 1 parachute. Anyway, this is an introduction section of the forum! I'm Chris, I'm 17 and from the UK. I'm currently studying Physics, Maths and Product Design at A2 level. Hi! (Sorry if the Mün rocket stuff is out of place in this section of the forum) Regards, Chris