KerikBalm

Well, Welsch had relaible witnesses to the sonic boom, at least more relaiable than WWII tales. I believe Welsch also had radar tracking data and his own instrumentation to back up his claim, but it wasn't as rigourous and precise as the measurements used on the X-1. But the gist of it is that Chuck and the X-1's acheivements weren't nearly as groundbreaking as they were made out to be.

At the moment, there is no need to make extensive mods to do ISRU. I propose we add a system that consumes IntakeAir and produces oxidizer. Example: TechRequired = automation entryCost = 8200 cost = 40000 category = Utility subcategory = 0 title = ISRU Gas Condensor manufacturer = Kerboplanetary Resources Inc. description = A compressor and refrigeration unit capable of fractional distillation of liquified air. Can produce liquid oxygen (oxidizer) with access to air containing oxygen. attachRules = 1,0,1,1,1 mass = 32 dragModelType = default maximum_drag = 0.2 minimum_drag = 0.3 angularDrag = 2 crashTolerance = 6 breakingForce = 200 breakingTorque = 200 maxTemp = 2900 vesselType = Ship MODULE { name = ModuleEngines thrustVectorTransformName = thrustTransform exhaustDamage = True ignitionThreshold = 0.1 minThrust = 0 maxThrust = 1 heatProduction = 600 useVelocityCurve = True fxOffset = 0, 0, 1.6 PROPELLANT { name = ElectricCharge ratio = 100 DrawGauge = True } PROPELLANT { name = IntakeAir ratio = 0.1 } atmosphereCurve { key = 0 1000 } velocityCurve { key = 10 0 0 0 key = 5 0.2 0 0 key = 0 1 0 0 } } MODULE { name = ModuleAlternator RESOURCE { name = Oxidizer rate = 500.0 } } RESOURCE { name = ElectricCharge amount = 100 maxAmount = 100 isTweakable = false hideFlow = true } RESOURCE { name = IntakeAir amount = 10 maxAmount = 100 isTweakable = false hideFlow = true } RESOURCE { name = Oxidizer amount = 10 maxAmount = 100 isTweakable = false hideFlow = true } } The *only* problem I see, is that it would allow you to do ISRU on Kerbin, and sell oxidizer for funds... but with and end game tech unlock, and given that oxidizer is much cheaper than liquid fuel, I wouldn't worry about it. No major changes are needed: Intake air supplies the resource for a weak engine. That weak engine has a velocity curve such that it only works when stationary (well in this case <10 m/s) The engine alternator produces oxidizer. I would even be temped to add one for Xenon gas, and have it use "IntakeAtmosphere" (no check for oxygen)... but I don't think there is such a need for ISRU for Xenon. It wouldn't be game breaking, it would only allow ISRU on Laythe, and you'd still need to take liquid fuel (both to react with oxidizer, and to lift the oxidizer up from Laythe orbit). Thoughts?

This is super easy to do by yourself. Example: PART { name = xenonTank125 module = Part author = Whatever mesh = model.mu scale = 1 rescaleFactor = 2.0 node_stack_top = 0.0, 0.1404661, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0 node_stack_bottom = 0.0, -0.1404661, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0 TechRequired = ionPropulsion entryCost = 8800 cost = 800 category = Utility subcategory = 0 title = PB-X1500 Noble Gas Container manufacturer = Probodobodyne Inc. description = A large cryogenic container for inert gases such as Xenon, Argon, Helium, etc. attachRules = 1,0,1,1,0 mass = 0.0625 dragModelType = default maximum_drag = 0.2 minimum_drag = 0.3 angularDrag = 2 crashTolerance = 6 maxTemp = 2900 breakingForce = 50 breakingTorque = 50 RESOURCE { name = XenonGas amount = 5000 maxAmount = 5000 } } Use the same model and mbm files as the stock xenon tank, add in the rescale factor line. Tweak as desired

You seem to watch a lot of TV that makes unsupported or poorly supported claims. The first well documented case of controlled flight beyond mach 1, of a piloted vehicle, is that of George Welsch in the XP-86. Due to this, they've since had to reduce the claim of the X-1 to "in level flight"

When it comes to this subject, I think I know well enough to not need to be too careful. I'm well aware that people still discover things these days. For example, I've discovered the effect of knocking out the genes FASTKD1 and FASTKD4... (not ready to publish yet, and I doubt anyone here would care about this subject). I'm well aware that alcohol dehydrogenase genes are already known, and it was quite clear that the OP just learned about them.

With proper aerodynamics, in some cases, perhaps wings will let you do better by minimizing losses to gravity drag. But a high TWR should allow that too. With something like FAR, terminal velocity is rather high, so you can just punch straight up really fast as well. I'm not sure its ever that practical. Certainly, if you want flight time in atmoshere, wings are better than a rocket just hovering along... but once the distance gets to a certain amount, a ballistic rocket trajectory will likely be better.

In KSP's incomplete state, there is no shame using mods. I want to see electric fans and air aumented rockets... and a titan analogue... a titan analogue would be boss. IRL, Titan or Venus are really the only bodies worth considering for planes. Mar's atmosphere is way way way too thin, less than 1% the density of Earth's in most places (also, solar power is weak out there, the same is even more true for titan, but its lower gravity + thicker atmosphere would be more conducive to flight with RTG power). Venus would only work as a solar powered high altitude plane that never lands and always stays in daylight... and given the super rotating winds of venus... thats a pretty tall order

Lets suppose you just hover at 10 meters, for 10 minutes... how much fuel would that take. "But thats different!" you'll say "I'm talking about a descent" -Ok, Lets say you're now at 10 meters, descending at .01 m/s... It will take you 1,000 seconds to reach the surface - approximately 1600 m/s of dV on the Mun. "but I'm talking about deceleration! not the final descent speed" -Ok, but you acknowledge a controlled descent at a slower speed will use more fuel than a controlled descent at a higher speed Lets say you have to decelerate 1,000 m/s in the suicide burn. If you do this in 10 seconds, or in 100 seconds, what is the difference? Lets assume a 10 m/s^2 constant deceleration rate (as you get lighter, unless you throttle back, this won't be true, but the math is a lot simpler if it is). Lets sum up in 10 second increments (not doing an integral to take it to zero, just to make it simpler) T=10 seconds of the slow burn, goinging 900 m/s now- you essentially suffer the losses of descending at 900 m/s instead of 1,000 for 10 seconds + losses of 10 seconds of an 800 m/s descent + losses of 10 seconds of an 700 m/s descent + ... + losses of 10 seconds of an 200 m/s descent + losses of 10 seconds of an 100 m/s descent Not coincidentally, I believe these losses will add up to the time spend burning * the gravity of the body * sin of the angle of the burn (which will likely change throughout the burn, especially with a slower burn)

Maybe we should just stick to KSP and subjecting those poor kerbals to it:

I think in there you should have the radius of the planet, ie, surface is 600km vs 6,000 km from the cnter of mass, and then do all your other points from the center of mass

Kerbin is not Earth - relative to its radius, the atmosphere is much thicker. A 70km orbit in KSP would be like a 700 km orbit IRL. Whereas a 50km orbit decays pretty fast, a 500km orbit for Earth will last a long time. You can't convert them, they aren't the same proportions.

There's also this map: http://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/w/images/7/73/KerbinDeltaVMap.png But some of the values are a bit fudged - as you'll notice they are different between this map and the previously linked one. Plane changes, drag, etc add a lot of fudge factor. The 2nd one is a bit easier to use, and a lot simpler, even if it is less precise. From LKO: 950 (sufficient for edge of kerbin SOI) + 956 (gets you into Jool SOI) -> with just some minor course corrections, you can directly aerobrake at Laythe! <2000 m/s to get to Laythe The landing is essentually free (bring wings or a parachute) Getting to orbit from laythe, the jets are essentially free (they have an effective ISP of something like 19,000 at high altitude, and 40,000 at mid altitude) With far, you should only need another 200-300 m/s to get to orbit. 2200 (conservative) m/s to get to laythe from LKO, land, and get to laythe orbit. The problem becomes finding out how much dV you need to get from low laythe orbit to Jool escape - the wiki's dV map doesn't help, as it routes you to low jool orbit first. As an approximation, take the dv from jool intercept to low jool orbirt, and from that subtract the dV to go from low jool orbit to laythe intercept. 2200+ 780 (laythe escape) + 2630-1600 = 4010 to get from LKO, to laythe and then escape jool. Then you still need to get to kerbin intercept (and aerobrake from there), add another 956... 5,000 m/s, assuming proper aerobraking and use of jets (but not counting jets towards the dV) should get you to laythe and back. Adding up the dV from the other ma gives a value of 5070 + whatever you need to get to low laythe orbit that jets can't provide (300 m/s is my estimate)... I guess my rough estimates from the other map would have come up a few hundred m/s short... :/

True, I'm just speculating here (as I'm studying RNA processing/stability in Mitochondria, not this metabolic pathway, and I'm too lazy to look it up in the literature)... since you'd want both reactions to happen at the same time (so that aldehyde doesn't build up), they are probably coupled in some way/ localized in the same area, and thus most likely function under the same conditions. For most mamalian enzymes, the salt concentrations are more or less the same throughout most of the cell, as is the pH (mitochondria and lysosomes excepted). But I wouldn't expect them to work well in the conditions of your stomach, or in a bottle of whiskey, or beer.

I wouldn't say "discovered", I would say "learned" These arent' the days of Columbus... discovering things that were already known to others... Anyway, most enzymes have a fairly narrow pH and salt concentration range, I doubt it would work.

Unless the new feature is really cool, I'll probably stay with .24 I already added SP+ to my .24 instal, after hearing it would be stockified in .25 So... close enough that I'm not going to start a new save, especially not after I've made myself a heavy lift spaceplane, and lugged up a bunch of mission packages to orbit, but haven't actually done the missions as I'm still waiting for the launch windows (I'm doing asteroid rendevous -> giving Kerbin new moons and high speed ion probes to try to get to my targets before the launch window for the manned missions + I still need to farm out minmus - I got too much science from contracts I guess, and I also had to wait for the Mun -> Minmus transfer window for my lab+fuel depot+ lander that was at the mun, and still had enough fuel that I felt no need to launch a new mission

Are you using NEAR/FAR? I think its aerodynamic forces that prevent you from turning... I think you need a lot more controllable fins, and bigger ones (try the canards), and set their tweakables to have the maximum deflection That thing is truly massive... you really want to take 4 OTEs worth of fuel up at a time?

Regarding the LV-N vs other rockets - some might bring up Tavert's excellend optimal engine charts... but they have one flaw: they are mass optimal, not fuel optimal. If one is going to re-use a lander over and over again, you want a fuel optimal engine. Considering the best "chemical" ISP is 390, and the LV-N is 800, then if the crafts dry mass with the LV-N is less than 800/390 times the dry mass with the "chemical" engine, then for *any* delta-V, the LV-N is fuel optimal. If its not, then it becomes more complicated, as you need to use the rocket equation to determine the mass ratio you need to acheive a target delta-V. To get to orbit from Duna, you need a delta-V over 1300 m/s. In all my lander designs, this strongly favors the LV-N. Even more so if I make a 2+ kerbal lander (even using 2x 1 seat lander cans, which are mugh liger than 1x 2 seat lander can). Even on the Mun, I used a LV-N, but that was because I was also carrying up goo and mat bays to the orbiting fuel depot+ science lab - when farming biomes, I very much consider fuel optimal solutions. Yes, the LV-N is ungainly... its too long... but I get around this with some structural elements (two side mounted T-200 tanks with structural fusalages beneath them, and then the tiny girders at the base, before adding struts), which add to the dry weight even more, but for the dV needed to get to orbit from duna + my requirement for a capacity of 2 kerbals (or rather, considering fuel use per trip * trips needed to get all the kerbals back), the LV-N comes out way ahead for me for use on Duna.

Well... hmmm, I haven't taken any screenshots of my setup on Duna... although I only have one "simulation" - ie a duplicated game that I edited the craft into duna's orbit. Mods: NEAR Custom biomes (helps motivate me to go all over Duna) SpacePlane+ (which will soon be stock) Self-made mods: Nosecones and part adaptors are liquid fuel/Liquid fuel+oxidizer tanks with a 9:1 full:empty mass ratio Xenon tanks have a 9:1 full:empty mass ratio Added larger xenon tanks (just the small can, scaled up) Added a "IntakeAtmosphere" resource + intake module to circular intakes Added a "ducted electric fan" part, massing 0.4 tons, producing 30 kN of thrust, consuming electric charge in a 45:1 ratio with intake air, with a thrust curve: 0 m/s = 100% thrust; 175 m/s= 70%, 250 = 30%, 275 = 0% thrust. - Uses the version .18 basic jet graphics (so its visually distinguishable from the current basic jet engine) ISP: 1800s at 0.3 atm, dropping to 1000 in a vacuum Science lab boosts transmission science by 2x instead of 1.5x 1st part of the mission, hefting up the tug/crew vehicle, and the massive fuel depot. I didn't take any pictures, but it's quite similar to this one (which is intended for laythe, the tug lacks the hitchhiker container, and carries a large supply of xenon that is not present on the Duna fuel depot, it also carries a little more fuel) The 2nd part of the mission, was lifting up the all in 1 Sciencelab-habitat-rover, the "ike experiment package" and the lander. Yes, the Lab-Rover has wings, to allow it to steer to a more appropriate landing site when de-orbiting, also to give it more time to do atmospheric analysis (although this was later rendered redundant by the 3rd launch). It also has a small monoprop supply to deorbit, and to complement the parachutes for a soft landing. The 2 person lander also has wings to allow it to steer closer to the rover (I don't use mechjeb, and don't want to waste time save scumming, also, NEAR/FAR help those wings actually work). Its also got a small supply of xenon for some extra dV if needed, its designed to be able to go from an equatorial orbit, to the poles, and then back to the depot in equatorial orbit The 2 person lander was also somewhat redundant, as the 3rd launch was a SSTO space plane, with 2 rapier pods on detachable pylons (with probe cores and parachutes, to allow recovery), it has a very high aspect ratio wing, 2 lift fans, 2 propulsion fans, and a nuke with enough fuel to get it to duna. In duna's low gravity, the lift fans actually allow it to act as a VTOL (yet another reason I'd like ISP curves to scale thrust, not propellant consumption), and with a refuel at the depot before de-orbiting, it can function as a duna SSTO to ferry crew to and from orbit. It masses more than the 2 person lander, and requires 2 trips, but it can get to roughly 250 m/s and relatively high altitudes in Duna's atmosphere on its electric fans alone. Also, as it can just fly to the poles, and back to the equator, it can save a lot of fuel for polar expeditions. For the moment, I plan to use the lander only fuelled enough to make trips to and from the equator, and the electric fan craft for expeditions elsewhere. I'm also planning another heavy lift spaceplane to drop one (or more) larger, stationary, surface habitat + surface fuel depot (I love the new Claw part, it makes linking things on the ground so much easier) + better rovers (that science lab rover is rather meh... I gave it a pretty low CG and wide wheelbase... but I could do much better with a smaller rover) Duna wil be Kerbalized! If you think about it.... much of the surface is over the armstrong limit... it gets to nearly .2 atm, which is easily enough for liquid water to exist, temperature readings suggest it should get warm enough to melt ice, and its got plenty of ice.... its a much better terraforming candidate than mars.

#1), Normally, you want to eject retrograde to the motion of the planet... this only occurs twice per year for a polar orbit... I don't know how well that would align with the transfer windows. When your polar orbit is perpendicular to your ejection angle, this will cost you about 930 m/s (if i remember the orbital velocity for low duna orbit correctly). How far north is your base? If I read your description right, its the crater with a "channel" running towards the main lowland depression? According to http://www.kerbalmaps.com/ The crater seems to span 6-26 degrees lattitude? I don't think its worth doing a polar orbit for that. In fact, you really don't need your orbit to go to any higher lattitude than a point oyu want to "service" - you also save some dV from the planets rotation that way, but for Duna, its quite slow. The slow rotation also means the launch windows from the base to the transport hub will be less frequent, but still more frequent than kerbin launch windows. I think an orbit with a ~10 degree inclination should serve you just fine, or an equatorial orbit since a day on duna is quite long.. 18 hours ie 3 "kerbal days". (day length is related to transfer window frequency from the surface to an inclinded orbit) If you have NEAR/FAR, which makes aero much better, gliders work better in duna's atmosphere, and you could easily reach that lattitude when dropping from an equatorial orbit. I'm not sure how well it could save you dV on ascent though (if your craft had negligible parasitic drag, and a high L/D, you could use the atmopshere to make a plane change at the equator for "free", assuming your apoapsis is still within the atmosphere, or you are still in enough atmosphere when you cross the equator) #2) You should do these manuvers at the ascending/descending nodes. Burn normal to the ecleptic to come in at a higher lattitude, antinormal to come in at a lower lattitude, you should be able to come in right over a pole if you wish (I don't bother with that) I also use modded "electric ducted fans" for moving about duna (since a rover would take far far too long), and they should work just fine at .1 atm. I only "space" and "de-space" (space=orbit ) from the equator, and then travel by solar powered means from there

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bi-elliptic_transfer You would want to do this, not a direct escape transfer. Drop your PE inside mercury's orbit, then burn there to reach speeds well beyond escape velocity

Intake spamming can get you a lot higher than this... although at 50km, you won't be producing much thrust. While I haven't tried storing intake air, I can easily get a perapsis in stock, above the ground, and an apoapsis that was quite high (200? or so) FAR/NEAR (I use NEAR)nerf jet engines, making it much harder (they seem to top out at about 1750 m/s, and their TWR is much lower) If I were to try this challenge, I would "cheat" - ie take advantage of a loophole: You never specified that this has to be done from Kerbin - hehehe I'd start from the surface of laythe. Orbital velocity there is ~1875 m/s, and with jets, you can easily reach 2,000 + m/s -> It is quite easy in full stock to get to orbit there on turbojets alone.

I think i've done this on Duna too, IIRC, when I got low enough, while still on an escape trajectory, it let me take atmosphere samples, and then when I dropped below escape velocity, I couldn't any more, until my apopaps was also lowered to in the atmosphere

Mine often does not show burn time correctly either (mac os) I often have to throttle up to get it to start calculating burn time. So.. say 2 minutes before a node that I'm expecting to take 1 minute of burn, I start burning for 1-2 seconds, and then it displays the burn time, and then I hit X, and then start the burn using the "50:50 rule" based on that burn time. If I really want to be precise, I quicksave, get the burntime, and then load

This feature was added very recently - 0.24

And if you don't like firespitter, its easy to mod yourself. I haven't downloaded firespitter, but I did make my own "ducted electric fan" I duplicated the basic jet (I almost never use that thing anyway), changed the name, tweaked the mass and cost, but the most important change was here: MODULE { name = ModuleEngines thrustVectorTransformName = thrustTransform exhaustDamage = True ignitionThreshold = 0.05 minThrust = 0 maxThrust = 30 heatProduction = 50 useEngineResponseTime = True engineAccelerationSpeed = 0.5 engineDecelerationSpeed = 0.75 useVelocityCurve = True fxOffset = 0, 0, 0.74 PROPELLANT { name = ElectricCharge ratio = 45 DrawGauge = True } PROPELLANT { name = IntakeAtmosphere ratio = 1 } atmosphereCurve { key = 0 1000 key = 0.3 1800 key = 1 2000 } velocityCurve { key = 275 0 0 0 key = 250 0.3 0 0 key = 175 0.7 0 0 key = 0 1 0 0 } } This requires you to make an entry for "IntakeAtmosphere" in resources.cfg. It also requires you to add a source for it. I added this to the circular intake (which I also use so infrequently, that closing the 2nd intake module is not a problem), but you could easily also add it to the engine itself so that it functions as a standalone unit: MODULE { name = ModuleResourceIntake resourceName = IntakeAtmosphere checkForOxygen = false area = 0.008 intakeSpeed = 10 intakeTransformName = Intake } RESOURCE { name = IntakeAtmosphere amount = 0.2 maxAmount = 0.2 } As a finishing touch, since the artwork changed between .18 and now, I took the model and texture from my old .18 install, and used that for the "electric ducted fan". Its very similar but still visually distinguishable. I think I made it pretty balanced... its velocity curve is very limiting (good luck getting past 250 m/s using them!), and it eats electricity pretty fast, but its useful enough (also I reduced the mass to only 0.4 tons, but its TWR is still much less than the basic jet engine)