Pecan

I use SSTO rockets nearly all the time. So much effort has been put into making Kerbal Flight Simulator nice for spaceplane fans that single-stage rockets are easy, cheap and much better able to handle wide or awkward payloads. Do you have any specific questions?

Why don't you leave all that excess baggage in Kerbin orbit before going to Eeloo and back? That would save a lot of mass.

Standard 'video sucks' #3 Standard 'please write' #1

The straightforward 'shuttle' advice for any such problem that doesn't actually ask a question is ... DON'T. Almost any other way of getting into orbit and back, in KSP, is easier, simpler, cheaper and more fun. If you're building a shuttle just for the sake of making a replica then; wall, head, bang. (It's possible, but it's going to hurt) NB: New engine with wide gimbal has been profiled for 1.0.5 or 1.1. It will make handling the change in CoM easier, if not eliminate the problems inherent with the shuttle design.

Hodo is rarely wrong (why don't you have more rep, by the way?) but in this case I have to say TAC FB is the choice of people who don't explore enough mods. Goodspeed does much more.

"Better to remain silent and be thought a fool ..." (Abraham Lincoln) The question is, "what are you trying to achieve?" If you wish to show people how to 'do' KSP then there is a whole lot of stuff here, on the wiki and other resources that will show you how to design vehicles that work. Reading them will help a lot. On the other hand, if you simply wish to "speak out" then explosions and failures are easy.

Yes. And some other stuff that's more than 10 characters but adds nothing except ... scene changes still have a memory leak. Be happy with this other game you've moved to.

The demo copyright message (version 0.90.0 Beta) is incorrect - the mechanics are based on 1.0, including errors versus the current version 1.0.4. By design the demo versions - any of them - do not allow plugins/mods and as been mentioned any attempt to re-program them is against the licence agreement. That the 0.13.3 demo version might be moddable is a bit of a joke, in that it's so old it's nothing like the current version(s) of the program. Quite why GregroxMun thinks the parts in the current demo are underpowered I don't understand though, since it's quite possible (as I have shown in another thread) to build a Mun and Minmus return-trip manned lander and at least both of those moons are represented. In earlier versions there is only one moon, or none. In any case - get the full game; it's definitely worth it. ETA for below: Yes, the range I could criticise. It seems a good demo of what's possible to me, but I agree it's not a good demo of what's available. I'd hate the job of deciding how much to give away in the demo versus retaining for the paid version though. Demos are pretty much "damned if you do, damned if you don't", unfortunately. ANOTHER EDIT: Please see signature, which I am now changing to reflect my interest in demo-version questions.

Uninstall those and get used to how the game works first. All the rest certainly add a lot, but if you can't control the beast as it comes they're just more confusion and complication you don't need. Before you think you've wasted $40, consider what the rest of us have learnt to do. You can do it if you stick with it :-) (Still 40 Hong Kong dollars isn't a huge amount to spend, even if you can't get on with the game. Keep smiling).

You know how orbital mechanicss is utterly insane? Like, if you want to catch up with something ahead of you in orbit you should slow down? Or, if you want to meet something behind you in orbit you should speed up? Guess what - just leaving Kerbin (any body/planet) SOI by going prograde = going faster = once you leave the SOI, with a slightly higher solar Ap, you're also going to have a slightly longer/slower orbital period so will automatically fall back into the SOI as the planet catches up with you. Going to Duna, for instance, you have to make sure your Ap is so high you 'dodge' the whole SOI, otherwise it's all back to Kerbin. Which also means ... just leaving a body's SOI by going retrograde = going slower = catching up = you'll also re-enter the SOI; unless your Pe has become low enough to transit to, for instance, Eve. TL;DR - "just" leaving a SOI prograde/retrograde, there's no need to burn back into it at all, you'll fall into it automagically.

Some errors (the correction of which will greatly supplement your facility with exo-atmospheric transportation of all varieties. I'm in loquacious mood): 1. 3 909s do not give you "bonus ISP". They all have exactly the same ISP because they're the same engines. They REDUCE your deltaV because although you have the same ISP you have to carry around more mass to get it (three engines instead of one). The only thing three engines gives you is more thrust. 2. Radiators are not good for re-entry. If it's 2,400 degrees OUTSIDE (alright, you said m/s, but I'm making a point) the last thing you want is radiators bringing it inside. Hint: heatshields are insulators

Which whitehouse? There's a nightclub next door to my ex-wife's place called that. Is he (Miguel; obviously I'm not interested in anyone calling themselves el presidente) coming to England?

Moderators, please lock this thread. You can move along. There is nothing interesting at the South pole. Santa wouldn't use a heavy-duty laser to destroy anything approaching his secret workshop. Especially not the killazap 2000 model. These are not the 'droids you're looking for. Oh, er yes, it's just a bug, that's right.

Alright - the .PDF is back. https://www.dropbox.com/s/45q1qu1scdvx5sd/Induction%200.90.zip?dl=0

Applause and accolades for testing and reporting what you can anyway :-) There's always more options than can be fully explored; that's what's kept us here for so long, after all.

Sorry people. Not sure what is happening here. The documents are gone from dropbox, so I'm re-uploading them. When I can find them ... Be warned though that this is a version 0.90 document. Most of the information should still be relevant but some will not be. Don't like the look of the example rocket, for a start ^^.

Are not all the 'extras' of which you speak also needed for disposable liquid-fuel boosters? If you're comparing core + SRBs to core-only it's not really the same test. How do SRBs compare to LF(O)s in a similar configuration. (My view has generally been that SRBs aren't worth it in that, once you need/want boosters you're better off with the controllability and longer burn-time of LFO. Since you're coming from the opposite view I'll be pleased to be proved wrong)

I am angry that Squad continues to use the term 'media' when the only medium you promote, encourage or - in this case - allow is video. Please consider either calling yourselves the Medium Group or endorsing other forms of media.

I really wish I'd seen this thread before it degenerated. For nearly all of the things mentioned - Unity/Engine, mods, can be done with KSP as it is. For most of the rest - hello! This is computer business. If it doesn't make sense it doesn't compute. If it doesn't make money it isn't business. For the remainder - thank you for the rare breaths of sanity. FWIW: Squad have done a brilliant job of producing a brilliant game. It's not perfect but it is (within the limitations of computation and the engine) perfectable. Version numbers are as much about marketing strategy as they are about features and functions (let alone bugs!) so the first question is ... what would make Squad want to stop 1.xxxxx and make KSP 2.0 anyway? There are three reasons - 1) They stop development of KSP and do other things (I'll pre-order as soon as they announce) then come back to it in a few years. 2) There is such a huge, fundamental, change in how they develop KSP - new engine, entirely different game-dynamic or even new solar-system - that it really needs to be called a different version (purchasing decision reserved, but probably) 3) They keep developing KSP as it is but want to stop free updates so we all buy again (I'll pay). Withiin KSP 1.xxxx what I'd like to see most is more procedural parts, such as fuel-tanks. That's already moddable and doesn't take too much from the easy construction mechanics which are an essential part of KSP, as far as I can see.

Nice plane. Use a SSTO rocket though. Easier to design, easier to build, easier to fly. MUCH easier for large or awkward loads. Harder to land accurately and uses more fuel. Fuel is cheap.

I am updating A Complete Beginner's Guide as Volume 1 of a series, also to incorporate Exploring The System. Somewhat hampered because Squad have refused copyright permission to use screenshots from the game, although they do allow commercial use for videos. Updating manuals is a real effort, especially as Squad won't allow anyone writing one on the 'media' team - only people who make videos - so you can't get early access to releases. Bottom line is they REALLY don't want anyone to write a manual!

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Ascent ships on fire off the shoulder of the launch pad. I watched I-beams glitter in the dark near the Armstrong memorial. All those moments...will be lost in time. Like tears in the rain. Time to die. [And remember a few things, i) SSTO does not mean 'spaceplane', ii) life is better if you don't rely on a 'score' from someone else, iii) a marketing company that doesn't know copyright law or how to communicate is not a great investment, iv) I'll probably be back anyway in a month or two, ragequits are like that (although probably under a different name, as I expect a forum ban for publishing KSP user-guides), v) it's all only a game]

So do you have any advice for after getting To Orbit? There's Eve, Gilly, Duna and Mun to get to yet?

Sounds slow; don't forget all the time you're trying to gain height you're fighting gravity, and gravity always wins. As cantab said above, that advice is outdated. Terminal velocity is so high now that you're unlikely to be able to reach it unless you are only climbing very slowly but accelerating quickly horizontally. Full-throttle or you're carrying more engines than you need. Stage them off or get them working! On Apollo: note that they cut the centre engine one minute before jettisoning the whole first stage. Given how much more complex staging is in real-life than KSP, think of the extra work it would have taken to just jettison that one engine, better to hang on to it for a minute even if it isn't helping. I've now seen a few people though who are saying they are getting good results with an almost-continuous low-thrust circularisation burn while climbing to Ap instead of cutting throttle and cruising to it. With this technique Pe is already above-ground, orbit possibly almost circular, at an altitude of 50km which leaves very little for the final circularisation at Ap. Whether this does indeed require less dV and, if so, what TWR regime is best, is not something I've investigated much because MJ does most of my launches these days, I'm busy. [ETA: and I MJ because I test my designs by hand first, and hand-over once they launch well enough to autopilot boringly well]

Don't even get me started on why we have to do this 'click on two parts' thing (no idea!), but the SECOND one you click will become the new root, not the first. You can click the port, move the mouse off it and back to it, then click again. It's fairly easy to check for subassemblies - when you click on them to create a clone, the only node that will show will be on the root (by definition). In fact, it shouldn't even let you save anything as a subassembly unless it has at least one free node on its root.