zeppelinmage

Landed on Gilly with an ion-powered lander. Also EVA'd from orbit -> surface -> orbit just for laughs.

Jeb arriving in the Eve system for his mission to Gilly aboard an ion drive lander.

Really really low level flight over Moho. I didn't have enough fuel to orbit, so I went for a low-level flyby. Moments later, the mission ended as planned with a 4 km/s lithobrake.

Yep, makes my naming the ship "express" rather ironic.

I did not go to space today. Come to find out, I had inadvertently clipped a pair of launch clamps inside my center tank. >_<

While figuring out a solution to a major SNAFU with another mission, I decided to load up my sandbox save and try for Eeloo. Because it's sandbox, and I've maxed out my Tree, there's no science here. Just three kerbonauts going where no kerbonaut has gone before. Here's the mission:

Eeloo!

I have not had a chance to install the enhanced navball yet - this week's been busy on this end. But thanks, I'll make sure the lander is as similar as possible to the original. I'll also use the navball mod, just the maneuvers would still be extremely finicky and I'd just rather do it right. Right now I'm finishing up an Eeloo mission, and after that I'll send my new lander up.

Doesn't help with maneuver nodes, though. No retrograde marker for those. I'm not nearly skilled enough to "fly by eye". I need my maneuver nodes.

Ziv, could you provide a ruling for providing "replacement landers"? I found out, far too late, that my mini lander was very poorly engineered. The weight balance issue I can deal with... what I can't, though, is the lack of probe core. Because my Kerbal is in an external command seat, the navball (and all-important blue maneuver node targets) orients to his "forward view"... and the docking port ends up "backwards". At this point, I am completely SOL, as my Tylo lander is discarded, and my Laythe lander will be useless once I rendezvous. I could send a "refueling" mission out, without additional Kerbals, that only brings a little gas and a new, better engineered, mini lander. But I'll only do so with your OK. (I won't use the new transfer unit to travel between moons, simply to rendezvous with the old lander and replace with a new one. My previous mothership will continue to be the primary vessel, only docking with the "refueler" if needed.)

Currently on a brief break, now that Tylo and Laythe are complete. I have a lander en route to Vall, but I found out during orbital maneuvers that it is a bit off balance. (Thanks, Goo Container! ) That makes burns problematic, and I worry that I won't be able to complete the mission after all. But when I get back to it (probably tomorrow night), I plan to pump a bit of fuel around to try and help alleviate the balance issue.

Yeah, the drop tanks are engineless. A weight-saving measure. Shifting fuel won't help as they're symmertically 4x; it would make it completely uncontrollable, at least for me. Which is what I ended up doing. Got most of the way there, then EVA'd to orbit. Now in the process of rendezvousing.

My last attempt was at ~10k orbit. I turn just after liftoff. My DV with tanks is 2270, without I have no idea, because my KER module is attached to them. *facepalm* Before landing I have 5775, which should be just enough to land and take off again. As long as I can get to orbit, I can use my mothership (which has like 8k) to rendesvous.

I got off the ground; left both drop tanks on and lifted off just above TWR 1. Once I was at 45 degrees, dropped both drop tanks and accelerated. Worked fine, just didn't have enough DV to orbit.

I haven't tried yet; I'll give it a shot.

SAS is on; RCS is empty; fuel is balanced; all sixteen engines are still running. Top-heavy is probably the problem... I'll also try turning off suspension.

Well, that's extremely frustrating... Finally had a decent landing; more than half of my tall tanks full of fuel; should have been enough to lift off again. But for some reason, as soon as I turn to 45 degrees, the thing begins to tumble end-over-end uncontrollably. I think it might have to do with the bugged landing... though every time I've been able to safely touch down, the lander legs penetrate the surface, causing wobble: Anyone know what, if anything, I can do to alleviate that problem? (btw, those drop tanks are jettisoned before takeoff to save weight.)

My Pe is just clipping the edge of a crater. My problem is I have absolutely horrible timing. I either bleed all horizontal speed at like 2k above the surface, or I lithobrake at 200 m/s. It also doesn't help that I put my KER module on my first droptank, so I lose all those handy numbers. I think I need at least two more attempts... one to find out exactly how long it really takes to bleed off my horizontal speed, and another to "suicide burn" it to landing.

I managed to land on Tylo today, but used WAY too much fuel. Clearly I need to perfect the suicide burn. Tonight will have to be Attempt #40.

Ah, yeah, could do. But I just completed it anyway. Found a few minutes before heading to bed, so I decided to give it another go. Burned about 200 m/s to slow down before the chutes opened, and Bill held on this time. Laythe successfully landed and re-orbited. I do hope a water landing is valid (yes, Bill touched the surface), because my trajectory refused to let me land on any of those tiny islands.

*hi-5* My intention tonight was to land on Laythe. Decoupled my lander, had Bill in the Command Seat, and sent him on his way. Re-entered atmo and popped chutes. As soon as it hit 500m and the chutes opened, Bill fell out of the lander, plummeting to his death. I think I need to perform a partially powered landing to reduce that G-load on poor Bill. But, of course, I'm out of time tonight. Next time.

My status as of today: Currently in elliptical Joolian orbit, from 800 km out to Tylo. I'll wait on this orbit until moon windows get close, then I can burn small burns to get captures for the landers. Laythe is first up, will probably tackle that tomorrow. One thing I noticed; now that my mothership fuel is becoming low, the COM has shifted quite drastically. The mass difference between my radially attached Laythe and Tylo landers is especially noticeable now. Whereas before I could get away with slight corrections at full throttle, now I have to limit thrust to 30% just so the drift is manageable by holding WASD. Also, lag is killer on this thing... 9-minute burns take an hour or more. (Which is why tonight was doing nothing but finalizing my Joolian parking orbit.) ...I can't wait until I can separate the Laythe lander and rearrange the mass. Lol.

Killing horizontal speed, then fighting gravity vertically (two decelerations, horizontal and vertical) is less efficient than coming in at an angle, killing both at the same time. Right triangle: your vertical velocity is one side, horizontal is the other. More efficient to burn along the hypotenuse.

I focused on Pythagoras since prograde vs normal is a right angle. KE = 1/2mV2 That makes much more sense. And reading the wiki... So Oberth can basically halve the delta-v requirement relative to not having a body present at all. Which explains the above, and the fact it is always advantageous to perform as many burns as possible as close to your parent body as possible.

a2+b2=c2. I didn't think Oberth would make a 2000 m/s difference... and the trig wouldn't double the cost either.