JenBurdoo

I'm in career mode, and thinking of pulling into Kerbol orbit, doing some science, and returning. Am I right in thinking this would be about 6500 delta-v? (4500 into LKO, 1000 to escape Kerbin, 1000 to return to Kerbin)? Also, how much more would it take to get to within 1 million KM of Kerbol for "low-altitude" science? I am assuming I might be able to have grav-assists. What can I expect if I do this? What would the mission profile look like? Am I going to fall behind Kerbin once in Kerbol's SOI and either have to wait for it to come round again or spend more D-v returning? And what would be preferable, going towards Kerbol or away?

Jeb just became the first Kerbal to visit the Mun in my career mode. Collected 410 science with an 8K dv orbiter (with plenty left over for orbital changes). I picked up EVA reports over ten of the biomes, plus two Goo canisters and a ScienceJr. I've gone to the Mun in a modified Kerbal X, but this is the first time I've done it in career. Planning to fly the same ship to Minmus next. With modification the craft should be able to land, too.

I hadn't thought of a midcourse correction. I like it, but would it waste more fuel than orbiting and re-inclining, given that normally I'd head for the leading edge of the moon to get gravity-assisted slowdown into orbit? The ship I'm planning on has, I think, fuel to spare, so I can probably try several different options.

It's pretty expensive delta-v-wise to get into polar orbit, which I'm trying to do in career mode to get max EVA science from Munar biomes. I can think of several ways of doing this: - I can enter polar orbit of Kerbin, then do Munar injection from there instead of matching planes/Hohmann maneuver etc. - I can circularize orbit and change my inclination at the descending or ascending nodes. - I can land on the Mun, then launch into a polar orbit (going north or south). - Or, I can extend my orbit's eccentricity, then change inclination at apoapsis, then circularize at periapsis. The last three obviously apply to Kerbin as well. Which of these is the most efficient?

I'm pointed sideways inside the crater (parallel to the rim), and all my attempts thus far to point the ship UP the crater wall have failed. I suppose I could try flying an unmanned version of the same ship (with a probe core underneath?) to a pinpoint landing to retrieve this stranded crew. In other saves, I have landed this ship with MechJeb help, but ran out of fuel before return. I'm also in career mode and have an 8000 m/s ship that should be able to orbit the Mun or Minmus and has thus far succeeded in an unmanned flyby and return. Pics later. The experience (and help from you folks) with the Kerbal XL1 has definitely made a difference, so thanks!

So you folks know, I have been able to (badly) land the Kerbal XL1 on the Mun: But now I have 700 DV left, so even if I could stand the poor thing back up, I doubt it would make it home.

I have trouble sometimes distinguishing my ship types from the missions they're on. It would be nice to be able to have multiple names assigned to a craft -- the class of rocket, the payload, the mission title. Think of it as Saturn I/V:CSM/LM:Columbia/Eagle:Apollo 11, or Titan II:Gemini:Gemini 3:Molly Brown. All of these are different names assigned to the same craft under different circumstances and contexts. Like a warship class, for example a carrier could be referred to as Yorktown class, CV-6, Enterprise, or Big E. All of which tell you specific things about it. I want to be able to separate my ship classes from my mission names too. I want to have ship classes. This can be laboriously achieved by renaming the ship once it's on the launchpad, but then it gets saved as something new. Thoughts?

One of the major problems I have with the mission log as it is now is that it focuses on the physical ship. It only notes liftoff, landing, staging and damage. After a long mission, there is nothing to indicate what happened on the mission. Days on end could have been spent orbiting Kerbin or heading to the Mun or Minmus, and nothing is said yea or nay. The minimum I'd like to see would be changes in orbital status, for example the exact time that a ship entered and left a planet's sphere of influence. I wouldn't be surprised if this will be implemented at some point, though.

OK, I was under the impression that the vanilla Kerbal X could "make it to the Mun but getting back may be an issue." This has significantly MORE delta-V and it is still having trouble getting there and back. OK, I'm still a significantly-under-average player at this point... but still.

I think this IS definitely capable of landing on the Mun. Not that I've succeeded yet -- I've exploded one and crashlanded another. I don't think it has enough to get home, though as I was down to less than 700 D/V afterward. Needs more work. More powerful launch engine(s)? The Girders work fine by the way -- they are intact though the parachute isn't.

Well, the modifications are going well so far, but I am concerned about, as several people have mentioned, the lander tipping over. However, I haven't learned to set up fuel lines yet. Would it be possible to attach the landing legs to girders sticking out from the body of the craft? How likely would they be to break?

I'm a librarian living in South Florida, working two nights a week. The light pollution is pretty bad, but I am planning a program to at least look at the Moon, Jupiter and Venus, weather permitting -- and the ISS, which according to Heavens-Above is often as bright as or brighter than Jupiter, so I should have a chance. Next flyover is February 4. I would love to run KSP at work -- especially on a screen it would grab the teens' attention -- but right now there's a lockdown on downloading anything due to viruses. In my last job, I did a children's summer program on the fortieth anniversary of Apollo 11. It was also the centennial of Louis Bleriot's flight across the English Channel, so I made it a general aviation/space program. We read the award-winning The Glorious Flight about Bleriot, and a picture book about Armstrong. We had a slideshow of weird-looking planes, made paper airplanes, played youtube space filksongs, and for a craft made edible Galileo probes out of cookies, cupcakes, marshmallows and toothpicks. It was one of the most successful programs I ever did.

The LVT30 is narrower than the Poodle, and the casing that goes around it once I reconnect the parts just... is a lot slimmer than the parts above and below it. Is that going to be a structural problem (I imagine the top collapsing on an engine too narrow to hold it), or is it possible to brace it with struts or force it to cover with a casing the same size as the sections above and below?

I like the mission log that appears when you press F3 and after a crash. But I'd like to see more features and enable it to appear after a successful landing as well. Even better would be something like the science center, where you can review your mission achievements. All the interesting statistics that appear in real mission reports, like crew names, number of orbits, number and length of EVAs, orbital parameters, launch and landing sites, and dockings. See the Wikipedia article on any individual spaceflight for examples. This would be particularly handy in career mode, especially if there's an experience feature for kerbonauts.

The RCSs are there, they're hiding behind the landing legs as the center of mass is close to that point. What would I need to boost the TWR on any/all stages? Just adding fuel seems to be a losing proposition.

Hm, you're right. Doesn't that mean it can't take off, though? It has to be over 1.0? I suppose during TLI and landing I'll have burned some fuel though. I used Alt-prtscrn, is that not preferable? Also, what's UI? Feel free, I'm very much a newbie here. Thanks for the comments!

As you can see, it's a stretched Kerbal X, with more fuel in the boosters, first and landing stages, plus lights, RCS and repositioned landing legs. I think it's got the required Delta-V. I understand Minmus can be easier to reach, so if this can make the Mun I may be able to use it for both. I just flew it (with original-size boosters) on an Apollo 8 style mission to Mun orbit and back, but wasn't sure enough of its being able to land and return. I'm fairly new to the game, so even that took some trial and error. Thoughts?

The Bumblebee, which I've seen at the Pima Air Museum - smallest manned plane ever flown (at least in 1984). Also the Gee Bee racing plane. If you want something akin to that Caproni, try the Langley Aerodrome.

Me, I'm curious to know if it's possible to have Kessler Syndrome in KSP. I doubt it, as it looks like any debris that explodes ENTIRELY explodes. One booster, one piece of debris, not lots of littler pieces.

In the sense of achieving something you didn't expect. As an example, my first week of playing, after a lot of disastrous failures to get Kerbals faster than suborbital speed, I took a page from real life and launched a Stayputnik instead. I strapped the probe to five short SRBs, hit space, and... Five minutes later, it was in solar orbit. I had no idea they were that powerful (though in retrospect, it's probably the lightness of the probe). The first object ever to leave Kerbin's sphere of influence did so completely by accident. That was also the point at which I said, "This game is awesome!"

Eh. It's really the difference between Russian and US tech. What engineers call, "the best is the enemy of the good," or the old (false) tale of the expensive orbital pen versus plain ol' pencil joke. The bottom line is that ultimately the Russians have done more in space (OK, at least since 1972, but that's 40+ years), and done it more cheaply and safely. And the Soyuz is STILL kicking around, nearly 50 years after its first flight, while the shuttle has come and gone. So they can only take three people up. They still ended up with seven space stations (vs. the US one) and about three times as many launches. In terms of quality, the shuttle is arguably better -- in terms of sheer quantity (and more importantly, reliability), the Soyuz wins hands down. And reliability is good if you're flying in space.

While I orbited once using a stock craft, my first successful orbit and safe return with something I built myself left me truly exhilarated. I even managed to do an EVA, RCS my Kerbal around, and return him to the ship. Lots of trial and error there; the last time I tried an EVA and let go, I completely lost control and view of the ship, so poor Jeb never made it home. (Well, he must have eventually, as it was a suborbital flight, but you know what I mean.) I've actually started launching unmanned craft to "rehearse" my manned missions, because it breaks my heart to lose Kerbals. I've also learned the quicksave function! Haven't done a moon landing yet, but did achieve my first orbital rendezvous with the help of MechJeb. Now to try it without.

Pretty obvious from the title. I can see mission logs, with timelines and statistics of the flight, immediately after crashing a flight, but they do not appear after a successful landing and recovery. How can I review my previous flights?