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By adding them to the 'further modding' list. There are quite a few things I will want to show on the predicted trajectory using interactive markers (you should be able to click on them to get more details). Examples include aerodynamic events (free molecular flow to fluid flow transition, Mach numbers, instability), stationkeeping burns, long-duration burns (start and end). A maneuver node can be such a marking. When tweaking it, the new trajectory is computed using the dynamic integration (I really don't like this name, can someone come up with something nicer?). As for the interface for tweaking it, I think I'll go with a window and sliders; the current system has ergonomic issues. An interesting question is that of the axes. In stock KSP, we are always in a Keplerian orbit, so it makes sense to see burns as a linear combination of prograde, radial and normal. This will also work for strongly bound orbits. For weakly bound orbits, other axes may be useful. Remember that double precision limits the size of the system. The resolution with a 53-bit mantissa at the aphelion of Pluto is 0.8 mm, so you can't do much bigger. If I were to use extended precision (which is slower, as x87 is a scalar FPU, but I don't know how critical performance will end up being), the resolution at 1 light-year would be 0.5 mm. This would be much nicer for RSS. If performance really isn't an issue, I could try double-double (implemented in software, so an order of magnitude slower), which would give me an error of 0.01 mm at the edge of the observable universe (though for systems that big you'd really want GR, and I don't want to look at the curvature of that rabbit hole). I could talk about IEEE 754 quads, whose error at the edge of the observable universe would be 87 nm, but this is getting rather silly unless you're interested in molecular dynamics at the scale of superclusters. Anyway, I'm not currently in the planet-making business, and I hear PFCE is rather buggy (e.g. compatibility with FAR or lack thereof). I'm not sure if the problem of making a fully functional star, i.e., a star which is a light source, feeds the solar panels, etc. has been solved either.

The Fox Terrain Avoidance System v1 A script that uses the kOS onboard computer mod Disclaimer: This is an experimental script that uses the kOS mod. You must have the kOS mod installed for this script to work. This script is not a stand-alone part or plug-in. This script currently only works for ground based vehicles and is offered here for demonstration purposes and to foster discussion, collaboration and inspiration. This post has a lot of words because it is explaining what the script does and encourages discussion on how to make it better. The FTAS is a script that is loaded into the kOS part and runs within the kOS environment. Right now it only works on ground vehicles but it demonstrates that terrain avoidance for craft landing on the Mun or other body can exercise a level of ground avoidance reasonably reliably. This script demonstrates that a ground vehicle can be automatically controlled, without any intervention, to seek flat terrain and to stay on and within the vicinity of flat terrain - a crucial ability for any landing vessel that does not want to tip over! Here is where I talk about the theory of the FTAS system. In brief, the game engine does not allow any craft to evaluate the terrain in front of it, but the script constantly monitors the height of the terrain directly below it and the height of the terrain a few meters behind it. By doing this, the vessel constantly evaluates the changing nature of the terrain. If the terrain immediately below it is the same height as the terrain a few metres behind it, then there is a good chance the vessel is over flat terrain and a landing is acceptable. If the terrain varies by a large degree, the vessel is probably positioned over a steep slope and a change direction is required. If the vessel continues changing direction and continues scanning for flat terrain, it will eventually find an acceptably flat plateau to land on. In this demonstration, I have a rover running the FTAS on board with mechjeb keeping the rover at a constant 9 m/s. The rover has found a flat depression and no matter how many times it approaches the lip of the depression, it decides it should not leave the grasslands it is on, turns around, and returns to the centre of the depression. Youtube of my development version with random debug information on the screen: The green line shows the path the rover has taken. I had the screen capture running for a long time and there are a lot of green lines and the rover stays contained within the depression. If this were a lander looking for a landing spot, I'm very confident it would have stayed within the boundary of the depression during the descent and would have landed safely on the grasslands and not on the hills beside it. The algorithm is not perfect and not 100% efficient. Because it can't see in front or to the sides, it only knows the level of the terrain behind it. There is an assumption that the terrain in front of the craft is more or less the same as the terrain behind the craft. In most cases, this is true, but very irregular and sharp slope changes can confuse the script. Also, when a terrain change is needed, it doesn't know if it should turn left or right. It needs to guess and then take another terrain "probe". If the terrain is going up and not down, then its guessed wrong and turns around 180 degrees. For this reason, the script will always seek the lowest possible flat terrain. If there is a flat ledge halfway up a slope, the script will likely skip over that and continue to seek flat terrain at the foot of the mountain, sometimes right next to the mountain. The 'probe' only works in 2 dimensions - that is, one axis of travel. The craft can travel perfectly parallel along a very steep slope and it will think its on flat land. The reason why this doesn't matter much is for two reasons: a) it is very difficult and very unlikely for a craft to travel perfectly parallel for any amount of time. Thrust variance and natural ship wobble, drift means the direction of travel is constantly changing - even if by a little bit. in most cases, a change in gradient in one direction also means a change in gradient in all other directions, meaning, a lot can be concluded by measuring terrain in only one axis. I invite ideas, discussion, proposals and test scripts that can help address some of these deficiencies. Here are some (dark) screenshots showing the path the rover has taken: Screenshot #1 screenshot #2 Here are the scripts you can try out. Feel free to: - use these scripts privately any way you like; - repost modified/improved scripts crediting myself FTAS Rover v1.zip To use - open a kOS terminal and execute the following copy ftasrover from archive. run ftasrover. Ensure your ground vehicle is moving forward. Thanks to: Kevin Laity for creating the initial kOS plugin; erendrake for continuing the development of kOS; Steven Mading for being my most thoughtful critic and offering the most sound technical advice; Zephram Kerman for being my sounding board;

cant do much more, i am using a stock plane on stock points. And i have observed the missiles for the submarine aren't as powerful as someone would wish, and if you talk about float code, i have seen how several big chunks of the carrier even cutted at half can float by themselves, maybe this can be fixed by making a code or a script that forces the aircraft to float if it has X parts together. Thanks for the work you are doing, not many mod-makers would actualy answer most of the feedback users give them. I would honestly suggest for a more realistic-based aircraft carrier (4-5 wires, angled deck, maybe catapult, etc.) or to make a better way to spawn in the water due to bugs and glitches, but its up to you.

If you're going to include the parts, you might want to talk to the mod authors to make sure they're okay with you redistributing a modified version of their files.

It doesn't work with FAR yet. I've toned overheating down in the dev version already. As for progress, there are still things to do. Not to mention I didn't get a response from Cepheus yet. There are slight issues with aerodynamics, and robotic arm is untested with the latest version. Models are still being refined. If Cepheus doesn't respond before we're done with the models, there will be a public beta. If he does respond, then I'll talk to him about it. The current dev version would already be an improvement over the released one. We might soon have dev pics to show, but working out aerodynamics isn't the most spectacular thing to do. Oh, and check Dtobi's thread. He's contributing a little something as well. Also, I'll have exams in the next week, ending at 22nd. I'm afraid this means work is gonna slow to a crawl (well, it already did. I was doing integrals all day. ). After that, there might be a progress update. It also depends Ledenko's schedule, so don't hold your breath.

True For that reason Venus is so important to science too. You are right about the 50% (quite less). I dint found it when I search it. I retract. Good analisys. But that was my real example? That is the only way? How I said. ECONOMICS IS NOT SO SIMPLE. Is like saying that hot air rises over the cold, and from there try to simulate the entire global climate. First you will not bring 5T of diamonds, it will be 5T of each expensive element or product that you found or develope in venus. In case diamonds are so easy to get. Then you will have that DeBeers would become in the main investment. You personally not need to do nothing, Nasa or other agencies are not the ones that would make money mining or wherever. You just build it, and they will come. Now you may think that it would not be good for DeBeers get so much diamonds becouse that would get down the price. That would be stupid to think. In that case they should stop all mining in earth and weight to the price market rise. First, Diamonds has a big margin of profits than even if they price gets down, the earnings are huge. But if the diamond price gets down a lot of companies would start to use it for their products to improve their quality. So the price rise again! Lets change a little, now lets talk about platine or other elements. If you bring so much of one thing. You can sell it to very low prices.. This would eliminate any other competence, so when their share prices collapse, then you buy them and control the maket. That is what China did with heavy elements. And like those, there is many other different strategies to make a business sustainable. The big true. All these resources are not renewable. Each time cost more to extract them. At the end of this century would be extracted almost all the resources close to the surfuce. For example, if you need resources that are just 30m below and you need open pit mining, then you need to remove first 30m depth multiply by many football fields in volume to start. That is not economic viable. So you reach a point when its more cheap deep 5m in venus than 30 at earth. And when that time comes, You need to be prepared with machinary already extrating resources from there. If you dont, our global economy collapse. It is like renewable energy vs Oil. It reach a point "to day" when any investment on renewable energy is more profit than Oil. This means that we never had it before to become economically viable? Not. We have it and use it since many years. But now we are ready to make the change. So debeers can get more diamonds but they dont want it? That is really silly. Diamonds are not easy to find. There is a lot of study to see where is profit to mine or not. About sulfuric acid, I never said bring that from venus! Sulfuric Acid is the most value chemical element to the industry. This mean that all manufacture process to make habitats and all you need to live there become cheaper. Also means that with extra energy, great temperatures and pressures at surfuce.. No oxigen at surface (here we expend a lot of money just to separate or remove oxide elements from metals) and acid sulfure. It becomes in a paradise for many industrial process. So you can develope products there for a tiny of their cost. Yes, you can live at craters shadows. But you also can sent a solar cell made of graphene with a brayton cycle to increase its efficiency much more close to the sun, and sent the power using a big laser aperture and a fresnel lens to focus the energy to earth. I dont know what is more efficient.

Spaceplanes and docking do benefit the most from analog control, whereas rocket flight benefits the least. If you go with a full HOTAS setup, you want to have enough buttons to never need to touch the keyboard. I used to run an X52 Pro. Now, that's a super-sensitive joystick and there is currently a Unity limitation that makes super-sensitive sticks hard to use. I personally would say go with the Logitech Extreme 3D Pro unless you really want a full HOTAS suite, but then you do begin to talk about laying down some cash (X52 Pro right now = $120-$140).

Hey I don't expect (understandably) that this suggestion actually get heard out by squad, simply because of the massive amount of suggestions in this section. However, I'd like your opinion: 1.Some member made a chart of the optimal engine to use according to the situation here: Mass-optimal engine type vs delta-v The result can be summed in this sentence: Use the atomic rocket for big payloads where twr is of little relevance and use the 48-7s for anything else. I know that engine stats are not the only thing that matters (radially attaching, height, price and most importantly part count) but the engines could probably be rebalanced much more precisely by using a data a chart like this than by guessing values by hand. Something puzzles me however: small engines as a rule of thumbs seems to mostly outperform large ones. Wouldn't it be more sensible for it to be the opposite? AFAIK IRL Rockets having a ton of miniature engines wouldn't outperform these having a couple large ones. 2. Ion engines in this game are considered to be of little use by many players because of how slow they are. I don't think their twr should be made even higher because its already unrealistically high, I actually think it should be decreased once there is a solution to decrease how much irl time you spend waiting after them. But that's not what I want to talk about. I think the ion engine should be replaced by a VASMIR engine with equal stats. I am not fond about including near future tech in the game, but according to the wiki page on this thing, its going to have a major real-life application in being used on the ISS as soon as next year, meaning adding it to the stock game would be less of a stretch than with the nerva. Its twr is higher than than a normal ion engine and most importantly it uses argon gas, which is much cheaper than xenon and can be used to justify a lower in game cost. Your thoughts?

France and the UK might fight. Stateside, I hear little talk of invasion. Oooh! -- The 700 billion dollar military budget is mostly healthcare, impeding cuts thereto. -Duxwing

Scientists tend to view knowledge as a means to understanding how the universe works. Engineers view science in terms of potential application. And economist convert those potential applications into profits to all (at least in theory) So, scientist has nothing to said about what is economic viable or not. In the same thing that economist can not said nothing about what is possible or not. Currently lauch cost to low orbit: around $12 million per metric ton. Skylon would down that number to 650000 U$S You can construct and send a rocket to launch payloads from Landis Land to Low orbit (DeltaV without ballons 8km/s) and back. In venus they need to get only the hidrogen and oxigen (both from sulfure acid). So you would had a cost close to 20 millons per metric ton (middle sette age, you already had the a big base but still the manufactured process is low develope). After that a Solar Sails sent the cargo to earth (is almost free, but it has a investment cost, lets said 5 millons per trip.) Then you have a cost of 25M to sent 5T of payload to earth. You need mine to get elements to construct the base. But in that process you also get many other things that are valuable. With the time, you separate all those things, and when some colonists go back, you use the extra free payload to sent back those things to get profits to help you to cover the costs. Just in case you have the lucky to get one piece of diamond of more than 2kg, you can sold that for 5 Billons or more. Enoght to cover many of your costs. You think that only by science interest you would be able to sustaint a colony outside earth? Not, it would die. And ever if you get enoght money to sustain it, it would never grow up. You need invesments looking for new business. Money moves montains (literally). If investments found that they can make a profits, you would have a colony in not time. Towns are made it that way. When towns does not have any good resource, die. But when they do, grows so fast that you had a city in no time. Also all the problems that you find, is becouse you are watching the problem from the earth perspective. From day live perspective. But all the things that may be seems difficulties at venus.. Are in fact benefics! Sulfuric Acid... You know that this is the most important chemical element in the industry? Sulfuric acid production is a good indicator of its industrial strength of countries. If the sulfuric acid cost rise, all consumed products rise. In one way or another are all related. (and the cost is rising) And in Venus rain from the sky! The higher pressures and heat on the surfuce can made all manufacture process that needs right that a lot cheaper. From where I can see, a venus colony would grow at exponential rate due all its advantages. It does not have any sense. http://www.kitco.com/ind/Zimnisky/images/aug202013_3.gif Also you can found who are the owners of each mine. You would find that mostly each mine are owner by 2 or 3 investment corporations. Try to find 1 company that controls more than 5% of world diamonds. Synthetic diamonds also are sale like gem, but you are misunderstanding that both source of diamonds (synthetic and mine it) works with two separate markets, industry and gem. Why? becouse size matters. When you cut a diamond to make gem. You end with many small pieces, you can make maybe other gem from those pieces and then you have dust. The cost of diamond dust is a lot lower, this dust is the one that industry use. Also made systhetic diamond dust is a lot cheaper than made big pieces. When I mention the 5T cost of diamonds, close to 20B, I was mention the average brute diamond cost. Of course you maybe find a piece of brute diamond of 2 kg, and that alone could cost like a 5T of average size diamonds. The diamond cost depends on the production cost and demand. And it does not matter where I get it, I would could sell it to the market cost. Well, it is cost efficient extract minerals from moon if you plan to stay there. But we still dont know if there is some place where we can extract water to make a self sustaint base. No talk of all other elements needed. And we already talk about all benefics of venus vs moon. So I would let it like second place and mars third. (Mars only would be good for space tourism). exhausted supply? gold? they had a lot of it. But they get more. More is always good. And not make me talk about all benefics of gold or platinum like noble metals; with plenty of uses. You dont wanna accept it, but the example is the same. You can not aply one rule of economic and try to simulate the whole thing. Economics has many rules.If you flood the market with one element, many different enterprise would arise (when before was not possible) to make good use of the new easy access and cost, so the cost would grow again. Factories some time do not use X element, just becouse they know that its production is limited, so if they use it it would rise the cost even more. Mining asteroids is very difficult for the lack of gravity. In venus you can use detonations to make holes, or many other things, to have something against what to push you it makes all operations a lot more efficient. Sure, the thing that you dont need deltaV to go out of there is important, but when you mine, you had a lot of things that you dont need "waste". Meanwhile in venus you can mine, place in one place all the things that are valueble, platine, gold, diamond, construction materials, etc, And within the time, you select and send the most valueable to earth to get other things that you need. First, we dont know how much time the silicon would face to carbon base electronics. When we already made a lot of discoveries of how to control graphene conductivity. Besides, a chip factory is ones of the most complex factories that can exist. Its very dinamic and needs a lot of things. A reduction in gravity is far beyond a benefic against all cons. Maybe far in the future is something that can be had it into account.

It's not just like different axioms, because the cartesian ontology doesn't end in reality, but in a flawed thought experiment made by Descartes. That's the root of the whole problem. If you attempt to trace the origin of your ideas, you'll eventually end up in the same place. We can talk about that in more detail if you want. It's not a claim. That's not in dispute. Changes in quantity can't effect ontological change. You don't reach the subatomic world by just dividing the atomic world quantitatively. At some point, you effect some qualitative change. Actually, the cheaters are those who claim sound is nothing else but its quantifiable properties, since they are simply ignoring the binding problem. Just think about this: how would you explain what sound is to someone who was born deaf? No matter how detailed and precise is your description of the quantifiable properties of the phenomenon, they simply never experienced the phenomenon itself. They may learn very well what the physical phenomena associated with sound are and what they can cause, they may even feel the vibration of a low frequency sound, they may even learn music theory and be able to read and write musical scores, but they just don't know what sound is. Not quite, but that's good enough. Precisely. For practical purposes, indeed, there's no problem, but then you're saying you're only concerned with utility, not truth. That's how science works, not philosophy. Sure. Frankly, if you're genuinely interested, I think you should just read the book I mentioned, Sungenis' Galileo Was Wrong. That's my starting point on the subject, and since you know the physics much better than I do, you may even figure out some sensible objections on that aspect.

I'm not saying we should use Teller-Ulam bombs for power generation, but that when people talk of breakeven fusion, they usually omit to say they mean in a small scale, controlled manner. Breakeven fusion is otherwise relatively easy to attain. By the way, what happened to Z-pinch machines? they used to be a big thing in fusion research.

You will need a Badass antenna and emitter to talk to that beast. I don't think any structure smaller than a University would have access to the resources required. The best hope would be for NASA to give all the info and hope someone somewhere has a transmitter able to communicate with the satellite.

Ok someone call Nasa for the specs, I think we could get something to talk to it.

Noooo! Don't bring facts and logic into a situation where one lets his/her emotions get out of control! Crazy Talk!!! {/end Sarcasm font}

i want to say named pipes is what they go by on windows. its pretty much the same thing as whats used on *nix. good luck finding a library that works on all platforms though. tcp/ip beats it out in this regard. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa365590%28v=vs.85%29.aspx ive tried to use them before for other projects but i was never satisfied with the results. its just so much easier to use the loopback address (127.0.0.1) under tcp/ip. i kinda like the idea of being able to use network assets if i want to (like being able to talk to a tablet or a raspberry pi). you might want to keep the loopback as the default address though. it should be pretty secure since it will never leave the local machine.

No, I don't want all engine parts separate. Merely the inlet, precooler (optional), body (burner and, where applicable, compressor) and nozzle (with or without afterburner). As for how they'd talk to each other: they'll all have to be in-line with each other, so each engine would have a dedicated intake (radial ones would be also be assigned to just one engine based on their placement). I imagine the flow to works as follows: Inlet takes in air and determines it's properties, like mach number, temperature, density, etc. Those are passed to the next part in the stack, either precooler or turbine. The precooler just cools the air, without altering it too much. Then the turbine gets fed data from the part before it and converts it into exhaust data. Nozzle gets that and adds it's own corrections (including afterburner, if present) and produces thrust from that. Every part depends on what the part before it is doing, and only that. The only exceptions would be turbofans, with inlets being fed shaft speed from the turbine behind them. Now, the engine body be the most complex part, since it'd have to account for numerous variations. Ramjet and scramjet bodies would essentially be just burners and nuclear jets wouldn't be even that (just a heating element feeding from the reactor). On turbojets and low-bypass turbofans it would be the entire compressor+burner assembly, and also pass bypass data down to the nozzle. High bypass turbofans would be the most complicated of the bunch, they'd need a special inlet model which would also produce thrust. This might be best left for later, but if done, would also easily allow making propfans and even turboprops! I can see quite a few combinations possible with those.

You basically wanted inlet, compressor, burner, etc have individual parts, that's ambitious:cool: However that would be much more complicated. How to make different parts talk to each other? Maybe I' think about it later, but for now you can assume AJE=all these parts combined. Ferram4 told me to cancel all aerodynamic forces for inlets for now, which I did, for now. As for aviation in KSP, ferram made FAR, DYJ made wings, I'm making engines, what's left would be fuselage systems(make them with real size and weight, etc.), right? I'm not sure adding scenery and airports are possible:D

kudos to bwalker1974 As many of you know by now, Squad is working with NASA--yes, THAT NASA--to create a mission pack that will involve a mission to an asteroid--an actual asteroid, not some silly on-rails mini-planet. It wasn't until now that I thought--'Wouldn't that make a great story?' So this is that story, following the tests leading up to the actual mission... For proper atmosphere, listen to 'Kingdom Hearts-Dearly Beloved' before reading. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Chapter One--The Idea K1 Observatory--Devanurary 12th, 230 AU (After Union) The last couple months had been slow. As it turned out, there was no real plan regarding the fiscal year in late 230. The plans for a Kraken Drive, while exciting, were science fiction as far as the Jedi Space Program was concerned. Wernher's suggestion of a Moho mission was shot down almost as soon as it was brought up, as had Jeb's idea for an SRB SSTO. As for Gene's EAV (Eve Ascent Vehicle), it was regarded with the same amount of seriousness as the Kraken Drive. That was why Bob was staring at the stars tonight--he wanted to help out. He thought that if he could find something in the sky to visit, the JSP could be great once again. He may have been a wimp, but he helped a friend in need. A small speck of light caught Bob's eye. He had been at this observatory many, many times, and he had never seen that speck. He zoomed in the telescope as far as he could. It slowly dawned on him what this was. The Kerbol system had no asteroid field, but the scientists had seen such things in other systems, and they always said that a very loose asteroid system might be possible. They had also said that, if they could find one, a landing might also be possible. Bob got on his cell phone and called the Director. One ring... two... three... Bob heard a yawn on the other side. The Director. "Who is it? It better be important, it's almost midnight!" "Director, I have just made the greatest discovery in the history of kerbalkind." "This better not involve sandwich making." "It doesn't..." ------------- KSC R&D Center, The Next Day There was a mumble of voices among the crowd as Wernher stepped up to the podium. News spread fast on Kerbin. Nobody knew quite what to make of it. Some said that a giant rock in the sky didn't deserve this kind of attention. Others said that this was more than a giant rock in the sky, that this might hold the key to a Grand Tour. Wernher was one of those others. He tapped on the mic to get everyone's attention. "Gentlemen, what we have here is the greatest discovery since the planets. As many of you know, Bob Kerman has found the first confirmed asteroid in the Kerbol system. From study of its trajectory, we have determined that it is not on a collision course. It is, however, close enough to put on a close-encounter course with Kerbin through use of powerful rockets." There was much more talk in the room now. This was insane, it had never been done before. Wernher tapped the microphone again. "Anyway, Congress has approved a manned mission to this asteroid, which Bob has named Unity. We will have to do many tests of many pieces of equipment, but in the end, we will land a kerbal on Unity." One reporter raised his hand. "What do you plan to call this program?" "Well, we'll need some luck, so Bob has named the program Godspeed..." --------------------------------------------------------------------- Feedback is always appreciated! Also, some pointers on what kind of tests I should do to prepare would be nice. Thanks for reading!

The ISEE-3 satellite, launched in 1978, is still functioning and its orbit will bring it back past Earth in August, and 12 of its 13 instruments are still working. Trouble is, NASA scrapped the hardware, and presumably the software they used to control the satellite in 1999. But what would it really take to be able to talk to ISEE-3 again? I assume hardware exists that is flexible enough to send the signals, and software can run on emulators, at a fraction of the costs NASA fears, but could we really? The satellite is by all accounts still in good condition, it'd be a shame to lose this opportunity...

CHAPTER 60 DUNA ORBIT INSERTION *** Commander's log, entry 130 (422 days after deactivation). In less than an hour we're going to enter Duna's sphere of influence. Then we will know whether we made a right decision. I didn't write anything here for the past two weeks. I just didn't have strength to do this. I feel very tired. Whatever the next hours are going to bring, I'm glad it's finally over. The discussion how exactly should we get into orbit felt like it was never going to end. By the time we agreed that the best option is to execute orbit insertion burn everyone got really fed up with this... *** DANREY: Jeb? JEB: Hmm? DANREY: I said we're go for a trajectory correction. JEB: You did? How much time do we have left? DANREY: Uhm, we should start 8 seconds ago actually... JEB: Damn. I'm on it. RCS online. DANREY: Just be gentle with the controls. JEB: I know how to fly, son. Done. DANREY: “Sonâ€Â? JEB: I'm sorry, I don't know why I said that. DANREY: I mean sure, you are older than me but- JEB: Forget it. How are we looking? DANREY: Hmm... well, it seems like we're going to be 1.26 million kilometers short. JEB: I see. DANREY: Nothing we can't correct. JEB: Good. You may go now, I'll take care of the rest. DANREY: Okay. Uhm... Jeb? JEB: Yes? DANREY: Did you- JEB: No. Not yet. DANREY: We need to make that call soon, you know. JEB: I know. I'm working on it. *** There were a lot of options. Duna-Ike system is unique for a lot of reasons. There are only a couple of places in our Solar System when you can try aerobraking. The Red Planet is one of them and we already used this opportunity first time when we were here. But what's really making it special is presence of Ike. Tidally locked in synchronous orbit, its mass and diameter in relation to a parent celestial body bigger than any mun. Perfect for reverse gravity assist. But even with sphere of influence so huge in comparison to its semi-major axis I weren't sure we make us it to slow down. To do this requires luck, a commodity we've run out of months ago. *** NED: Okay, let's get through this one more time. CAMBO: :sigh: DANREY: Very well. The aerobraking- MALLOCK: Do we really need to be here? It's not like we're going to vote on it. NED: Yes, we do. I'm not a pilot either but I think we all should know what we're going to do. ROZER: Yeah. NED: Shut up. Continue, Dan. DANREY: Ahem. So, aerobraking. We did it already several times, we did it on Duna. However, the last time we tried this it ended... badly. Acceleration peaked at 2.9g and the heatshield temperature rose to nearly 3000 degrees centigrade. I don't think that “Proteus†can handle something like this. Moreover, Duna's atmosphere density is so low we would have to go 10 or 11 kilometers from its surface, just like the last time, which in case of any trouble means- NED: I think we all know what it means. DANREY: Yes. So, considering this and the fact that we have only 34% of ablative material left, which we have to save for Kerbin encounter in case of any problems, the whole idea of aerobraking is just terrible. What we need to do is to perform standard orbit insertion burn, which- ROZER: 80 tonnes. DANREY: What? ROZER: Eight or maybe even ninety metric tonnes of reaction mass, that's how much this is going to cost us. We're not talking about some minor correction – this is going to cost at least 3000 m/s. It's two thirds of what is needed to get from the surface to low Kerbin orbit. DANREY: That's not true. If we use Ike's gravity well to perform reverse slingshot- ROZER: Exactly - “ifâ€Â. How come you be so sure it's a viable option? DANREY: Even if it won't, it's still safer than going through the atmosphere at 3 kilometers per second. ROZER: So you agree with me that we're going to spend 3000 meters per second. Good. DANREY: What? No! ROZER: And remember that you are talking about using the engines for a long time. With acceleration at 1g it's going to take six minutes or more. Do we have a guarantee that the fusion cores can handle this? DANREY: We don't but we don't have a guarantee than “Proteus†can survive atmospheric entry either! ROZER: Chief Ned, what do you think? Can we count on these engines? NED: For six minutes? ROZER: On full throttle. Can we count on them working in 100%? NED: … ROZER: Well? NED: No. ROZER: No, we can't. This is your answer. DANREY: We don't have to use them on full throttle! We can use 20-30% of their power if needed. We would have to just burn a little longer. ROZER: Oh really? And what if the engines fail completely during the burn? DANREY: You are concerned about the engines? What if we crash? What if there'll be some problems with ship stability during aerobraking? What if it starts spinning violently, exposing every part of it to extreme temperature? What if it just falls apart? Huh!? What then? ROZER: It may happen, yes. But RCS is working. SAS is working. With aerobraking gravity and atmosphere are working for us – we don't need engines if we have physics on our side. But if the engines fail we may never be able to enter the orbit or get an encounter with Kerbin. Never. JOHNDON: Wait, what if we just used b-both ideas? We can slow down a little using the engines and t-then complete orbit insertion with aerob-breaking. NED: That's actually a good idea. ROZER: No, it's not. The engines still may fail during the burn. DANREY: We can minimalize the time needed for burn using gravity assist from Ike. The Oberth effect- ROZER: Is worthless if you can't get close enough to a celestial body. We may not get encounter with the mun at all. MALLOCK: Wait. I have an idea. What if we send LAMGML directly to Duna surface? “Proteus†will stay on free return trajectory and either way only LAMGML has to land in the base. DANREY: Well, considering our inclination and base localization... and delta-v needed to land, take off and catch up to “Proteusâ€Â- ROZER: It's not going to happen. It's our only lander. And what if something happens while LAMGML is trying to catch up to the ship? The last thing we need is more casualties. NED: You dare?! You dare to talk about casualties?! MALLOCK: Hey! DANREY: Ned, calm down! NED: Motherfraker. JOHNDON: Where are you g-going? CAMBO: I'll go with him. MALLOCK: sigh: DANREY: Damn... Anyway, these are the only options – aerobraking or insertion burn. There are no alternatives. Which means we basically have only one option, since aerobraking in our current condition is virtually lithobraking. JOHNDON: What's lithob-braking? MALLOCK: Crashing. ROZER: I can agree only in one thing – there are no other options. DANREY: So, what are we going to do? MALLOCK: Do we really need to decide now? ROZER: The sooner the better. So far from the planet it would take only few meters per second to change our trajectory. If we wait, it'll cost us more. DANREY: So what is it? Jeb? JEB: I'll think about it. *** I thought about this really hard. For every argument for one of the options there was always at least one counter-argument. The more time I spent on this, the more difficult it was to choose. And I had to choose. I run dozens of simulations with various results. Sometimes we crashed, sometimes we didn't. Sometimes the fusion cores triggered chain reaction. I started to have nightmares again. But in the end, surprisingly the decision wasn't that hard to make. To trust the lives of all of us on his idea was too much to take. I knew in my guts that this would end badly. And as long as I live, I'll do everything to make sure we won't end like this, falling in flames through the atmosphere like Icarus. I chose insertion burn. The last days before the encounter were spent on repairing whatever we can and securing everything – after months in zero gee “Proteus†was about to become a real mess if all these thing were to get caught by the grip of gravity again. Ned was doing his magic with the engines. Endless tests of RCS and SAS in dozens of scenarios. We decided not to change our periapsis – circular orbit at 400 kilometers is as good as any. We prepared the LAMGML. There were some problems with a cooling system but we worked it out. We aren't ready. But that's the best we can do. *** DANREY: I'm back. 50 seconds. NED: Could you please stop? It won't make a difference if we start the calculations 5 second later. DANREY: Sorry. JEB: Did you check them? DANREY: Yes, everyone is in position in case of any trouble. NED: There's always trouble. DANREY: Honestly, I don't know should I feel safe hearing this from our nuclear propulsion specialist. NED: You shouldn't. DANREY: 10 seconds. Now that's reassuring. JEB: Be quiet, two of you. We're about to enter target's SOI. NED: So? All we need to know is- DANREY: We're in. JEB: Calculating maneuver. NED: And? Do we have Ike encounter? PROTEUS: SIMULATION COMPLETED. DANREY: Negative. Frak! NED: What? Why? We did- JEB: We're too fast. 3,7 kilometers per second, required delta-V for a circularization burn at closest approach 3216 meters per second. NED: Is it that bad? DANREY: We have enough fuel but that's more than we expected. NED: Well, can't we do something to get an encounter? JEB: It would take more delta-v than we could gain from the slingshot. It's too late now. DANREY: … JEB: Let's run some tests – we don't have much time. *** JEB: Are you ready? DANREY: Yes. JEB: Good. Let's turn it retrograde. DANREY: SAS online. Don't you want to use RCS? JEB: We don't have that much monopropellant. We already used some kethane to- DANREY: Jeb, look! Duna! JEB: … DANREY: So close after all these months... JEB: Yes... but we're not yet there. DANREY: Don't you think we can make it? JEB: I depends on the engines, not me. DANREY: Ned said that he has done everything he can to make the work. JEB: He did. Let's just hope it'll be enough. *** DANREY: 30 seconds. JEB: Is everyone ready? NED: Aye. ROZER: Yes CAMBO: I'm ready. MALLOCK: We're ready too. JOHNDON: As s-soon as we're in range, we'll start checking the frequencies. JEB: Good. Remember to check the probes also. MALLOCK: And the station. Copy that. DANREY: 15 seconds. NED: Are you sure 25% is all you need? JEB: We made calculations for 3 m/s of acceleration, Ned. NED: Okay, okay. And Jeb? JEB: Yes? NED: In case- JEB: Don't. DANREY: 10 seconds, I'm starting the SAS. NED: Just... kodspeed, old friend. JEB: Kodspeed. DANREY: Five, four, three, SAS online, one- PROTEUS: MANEUVER NODE REACHED. ENGINES 24 PERCENT THROTTLE. JEB: Damnit! Dan? DANREY: Orbital velocity 3862 meters per second, 3196 to go. Are you feeling alright? It's only 3 m/s, you- JEB: I'm fine. Ned? NED: We're good. JEB: Time? DANREY: Two minutes twenty seconds to periapsis. JEB: Fusion cores? NED: No problem so far. PROTEUS: ENGINES 23 PERCENT THROTTLE. NED: What? JEB: It's under control – we're using reaction mass, our TWR is increasing. JEB: What is it Dan? DANREY: Nothing, no problem so far. It's just that we're accelerating really slowly. NED: You mean decelerating. JEB: It's relative. PROTEUS: ENGINES 22 PERCENT THROTTLE. JEB: How are cores looking? NED: Nominal. JEB: Really? NED: Why would I lie? They are in a surprisingly good condition, so far there weren't a single- PROTEUS: WARNING. INSTABILITY IN FUSION CORE B DETECTED. NED: Frak! I knew it was going too well! JEB: Is it serious? Time! DANREY: One minute! NED: Be quiet and let me work. PROTEUS: ENGINES 21 PERCENT THROTTLE. JEB: Copy that. Stay calm everyone, we- DANREY: Oh crap... Jeb, radiation levels are rising. JEB: What the hell? How? DANREY: I don't know, there's a spike in detectors readings... but it doesn't make sense! JEB: What doesn't make sense? Clarify! DANREY: There's no way so much of such high-energy particles can gather here! Duna doesn't have magnetosphere! JEB: Damn! We have to increase the throttle, we- DANREY: No, wait – radiation level is dropping. PROTEUS: WARNING. INSTABILITY IN FUSION CORE A DETECTED. JEB: Ned! NED: I'm working on it! JEB: What do you mean dropping? DANREY: I don't know, it's just like we flew through some irradiated cloud of- JEB: Debris? DANREY: Or reaction mass. From NTR maybe? JEB: That's impossible. DANREY: Then how do you want to explain- JEB: If it's not dangerous it's not important! Give me time and velocity – Ned, what about the cores? NED: I'm almost done with the recalibration! DANREY: Orbital velocity 1432 meters per second, 13 seconds to periapsis. JEB: Should we worry about the engines, Ned? NED: Done! Not for a next few minutes. PROTEUS: PERIAPSIS ACHIEVED. ENGINES 20 PERCENT THROTTLE. JEB: That's... great. Let's finish the burn. JEB: Dan? DANREY: Orbital velocity 1134 meters per second, periapsis T plus 50 seconds. We'll soon get into orbit! JEB: Good. Let's do this nice and easy. Any problems Ned? NED: Nothing, not at all. The fusion cores are performing better than expected to be honest. Maybe we worried needlessly? Hell, I'm almost sure now that even if we- DANREY: We're in! PROTEUS: ORBIT ACHIEVED. DANREY: We're in orbit! Velocity 907 meters per second! NED: Yes! We did it! We- what are you doing? JEB: A small test. PROTEUS: ENGINES 50 PERCENT THROTTLE. NED: Uh! DANREY: What?! But our calculations- JEB: We're already in orbit and we won't fire these engines for a long time, it's the only chance to test their performance before Kerbin transfer burn. We need to- PROTEUS: WARNING. INSTABILITY IN FUSION CORE B DETECTED. NED: There's your test! PROTEUS: ENGINES 18 PERCENT THROTTLE. NED: Uh! Are you happy now?! JEB: Yes, I am. Without- DANREY: Jeb. JEB: What? DANREY: We, uh, failed to circularize the orbit. JEB: Doesn't matter, we can always correct this. Did you hear this? We're in orbit – give me your status report. CAMBO: Thank Kod! No problems here. ROZER: RCS still nominal. JEB: Mal? Johndon? We're definitely in range now, did you receive something? MALLOCK: Well... NED: Huh, it's actually not that bad... What's going on with these fusion cores? JEB: Hush. Did you receive anything from the base? MALLOCK: No. Nothing. Not even a distress signal. It's just dead silence, Jeb. JEB: … JOHNDON: B-but... JEB: Yes? JOHNDON: B-but we didn't get anything from the sp-pace station either. And the automatic b-beacon should be still operating no matter what happened on the p-planet. This is p-puzzling. DANREY: You have our status on screen. JEB: Thanks. MALLOCK: We don't know what could it mean but- ROZER: We know very well what could it mean. And it probable mean exactly this. JOHNDON: The p-point is what are we going to do now. Shall we land and investigate the b-base? JEB: Not yet. We need check the ship before we do anything else – we have to be absolutely sure we can afford to land there. We- ROZER: Seventy five point six. JEB: Excuse me? ROZER: Tonnes. We've just used 75,6 metric tonnes of fuel. This better be worth it. NED: You little piece of- JEB: Ned, don't. We will find out about this soon enough. In the meantime, we have to prepare ourselves and “Proteusâ€Â. We're going to start thinking about landing later. And going to the surface... whatever we're going to find there, we need to be ready. Dismissed. *** MISSION STATUS ***

Wasn't exactly today, but finishing yesterday, plus a little background. I'm playing a completely stock Career, with very little play experience - didn't do any sandbox in 0.23, and only clocked about two hours play on the demo. Reverting and quicksaving are perfectly normal, but so far no transmission if any science at all is lost. Once I got the thermometer, after a quick jaunt to grab Kerbin's thermoscience, I decided to make a Mun landing, taking with me three thermometers, and planning to do my first biome-hop. That all went well-ish, if a little inefficient. Then I burned to escape. In the wrong direction (relative to Kerbin). So, almost no fuel, on a Kerbin escape trajectory, haven't quicksaved since launch. Good thing you've got RCS, Jeb, I thought. 10 monoprop in capsule, 100 in tank and another 160 from those four Roundifieds, 270 total should be just fine, right? Managed to pull out of Kerbin escape, left myself a hair away, and transmitted my EVA reports and Crew reports. So, with so little fuel, I needed to get right up to my 82 million meter apoapsis so I could lower the 11 million meter periapsis for aerobraking. 35 km should do it without being too steep, leaving me with a little over 5/270 monopropellant. 'Just' fine was right. Given that that was now 6 days or so away, I decided to leave it be and not timewarp it in for a while - get some other things done, like my first three successful SSTOs (One even put up my first orbital probe - but only barely, and I needed to quickload after I... let the plane fall back, killing the kerbal within...) and getting the first docking port research node. Started a first space station, too - but I think I'll talk more about that when I complete it. So, MunTherm's return. While up at the apoapsis, I realised that it was possible that my landing could be pretty hard, and there was a chance that my thermometers would be destroyed. Unacceptable! I had only recently learned of EVA data collection from a Youtube video, but it was worth a shot. Way up there, and for quite a bit around, thrusterpack EVA was utterly ridiculous. The frame of reference is continuously flipping and Jeb is wasting fuel trying to 'right' himself, only to 'realise' that he is now on his 'side' - I mean seriously, is this relative to Kerbin North, the lander's 'down', or gravity? KSP didn't seem to be able to decide. I noticed that I could reach two out of three from a ladder, but the other definitely required the thrusterpack, so I kept trying, quicksaving and quickloading as I lost control. Eventually, I gave up on getting the last reading this far out and (after getting the station into an okay-but-incomplete shape at 200km) warped in for an aerobrake pass. First pass was pretty normal - into atmosphere, stow solar panels, and out again a little slower. Got out and went for that last reading (much easier with an apoapsis below Mun orbit), and put my solar panels back out. So, all science in the pod, that's two surface samples and three thermo readings, meaning any return of even the slightest success means full value. Safe! Then, two more full passes - in, brake, out - before my final landing pass on this, my first multipass aerobrake. And then, disaster (almost) struck! Parachute deployed normally at 149m/s, full deployment at 500m altitude... and there's a sudden wrenching. Lack of struts was the culprit, along with using a single XL parachute to land the whole lander. If there had been radial chutes on the lander's fuel tank, or struts connecting to the capsule, most likely the rest of the craft would also have survived... Fortunately, that moment of forethought at apoapsis, that little doubt saying "But what if the lander doesn't survive?", and the watching of KSP Youtube videos saved the mission! Splashdown into the ocean, recovered - forgetting to take ocean samples, but that's fine - and that brings me up to the 300 science I need for Electronics, my first of the 300-tier technologies.

Hi guys, first post here ive played this now for about 200 hours since Dec, and I am playing career with no mods, I was wondering if this has been discussed before, as I visit the discussion board quite often (daily) and decided to register and create a topic, this may be controversial, an some what unrealistic, but instead of randomly generating planets/surfaces, why not small/large objects like alien craft/artefacts shallow caves (for science samples or 'bonus tech' from a material sample) which could give a boost in science/rocket tech, and general excitement as one orbits a planet and sees some fuzzy object lying on a planet/moon that they have not been to, this would also put more 'Discovery' into the game as apposed to just the rocket science. Just a suggestion, id like some opinions on this, and will try to respond to all answers, and talk on this subject asap, as I am currently 'in work'...... and the bosses are lurking... cheers guys.

Sounds interesting. Its always easy to talk about this in theory, but to actually pull it off is a different thing. Might be useful to practice this before .24 with contracts and actual cash use comes. Possible difficulties: - actually build a solid SSTO that can deliver some cargo and land again - Refuel without KAS mod (which would make it really really easy) - pick up new module without infernal robotics/KAS - 4 pinpoint landings in a row at KSC (for me probably the hardest part) Might give it a go, if my free time permits.

Shuttles people talk about aren't the ones you built. That's a plane strapped to a rocket capable of lifting large space station modules!