Search the Community

I need to get back onto manned misisons soon as possible. Writing about probes is killing my writing style, which is quite apparent (Check out the differences of my manned flight and probe chapters...) I'm truly sorry about the poor quality of the latest chapter, as there is little to nothing to do with probes. After all, they can't talk, they have nothing inside (No likeable characters = No drama), and just provide science. I also need to shift the focus more away from the National Astronautics Adminstration to the Royal Space Agnecy and the Great Union Space Programme. I'm trying to make everyone a protaganist. Yes, the General Secretary of the Party is a protaginist, the Emperor of Roboda is a protaginst, President Madfield is a protagnist, everyone is a good guy. I'm also going to force in some factors like politics and militarism.

Dunan-X - The Arrival "I still can't get a lock on Kerbin, Jeb. The heatshield for the rover is blocking the high-gain." "OK, thanks Dosby. Just send them something short on the low-gain so Gene knows we made it past Ike. No time to turn the ship to transmit now." Great. Another design flaw. First there was the unplanned encounter with Ike (Why did they bother with the high approach if they were going to hit Ike anyway?), and now this. Not that any of it bothered Jeb. Never did. The whole world could be exploding around him and he'd still keep smiling along. Bill wasn't as happy. He hated these long burns, and didn't look forward to nine minutes of strange noises and heavy vibrations. At least they weren't trying to aerobrake this collection of junk. And maybe it would drone out the two CCHR highlanders and their strange language. It'd been driving him slightly batty for the last 55 days, not understanding half of what anybody was saying. Bill pulled his "don't hit this by accident" post-it note from the transfer stage's controls, which garnered an odd glance and a snicker from Jeb. "What? Can't be too safe." Jeb kept grinning, a grin you could hear across the ship's PA. "Ok dudes, this ride's about to get bumpy. Make sure you're strapped in. Duna capture burn in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Burn!" He motioned to Bill, who hit the throttle for the main engines. The NERVAs started up perfectly after almost 50 days in the cold, and suddenly the kerbals were punched into the back of their seats. Random bits of floating debris pinged along the back of the capsule. Or was it the bottom? "This outta wake up old Shep!" Nine minutes felt like thirty. The drive section of the Dunan-X was designed with the limited availability of nuclear fuel in mind, and only featured 4 of the fancy NERVA engines. When you’re mass is in the “several hundred tonnes†range, those four little engines can take a little while to do much of anything. Still enough to give you a kick after weeks in microgravity. When the burn was finished the Dunan-X was in a nearly-perfect 400km by 100km orbit inclined at 45°. Just like they'd planned. All the random bits of junk at the bottom of the capsule started to float forward again. "OK, Bill, lets get the satellites deployed so we can see what we can see. I'd like to get down to that big red rock." Jeb unsnapped his restraints and floated into the back cabins of the ship. Bill looked down to see Shepson asleep in the lower seat. He'd slept through the entire capture. Bill could only shake his head and set about polluting the Duna system with satellites. -- Deploying the MP-SMC-1 wasn't very easy. They put the craft off-balance at Ike when they dropped the first microsat. Bill decided it'd be easier to fly it remotely and at one-thirds throttle. The good news was it didn't take nearly as much fuel to get it into a polar orbit as Bill had feared. Thank you, lower Dunan gravity. The MP-SMC satellite array is a relatively simple solution for planets without a communications and mapping network. The package consists of three micro satellites attached to the “mother†MP-SMC satellite. The three microsats can serve as communication uplinks or mapping satellites, and relay data back to Kerbin via the mother satellite. The mother satellite also serves as a local router, directing in-system communications efficiently. The package is topped off with a healthy booster, allowing the satellites to deploy into nearly any desired orbit. A message from Kerbin crackled on the radio momentarily, then Gene's voice came through clearly. "DX, this is Cape. We're not sure what you meant in your last message by 'Something Short,' and we're hoping you haven't encountered major electrical issues. Please respond when you receive this to advise on your Dunan capture burn. Cape out." "That guy has no sense of humor" remarked Jeb as he bounced back into the cabin. “We’ll have to wait for the first surveys before we narrow down our landing options. With our orbit, I expect they’ll want us to go for the Category-B sites in the north. Night landings make for bad T.V. But first we need to finish our circularization burn." In the dark, naturally. "And get those satellites working." The orbits after everything was deployed. Four of the microsats will move into a pseudo-Molniya orbit and become communications satellites following the completion of their initial mapping mission. With Ike guarding Duna-sync orbit, Molniyas are the best option for reliable commsats. Take On Duna (Descent) "Look Jeb, I don't think this is safe. It has an automated landing system for a reason." Bill knew this would happen. It was inevitable. Almost as though the mission planners expected it when they added the rover to the mission payload. Here they were, in orbit around Duna, a million kilometers from home, and Jeb was about to do something stupid. "Jeb we haven't even finished the satellite surveys. If something goes wrong we might not be able to find you. It's a big planet." "Hey, we named it Lucky for a reason, right? There's still an open seat if you're game Bill. It'll be one heck of a ride!" "You're hopeless Jeb. Just be careful." The sound of the rover pulling away from the Dunan-X was jarring. After hundreds of Kerbin days in empty space, the most noise they'd heard were the strange sounds that worked up the spacecraft from the main engines. This noise was more of a snap and a shriek, followed by the sound of fairing tethers smacking the side of the ship. Bill just shook his head and returned to the surveys. Only a few more passes then he could join his mad friend on the surface. As usual Jebediah was heavy on the retrothrusters, getting the Rothar lined up for its entry onto the Dunan stage. "Lucky" they called it. Lucky for Jeb they'd decided to install a heat shield at the last minute, otherwise his trip would be warm and short. Part of the way through the burn Jeb used the rover’s self-righting mechanism to kick the upper fairing away. Don’t want to run into that on reentry. Entry? Retroburn complete, Jeb sat back in the driver's seat and took in the very unique Dunan sunrise. “Hey Bill!†“Yes Jeb.†“You see that big mountain just over the horizon? We should drive over to that when we get the chance. Shouldn’t be more than a day or two. Looks like it reaches up into space!†“Whatever, Jeb. Just keep us updated on your reentry and landing, ok?†What a wet blanket. "C’mon Bill! This should be more fun than my Mun landing! I’ll call you when I find the nearest snack machine." Jeb kicked back and braced for the awesome fire and light show of reentry. Entry! First Kerbal on Duna! With style! Always count on Jebediah to make a crazy theatrical entrance. Enter Jeb, stage sky. Next Year's Model Time hasn't stopped back on Kerbin, where the engineers just finished testing the vessel for Bob's mission to Vall, and were proceeding with launch and orbital assembly. First up was the crew lander. The XKV-2 lander is capable of returning from most of the moons in the Kerbol system, and a couple of the planets. While not as roomy as the Dunan-X, it makes up for the lack of amenities with a noticeable reduction in mass. Lightweight parachutes are included for emergency use only. The assembly launches were all unmanned, and crews will launch to finalize the ship at a later date. Here's a fuel pod being launched. Just imagine there's a nice fairing on that. The drive segment proved the most difficult to get to orbit. Initial plans were to include only one of the fuel pods and have the main drive use larger tanks. This necessitated the creation of a larger launch vehicle, dubbed the Heron XK. Unfortunately the rushed design failed, resulting in a catastrophic (and radiation-spewing) loss. A quick design revision (and a hushed nuclear waste cleanup effort) and the new drive section was within the limitations of existing and proven launch hardware. Two of the six nuclear engines were salvaged from the failed first launch, the other four were robbed from another (now delayed) program. The change necessitated the inclusion of a second as of yet unbuilt fuel pod, bringing total module count to four. The new drive section was launched without a hitch. Initial assembly complete. Presenting the newest ship in the KSA's Interplanetary Exploration Fleet: the "Axiom of Choice." Total mass in current configuration: 165t. Current part count: 128. Each additional fuel pod adds 55.3t and 20 parts. The lander stage was developed from the proven Dunan-X design, with a reduced part count and a lower mass for operations on smaller moons. The main drive stage features a 50 percent increase in thrust over that used for the Dunan-X. The modular design allows for the inclusion of any mission payload. The fuel pods allow the ship to expand to meet any need. This is truly next year’s model of Interplanetary vessel! The first mission planned for the AoC is shake-down run to the Mun and Minmus. By then construction of the revised fuel pod will be complete, providing enough fuel to reach and return from Vall with the mission payload. With the Axiom of Choice launch and initial assembly complete back in Kerbin orbit, it was time to send up the inspection and final set-up crew: Bob. Gene had offered to delay the mission until after the Dunan-X landing, but Bob refused. “I’d rather watch it from orbit. I hear there’ll be fireworks over Kerbin City.†So while Jeb was busy descending to Duna, Bob was headed skyward from Kerbin. Night launch, as is my custom. This was only the second launch of the Peregrine-based Eala, and everything went perfectly. First rendezvous with the Axiom of Choice was almost two orbit away, and Bob would be back over KSC and Kerbin City just in time to watch the Dunan-X landing celebration from space. The fireworks weren’t as impressive as he’d hoped, but his ship? His new ship? That’s pretty. Now if only he wasn’t so terrified by EVA. (The Eala 2 was my last launch in .21. Very smooth flight.) Take On Duna (Awakening) - Jeb Jeb awoke to a terrible headache. He couldn't remember much of the night before... was it something he ate? What was up with the buzzing sound? The sun was spinning overhead in an agitated way. And bright. Too bright. Thinking about it made his head hurt even more. He crawled around for a bit, decided that wasn't working and pulled himself using the walking stick he was carrying. Walking stick?!? He hobbled around using the stick, taking in the scenery, trying to shake the cobwebs out of his mind. Why was everything so red? And what on Bop was that noise! The Rothar had landed hard. Jeb was knocked unconscious when the rover’s chutes deployed, snapping him back with near-lethal force, causing the heat shield to be jettisoned early in the process. (He was lucky to be alive.) The whole reentry was a bit strange to him anyway. He expected flames, and wind, and noise. The air on Duna was too thin, and it caught him by surprise. He’d disabled the automatic landing system so he could choose the best landing spot, so instead of a soft, RCS-cushioned landing, the rover hit the ground at 20 meters per second. The unconscious Jebediah was thrown from his seat. That infernal noise! Jeb violently smacked the side of his helmet twice, then glared at the empty Dunan wasteland. Nary a green thing nor a blue thing to see. And of course he’d packed only a few small snacks. Had to make room for this walking stick. Flag! Where did that come from? Flag! Right, flag. Jebediah Kerman, First Kerbal on Duna! (Maybe.) Jeb remembered he had a radio. And friends in orbit waiting for him to call. "Hey Bill! Got a landing target for you! Big flag, says 'First dude on Duna' or somesuch." Jeb noticed the buzzing went away when he had his hand over the push-to-talk button on the side of his helmet. He played around with it a bit before he realized the problem. "Good to hear from you Jeb. We were starting to get worried. Send us your coordinates and I'll get started running the numbers for our landing." "Sure thing, Billyboy! I'll get to it right after I patch this hole in the side of my helmet!" (I had to fight KSP over this landing. The collision mesh for the self-righting legs is apparently /too/ close to the chairs, which was causing Jeb to be ejected 500m above the surface. Two attempts later I realized I needed to leave the legs extended, but even then the landing was rough. The Rothar flipped, ejected Jeb as debris, then came to a stop upright a short distance away. I had to persistence edit Jeb back to an EVA state.... perhaps the landing really did kill him? Not today. This won’t be an issue in .22, as the update has nerfed the landing legs, making the self-righting design useless.) Landing the Dunan-X - Bill It was white knuckle time for Bill. That last bump felt like it was more than just air. After 60 days in a vacuum even the thinnest atmosphere felt like sludge. The sound of the wind rushing past the lander’s windows was reassuring though. Sounded like reentry on Kerbin. Sounded like home. But Jeb was on the surface with a cracked helmet and probably a concussion. No time to waste. No time to screw up this landing. “What is that eeediot pilot of yours thinking he is doing now? Glupek! [some unintelligible sentence]†Shepson just shrugged and went back to lazily watching the fast-approaching Dunan landscape. It was the most he’d heard out of Luton since they broke orbit. Luton still had a stiff accent, and the only other Highlander in the area was back in the orbital module. No idea what that rant was about, but he was more curious what happened to the parachutes. He thought there’d be more of them. The chutes took too long to deploy. And since they were still reefed they weren't doing much. The geeks back at KSC had warned Bill he'd need to land on flame, but he didn't think he'd also need to kill his lateral movement with the engines too. Bill decided to trust the guys with the glasses and slide rules and punched the landing gear. Right as the drogues opened up. The main chutes were less subtle than the drogues, and knocked around everything that wasn’t bolted down. Bill was increasingly nervous. Time to throttle up. No, wait. Coming in too fast, throttle up! 30m/s, still too fast. 25m/s. "It was never this hard in the simulations!" he screamed. Think of the open mic, Bill. Calm yourself. 20m/s. 30 meters.... [bOOM] That one hurt. All the bumps and fake gravity from the main drive were nothing compared to hitting the ground at speed. The landing legs took some of the force (and prevented any real damage), but they also caused the ship to bounce into the air. Bill was struggling to keep it upright. The chutes cut. The ship fell like a brick. [booM] Another bounce. You couldn't see outside through the fire and smoke or the sand kicked up by the engines. [screeeeeeee] The legs were skidding across the dune, gouging four neat trenches. Bill killed the engines to stop the hovering, hands still gripping the controls tightly. The ship stopped shaking. All the gauges read zero. Shepson yawned audibly. "Are we down yet?" The Dunan-X had arrived. -- It didn’t take Jeb long to drive the half kilometer to the landing site. It did, however, take him entirely too long to find a spare helmet that matched his old one. The rest of the crew had managed to do their “first so and so on Duna!†ladder descent. Interviews, big speeches, famous phrases. Jeb rubbed the inside of another helmet from the storage bin and tossed it aside. Not the one. “Jeb, they’re all the same! Just, c’mon, you’re holding up the flag ceremony!†Bill was growing impatient as usual. Time to go outside and wear a fake smile for the cameras. If they could see it through the cheap space helmet. From left to right: Dosby Kerman of the ISC, Luton Kerman of the CCHR, Bill Kerman, Shepson Kerman and Jebediah Kerman of the FSK. The plaques on their respective flags read “In Unity for all Kerbalkind†or some equally motivating phrase in the language of their respective nations. We think. (No one really bothered to check the translations before shoving them on the ship 70 days ago.) (Yes, I had to edit in the different flags in the persistence file. It'd be nice if KSP allowed us to choose the flags at planting, but I'm happy just to have them now.) The Dunan-X was my final 0.21 mission, bringing the Ninth Cycle to an end. There will be a short epilogue before I jump into .22. Thanks for reading!

Has anyone gone up that tower on the island yet? Talk about a workout.. btw, Jeb only fell down three times on the way down..

O how fun it is to hear people talk about things the think they hear on TV. Ofcourse it's about funding. How else are you going to pay for your research? What do you think happends with it? Researchers aren't bank directors getting bonusses while the bank is in debt buddy. And how do you think you GET funding? By having a good idea! How do you get a good idea? Well, start by thinking of something that isn't know yet, and wanting to know it. Wait, I think I know a single word for that. I think there's a Mars rover named after that word. Which is up there to find out things we don't know Now would you mind pointing out the part where that is BAD thing? This is a game about creativity, reaching for the stars! Who the hell are you to say that someone else is not ALLOWED to do something creative in theyr own single player game?

It's exactly what the title says. So go ahead, talk about your dreams!

Talk about coincidence. I did not do another burn since the trans-Munar injection btw.

Well, it's how most 'real physics plausible' warp drives would work. (Like the one NASA wants to make.) Mostly because conservation of energy and conservation of momentum mean that if you go from Earth orbit to Jupiter orbit a lot of energy has to some from somewhere. It's also explicitly how hyperdrive works in Larry Niven's Known Space books, and a few others. Most Sci-fi franchises don't talk about it, because the relative velocity (and distance, really) between planets and stars is the kind of thing the writers don't want to worry about.

I find the shilly-shallying of the colonials rather tiring old chap. Can't we talk about something civilised, like cricket?

At zero or a positive increase will cause the chute to deflate and fold. It is cut to avoid all those nasties that I mentioned. (Well it is cut because the game can't collapse the chute and ropes on top of your ship or have it flutter around. The game engine does not support it from what I understand.) What I'm suggesting is that if you had watched your vertical speed indicator more closely you could have seen that was going to happen and either cut your throttle or decrease it to avoid your chute going away. i almost had that happen to me last night. (Never talk to your wife and fly at the same time). I did catch it in time to avoid the chute from being cut. also, the games does not do rope physics.

Love this mod! I'm kinda RPing the research required for it right now by trying to finish the tech tree before it's released - and I'm no Manley. I had to send rescue missions out for my initial flights to the Mun and Minmus, and now I need to rescue the guys sent to rescue Jeb from the Mun. At least he has two other Kerbals to talk to now.

Sumghai, Weren't you at one point thinking about doing KASPAR integration on the warehouse module? If not, you should certainly talk to the guy. Having that integrated with FuzTek would be insanely awesome. Optimizations are looking fantastic. That plus .22 equals unrivaled megastations.

Does this work in 0.22? Does anyone use it, for that matter? Also, could you talk to BobCat about the models? He could really use a plugin like this for Buran, and probably could provide an excellent model.

I have had issues with the ASAS drifting on me in .21 as well as in .22. It will not always hold it's heading dead for me and sometimes will meander off course even if the craft is capable of righting it's heading. I figured this was just an adjustment to ASAS to make you pilot more but the way you talk it's closer to a bug.

Issue is - players instead of playing and launching expeditions to Jool prefer just sit at launchpad to get all upgrades. Need to give them option to take all upgrades from start if they so desire it or to make every planet give only fixed amount of science. Or just don't care about such players. It means don't use any "slowly produce science". I'm talk about "issue" if someone want to have it.

I see there's still "ASAS talk". SAS is a function. Parts are called IRW and IAS. IAS has lost its purpose and exists only for compatibility with older saved crafts. Here's a thread about the whole issue.

10/10 oh yes so we can just but a rating bow and say we did rate the avatar and still talk about stuff right....

Plenty of talk about re-entry affect and re-entry heat, but what about launch effects? I think some nice puffs of steam (like a from a water sound supression system) and smoke on launch would look really cool, even if it was kinda pre-programmed to reduce particles and frame rate drop etc. Anything would be appreciated

Yeah, I am pretty stoked about this. If I could use the Remote Tech line of sight and delay with stock looking dishes and the kOS scripting functionaly together I would be so happy. That really has to be an ideal combination. No need for kOS to do range requirements when something like Remote Tech does it really neatly and nicely and no need for Remote Tech to develop a flight computer when kOS is doing that job in a very comprehensive way. There was even some talk of information maybe being relayed by orbiting probes that do not have a continuous line of sight. However, just the above would make KSP quite a different game. More realistic, a lot harder but more rewarding and entertaining. I prefer two mods doing what they do best, instead of them both trying to do each other's part (with all due respect) half assed.

There's already two whole pages of in-depth docking guides, and who knows if you'll even read this, but damned if I'm not gonna try. Welcome to MockKnizzle's Kwik 'n Durty Docking Guide. No mods needed. So. Step 1: Rendezvous. We already have something up in space to dock with, right? Cool. Let's say it's in a nice, simple 100km circular equatorial orbit. Awesome. Now we're ready to launch, yeah? What we're gonna do is wait until the target is somewhere in the neighborhood of 400km out (you can see the distance to target if you hover over it in map view), make sure we have a launch vehicle with some spare dV once we hit LKO, and light that sucker. We're gonna launch into a nice, easy circular orbit just outside the atmosphere. 75km is totally fine. Once we're up, we wanna check and see where we ended up relative to our target. Hop into map view. Our ship should be somewhere pretty close to where our target is, a little ahead or behind doesn't matter. Now, what we wanna do is find a node, either ascending or descending, and plot our rendezvous transfer there. I like to match planes first with a little purple-triangle action, and then after that, simply pull on that green prograde widget until you get a close approach (typically something less than 2km, be as precise as you want). Burn it. Sweet deal. We're now on a rendezvous course. What now, you ask? Step 2: Docking. , did you see how I set that up? So slick. Well, we're now hurtling through the cosmos on a near-intercept course with our target spacecraft, but we'd really like to stop by for some tea and not zoom past at hundreds of meters per second. So what we're gonna do here is wait until we're nice and close (hopefully within the physics load distance of 2-point-something km), align ourselves with the retrograde velocity indicator cause we're already in target mode (you better be!), and burn to kill our relative velocity. Now, be careful when I say that, cause I don't mean want to stop entirely - we just need to scrub off enough relative speed that we give ourselves some time to maneuver. Docking is a continuous process, you never just stop completely.Say we're coming in at a relative velocity of 120m/s at 2km out. We're gonna wanna slow down gradually to something more manageable, first like 50, then 20, then 10, then 5, then 1m/s. Our rate of closure is gonna depend on how far we are away, so we'll slow down more as we get closer. If you're paying attention to life and the navball, you'll probably notice that there's those nice little pink direction-to-target indicators, and also that the relative velocity indicators don't match up with them. We need to fix that. Since we're in the process of slowing down and we're typically oriented retrograde, we'll talk about "pushing" the navball indicators around. If we thrust with our ship's nose aligned somewhere to the side of our retrograde velocity indicator (green with an X), the indicator will move away from where we're pointing. In this way, we can brake AND push that little bastard so it's more or less aligned with the target retrograde marker (pink triangle-thing). That's what we wanna do. As we close the 2km or so to our target, we want to be slowing down in a series of steps, and lining those two indicators up at the same time. In no time we'll be within a hundred or so meters of our target, and since we've been making sure the keep the velocity and target markers aligned, we're heading straight for it. Now all there is to do is find your docking port of choice, swing the ship around in that direction, and finish the job with RCS (which I'm gonna assume people know how to use). Would you look at that, you're docked and it took less than 10 minutes to do it! Man, what a useful guide. Thanks, MockKnizzle!

I'm sorry, but I don't quite understand the meaning of this, if you'd like to talk about the update of .22, which seems to be the case, check it out at the official thread here: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/53061-The-Grand-0-22-Discussion-Thread Thanks, -M5K

Hello, I love KSP but I hate building, playing by my self. Does anyone run like a team speak community where we can talk, share idea's, etc.. If not I think I might create one =) GA

Granted, it is the password for launching all the nukes in the world and destroy the human race... I wish I could talk to cupcake moar.

I know at least two ways that can be done. One is posting on other existing threads about v0.22, and another is something I can't say because it is not allowed on forums. Honestly, this is stupid. "I'm so nervous, I want others to see I'm nervous, I better go and open thread #6256375 about v0.22 and talk about how I'm nervous."

Talk about one hell of a birthday present.

Time for a post about thermal mechanics, as progress is now being made on this. First of all, I want to talk about how generators in this mod work at present. Each generator has a rating when you build it and when you upgrade it that tells you the "percentage of Carnot efficiency" that the generator provides, this Carnot efficiency refers to the percentage of Carnot cycle efficiency it achieves. The Carnot cycle is the type of cycle used by an ideal heat engine, i.e. the most efficient a theoretical heat engine can be. The Carnot efficiency is given by 1-TC/TH where TC is the temperature of a "cold bath" and TH is the temperature of a "hot bath". Practical heat engines don't use Carnot cycles. They use (ideally) Eriksen cycles, Rankin cycles, Stirling cycles, Brayton cycles, etc. So, the total efficiency of the generator (which is what you see on the part display while it is running) is given by this percentage of carnot efficiency parameter (say 24%) multiplied by 1-TC/TH. The hot bath temperature TH is simply equal to the core temperature of the reactors, which you can look up on the table on the first page of the thread, in the wiki or in the VAB. At present, the cold bath temperature TC is arbitrarily set to 500. In future updates, instead of having an arbitrary value for TC it will instead use the average temperature of your radiators. The key point to take from this if you're less interested in the actual maths of it is simply: by having more radiators to keep your ship cool, the more efficient your electrical generators will be. Once radiators reach the maximum temperature, they will begin to accumulate heat that they can't dissipate fast enough, so the "WasteHeat" bar in the resource menu is effectively the danger marker - when that gets full: problems! Fortunately, as always, there are safety features to prevent things becoming too deadly. Once your WasteHeat bar fills up to 99% of maximum, your reactors will perform emergency shutdowns in order to prevent the accumulation of further dangerous waste heat. This is no big deal for antimatter reactors, you can simply restart them once the heat level drops to safe limits. The fission reactors, however, are not designed to be shut down completely but rather operate continuously at, at least, a low power level. They are capable of shutting down but doing so is an emergency procedure and they will then require maintenance to get them working again. Should you somehow keep generating heat (actually rather difficult with all the safety features) and reach the 100% mark, death and explosions will result.