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NASA intends to utilize a quad rotor probe to sample many sites on Titan. Dragonfly will launch in 2026 and arrive in 2034. https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasas-dragonfly-will-fly-around-titan-looking-for-origins-signs-of-life/

T.R.A.I.L.S. Plus v1.8.1.6 (Original Parts Pack by @Beale) Learn more at the WIKI "If it's more then you wanted to know, it's TMI" This is an update of @Beale's wonderful little Trails parts pack bringing it up to KSP v1.2 standards. It now includes an IVA which Beale began and I completed thanks to his generously providing his source files for the "Gemini" capsule, an IVA which I created for the "Big G" Module, and Titan rocket parts courtesy of @CobaltWolf and Bluedog Design Bureau! License MIT Manual https://github.com/TedThompson/T.R.A.I.L.S./wiki Recommended Mods EVA Parachutes & Ejection Seats - Provides a way to save crews of Vinci Pods Blue Dog Design Bureau - for more early era USA rocket parts and pods Downloads https://github.com/TedThompson/T.R.A.I.L.S./releases Bugs? https://github.com/TedThompson/T.R.A.I.L.S./issues *(versioning follows the format: Target KSP version.Sequential release number - v1.2.1.0 is version 1 for KSP v 1.2)

Dragonfly mission to the ocean moon Titan Your mission is to create as realistically as possible the upcoming proposed Dragonfly mission to Titan, the ocean moon of Saturn. You can read about it here, its really cool. Basically, you have to fly to Titan (Laythe if playing stock), and set up a self sustaining base with explorer quadcopters that can go out and take samples and readings, then return to the main base. Categories are full Stock (visual and info mods only, nothing that modifies parts or physics in any way) or Modded ( I recommend Firespitter for excellent rotors, although your quadcopters will be large) as much as you like. Basically your job is to recreate the mission as close to real life as possible, either in Stock or Modded. I'll accept pretty much any entry, but if you need rules, then the rules are as follows: You must fly the mission, no cheats of any kind, although quicksave/quickload may be used as needed. Be careful loading/saving too much in atmo, parts can do strange things especially offsets You must leave Earth/Kerbin, fly to Saturn/Jool. Next you must make an entry with a heat shield and parachutes to Titan/Laythe, land and set up your base. Your base must be self-sustaining - if playing stock this will require an ISRU to allow multiple quadcopter missions. Your exploration vehicles must be VTOL, preferably as close to a quadcopter as you can make it. You may use jets or rockets since there aren't working electrical props in stock. They must be powered by RTG (like in real life). They must be able to fly 10-100km, take a sample, and return with it. There should be at least a conceptual way to refuel them, although I won't require a demo if the piloting is insane (landing on a docking port, etc). Lots of pictures! We are recreating a real mission, make it look cool!!! Scoring may evolve as new entries come in, since I likely haven't thought of everything, but for now it's as follows: Quadcopter points: Real Weight: 100 points if close to 450kg, subtract points for anything over (10 points/ton) Honest Quad: 25 points if 4 engines VTOL Real Science: 25 points if you recreate sample collection and analysis, seismological studies, meteorological monitoring, and local microscopic imaging using LED illuminators Reusable: 50 points if you show a full round trip copter sampling mission, and are prepped for another More Copters!: 25 points for each additional quadcopter up to total of 4 Mission points: Low Mass: 100 points if launch mass is under 100 tons, subtract 10 points for each 50 tons over weight. Orbital Genius: 25 points for each clever maneuver - aerobraking, gravity slingshots, anything that lowers dV and looks cool. Phone Home: 10 points per relay set up in system for a max of 30 points, it's nice to be able to call home. I will also award an arbitrary number of points for general realism, including but not limited to: Using Real Solar System Accurate models of rockets Making the spacecraft look and function as realistically as possible Finding something cool about the mission that I don't know about, and including it. Have fun! If you are ready to get technical, Here is more detail in a pdf

Laho Butterfly Challenge This one requires some mods: Kerbol Starsystems Near Future Tech Scatterer EVE Pretty basic, the challenge is to do the to following: 1) Unmanned flyby of Laho 2) Unmanned orbit of Laho 3) Returning research probe from Laho 4) Relay around Laho 5) Manned flyby 6) Parachuting probe 7) Lander probe 8) Manned orbit 9) Probe mine 10) Return probe landing 11) Probe refueling station (needs at least 2 modules. Cargo holds are accepted if you have KIS, but there is no real need. You could also use the other low gravity moons for that. 12) Manned station 13) Manned landing 14) Base and planet a flag next to it, take a screenshot (F12) and post below! 15) Terraform it? Step 6 example.

Mission requirements; One mobile rover-base to stay on Titan One orbital station to orbit Titan 4 Satellites to orbit around Titan and create communication coverage on Titan One rocket to be sent and landed on Titan for crew to get back to the Titan orbit after mission ended Orbit station is getting ready to go Everything seems nice so far! See you later, Earth Needs so much DeltaV, hopefully second stage will do the job Crew looks at Earth last time for a long time period. Rescue rocket to be sent to Titan Rescue rocket's second stage Catch ya! All 4 rockets run to Saturn side by side Nearly 1 year passed after leaving Earth's orbit Crew seems happy Biiig big space, but not empty at all Here is Saturn! After 7 long years, we are close to reach Saturn. Making maneuvras to reach Titan. Rocket that carries Rover-Base, is fixing it's direction towards Titan Fixing other rockets' orbits (Orbital Station, Rescue Rocket, Satellites) Cool shot from Rescue Rocket carrier Rocket, making correction burn Orbital Station's carrier rocket is the first rocket out of 4 rockets who arrived Titan Orbit first! Time to orbit Titan A cool shot from orbital station's cockpit A rocket that carries satellites arrived! Time to orbit A rocket that carries rescue rocket arrived as well! Putting satellites on orbit A rocket that carries mobile rover-base arrived Titan's orbit as well That's it boys, rover is going down on Titan, right now! Flying car weeeeee Weird glitches. Well ksp version 1.3, RSS version 1.2.2, scatterer version 0.300 soo.. i expect glitches What are they o.O Are there trees on Titan? They are getting smaler when we gets closer.. Time to chute It was a VERY VERY SLOW trip, we are getting there boi! And rover is landed There is no crew yet on rover, but luckily it has it's own control computer! And i found a rock! First time i saw a rock on Titan ever on KSP Btw i broke my antenna.. That's how rover gets electricity (There is very little sun-light together with 8 days long night time, so nuclear activity was the best choice..) I didn't plan to bring Engineer down here, but to fix this antenna, i would change my plan Meanwhile in orbital station, crew is getting ready for leaving station to go on Titan's surface I use Alcor pod as a lander pod For one reason, i cannot move kerbals within parts so i needed to EVA mission to exchange my crew (because i need one Engineer down there to repair antenna so plans are changed!) Jeb's crews, Lisman and Dedorf ladies, they look happy. Station's crew looks meh Making preparations for leaving station Time to go! Maneuvras.. Btw that black bottom is not a heat shield, it is a fuel tank. Titan's atmosphere is like a pillow, so you don't actually need a heat shield unless you plan to direct hit on Titan with 20k DeltaV. Okay enough talking Crew looks incredibly happy This would make the job Or not... 55km off of the target Chutes.. It takes forever to land. I cannot move Kerbals one by one to the rover, so it makes more sense to mov rover to crew! After literally one hour, rover-base finally reached the crew! Lets get into your new house for few years, kerbals I don't like the geography, i want to park my rover-base next to one lake (methane lake). 120km to go. Reached the area where rover-base landed on (55km back). Separate part can be seen on the ground which separated chute and rover. 65km more to go. Glitch, if you fall down, you ded (fell one time) Finally i found one cute methane lake after 120km (took 2 hours), parked next to it Crew deserves to get one break to hang out (btw somehow engineer couldnt repair antenna, anyone know why? instead i mistakenly exploded it ) Night time on Titan 90 degree top angle from the rover, amazing view Sky from rover's cockpit See you in next mission while my kerbals hanging out! Next mission will be landing rescue rocket on Titan from Titan's orbit, and then carrying crew to the orbit station.

Mining methane from Titan (Saturn's moon). I mean, sure there's a lot of methane and hydrocarbon lakes which makes it a potential moon to be colonized and mined for fuels. But considering the distance from the earth, was it really worth for a mining operation to basically establish a mining site on titan, mine the methane, refine it as fuel, and transport it back to earth? Cassini-Huygens mission took almost seven years to reach Saturn flyby, and it's a one-way trip. Considering the time it takes between sending the mining operation to the arrival of fuel from Titan, was it really worth all the effort? (Assuming we are able to establish a colony on Titan) Replies are appreciated

Allright people, I need your help. I wanted to do an as close to reality Voyager mission as possible in KSP, so I spent most of my christmas break modeling and texturing a Titan IIIE launch vehicle and the Voyager probes. The end-goal is to make a video of the mission and put in on the Youtubes. I've finished the launch vehicle (image furher down), but I've run into a bit of a problem with the Star-37E/Voyager part of my build. From the reference images I see that either the Star-37E or the structure holding the Star-37E/Voyager stack has a hydrazine attitude control system, but what I can't seem to figure out is what type of thruster it is, its thrust, and most importantly, which directions of thrust the ACS system has. Is it only "forward" and "back", is it roll? I can't tell. As there are plenty of smart people on the forum, I figured I'd ask for help here. I'll post links to some of my reference images so you can get an idea of what I'm talking about. Reference image 1 Reference image 2 Reference image 3 Reference image 4 Anyways, here is an image of what I've got so far. There is a Centaur-D-1T inside the fairing, but I've yet to render an image of it.

I'm just vacationing in the Outer Solar system. I'll never get a crewed ship with life-support out here, so it's probe lander time.

Hi people! I'm playing KSP since... well for pretty long time, but it is my first post here in this forum. Actually most of my time i'm playing with RSS mod. It's because of Macollo. Once i saw video about he's Venus mission, i was so impressed by epicness of real flights and scales of real planets, so i decided that i must do similar mission. And about half year after i did it. I landed on Venus and then took off. Unfortunately i was not recording this flight, so now i have only several screenshots about it. Couple of weeks ago i decided to do another cool thing. While everybody flying to Mars or Moon, i thought that it would be great to get to one of the gas-giant's satellite. Sure most of them - pretty boring pieces of rocks and ice exept Titan. Titan have atmosphere, so it is possible to fly there. In december 2015 i sent there a probe - small unmanned plane with propeller. Thanks to dense atmosphere and low gravity it was flying very well. Now i decided to sent there manned mission. I already had a ship, named "Neil Armstrong", equipped with electric propulsion engines and four nuclear reactors. So i only had to build an SSTO for Titan. Unlike atmosphere of Laythe, air on Titan consists only nitrogen and methane, so i could not use normal jet engines. I choosed "Torch" nuclear turbojets for my plane. I already used them in my mission on Venus. They work very well in dense atmosphere and need no fuel. Also the flight promised to be very long, so i had to load my ship with 200 tons of food, water and oxygen. It should be enough for 13 years of life of four kerbals. Due to very high effectiveness of ion engines, total weight of the ship was only 1000 tons. Unfortunately, ion engines as effective as they are weak, so my TWR during departure burn was very low (approximately 0.07G's) Because of that and because of my navigational mistake, i spent too much deltaV to get to Saturn, so i had to cancel planned landing on Japetus. When i reached Titan's orbit, i saw mechjeb showing that i have only 7,5 km/s of deltaV left. One moment i even thought that i failed my mission, because 7.5 was totally not insufficiently to get back to Earth. Fortunately when I threw the extra food and fuel for reactors, numbers recovered to the acceptable values. In general, I want to say that this was the most difficult of all my missions, it cost me a lot of nerve cells and red eyes from lack of sleep. But it was totally worth it. I made a video of my flight and now i want to share it with you. Actually it is my first ingame-video and it's not perfect, but i hope you'll enjoy it. Part1 Part 2 coming soon...

Before you read, please don't bash my points, I found them in my research, I am just curious and need someone's non rude opinion and discussion about it. Titan, the largest moon of Saturn, is at present an open question and a topic of scientific assessment and research. Titan is far colder than Earth, and its surface lacks stable liquid water; factors whichhave led some scientists to consider life there unlikely. It has a methane cycle analouge to earths water cycle and there are many other factors and analogyies which argue it may host complex probiotic life. Some reasons I found in my research (source - wiki, I know it is not the most reliable source, but I just found it and need someone smart enough here to discuss this) 1) The Miller–Urey experiment and several following experiments have shown that with an atmosphere similar to that of Titan and the addition of UV radiation, complex molecules and polymer substances like tholins can be generated. The reaction starts withdissociation of nitrogen and methane, forming hydrogen cyanide and acetylene. Further reactions have been studied extensively. 2) In October 2010, Sarah Horst of the University of Arizona reported finding the five nucleotide bases—building blocks of DNA and RNA—among the many compounds produced when energy was applied to a combination of gases like those in Titan's atmosphere. Horst also found amino acids, the building blocks ofprotein. She said it was the first time nucleotide bases and amino acids had been found in such an experiment without liquid water being present. 3) On April 3, 2013, NASA reported that complexorganic chemicals could arise on Titan based on studies simulating the atmosphere of Titan. 4) Laboratory simulations have led to the suggestion that enough organic material exists on Titan to start a chemical evolution analogous to what is thought to have started life on Earth. Although the analogy assumes the presence of liquid water for longer periods than is currently observable, several theories suggest that liquid water from an impact could be preserved under a frozen isolation layer. it has also been theorized that liquid-ammonia oceans could exist deep below the surface. Another model suggests an ammonia–water solution as much as 200 kilometres (120 mi) deep beneath a water-ice crust with conditions that, although extreme by terrestrial standards, are such that life could indeed survive. Heat transfer between the interior and upper layers would be critical in sustaining any subsurface oceanic life. Detection of microbial life on Titan would depend on its biogenic effects. That the atmospheric methane and nitrogen might be of biological origin has been examined, for example. 5) It has been suggested that life could exist in the lakes of liquid methane on Titan, just as organisms on Earth live in water. Such organisms would inhale H2 in place of O2, metabolize it with acetylene instead ofglucose, and exhale methane instead of carbon dioxide. 6) Although all living things on Earth (including methanogens) use liquid water as a solvent, it is speculated that life on Titan might instead use a liquid hydrocarbon, such as methane or ethane. Water is a stronger solvent than methane. However, water is also more chemically reactive, and can break down large organic molecules throughhydrolysis. A life-form whose solvent was a hydrocarbon would not face the risk of its biomolecules being destroyed in this way. 7) In 2005, astrobiologist Chris McKay argued that if methanogenic life did exist on the surface of Titan, it would likely have a measurable effect on the mixing ratio in the Titan troposphere: levels of hydrogen and acetylene would be measurably lower than otherwise expected. 8) In 2010, Darrell Strobel, from Johns Hopkins University, identified a greater abundance of molecular hydrogen in the upper atmospheric layers of Titan compared to the lower layers, arguing for a downward flow at a rate of roughly 1025 molecules per second and disappearance of hydrogen near Titan's surface; as Strobel noted, his findings were in line with the effects McKay had predicted ifmethanogenic life-forms were present. Same year, another study showed low levels of acetylene on Titan's surface, which were interpreted by McKay as consistent with the hypothesis of organisms consuming hydrocarbons. Although restating the biological hypothesis, he cautioned that other explanations for the hydrogen and acetylene findings are more likely: the possibilities of yet unidentified physical or chemical processes (e.g. a surface catalyst accepting hydrocarbons or hydrogen), or flaws in the current models of material flow. Composition data and transport models need to be substantiated, etc. Even so, despite saying that a non-biological catalytic explanation would be less startling than a biological one, McKay noted that the discovery of a catalyst effective at 95 K (−180 °C) would still be significant. 9) As NASA notes in its news article on the June 2010 findings: "To date, methane-based life forms are only hypothetical. Scientists have not yet detected this form of life anywhere. As the NASA statement also says: "some scientists believe these chemical signatures bolster the argument for a primitive, exotic form of life or precursor to life on Titan's surface." 10) In February 2015, a hypothetical cell membrane capable of functioning in liquidmethane in Titan conditions was modeled. Composed of small molecules containing carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen, it would have the same stability and flexibility as cell membranes on Earth, which are composed ofphospholipids, compounds of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and phosphorus. This hypothetical cell membrane was termed an "azotosome", a combination of "azote", French for nitrogen, and "liposome". 11) Despite these biological possibilities, there are formidable obstacles to life on Titan, and any analogy to Earth is inexact. At a vast distance from the Sun, Titan is frigid, and its atmosphere lacks CO2. At Titan's surface, water exists only in solid form. Because of these difficulties, scientists such as Jonathan Lunine have viewed Titan less as a likely habitat for life, than as an experiment for examining theories on the conditions that prevailed prior to the appearance of life on Earth. Although life itself may not exist, the prebiotic conditions on Titan and the associated organic chemistry remain of great interest in understanding the early history of the terrestrial biosphere. As a prebiotic experiment involves not only observation through spacecraft, but laboratory experiments, and chemical and photochemical modeling on Earth. TL'DR So, what do you think?