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The Elcano Challenge : Ground-based circumnavigation

Fengist
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Squiggsy

Squiggsy

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thanks for the advice! although in practice I've found that the thing moves so fast outside of time warp that it's not really a big necessity, I can happily travel 70-80m/s and keep stability even on pretty rough terrain, i even went 115m/s briefly but ended up going along on one set of wheels, managed to not crash but it was pretty terrifying so I wont be trying that again (Jeb loved it though) I will try your suggestions though to see if i can speed things up even more, but im currently about to do a small water hop where i can time accel safely so i wont be able to test it for a little bit

when I use time warp i am always too weary to go over about 20-30m/s since whenever I do things seem to go wrong so the actual gains in distance over time aren't that great, I am currently writing my mission report for the first day though, the sun has set and I have gone a LOT further than I expected to!

And starwhip i think that was what made me get so high up, but not what caused it in the first place, i think Geschosskopf is right with the pogo stick theory, but I think it goes further than that and was an explosion assisted pogo stick effect, then yes assisted by the lifting body effect to glide me up to 1km up, was definitely hilarious, if a bit worrying as I thought to myself "is this just going to keep happening?" thankfully I haven't had a single crash since! (touch wood)

Edited by Squiggsy
my terrible spelling
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Xannari Ferrows

Xannari Ferrows

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I just had a bit of an interesting idea that might spice things up a bit. I'm currently working on an Eve rover, akin to the one I had in the KMC, but without the Ions. I was thinking: What if two or more [different] rovers were sent up, each with it's own crew, and all but one of them used Mechjeb's autopilot, while you drove the remaining one? You could have a race! Say, each rover is heading toward the same destination on the same route, with the same target speed. At that point, it's up to the properties of craft design, driving skills, and some terrain interferences.

In fact, why not make this a community project or something? Anyone have DMP or something? OoOoOoO that'd be interesting...

Anyone else think this is a great idea?

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Starwhip

Starwhip

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I just had a bit of an interesting idea that might spice things up a bit. I'm currently working on an Eve rover, akin to the one I had in the KMC, but without the Ions. I was thinking: What if two or more [different] rovers were sent up, each with it's own crew, and all but one of them used Mechjeb's autopilot, while you drove the remaining one? You could have a race! Say, each rover is heading toward the same destination on the same route, with the same target speed. At that point, it's up to the properties of craft design, driving skills, and some terrain interferences.

In fact, why not make this a community project or something? Anyone have DMP or something? OoOoOoO that'd be interesting...

Anyone else think this is a great idea?

Sounds cool! :)

Anyways, I sent out another Dawn Racer, which seemed to be slightly possessed. It spooked and rolled over when Jeb poked a tire.

Quicksave before getting out of the capsule next time! :)

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Geschosskopf

Geschosskopf

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I just had a bit of an interesting idea that might spice things up a bit. I'm currently working on an Eve rover, akin to the one I had in the KMC, but without the Ions. I was thinking: What if two or more [different] rovers were sent up, each with it's own crew, and all but one of them used Mechjeb's autopilot, while you drove the remaining one? You could have a race! Say, each rover is heading toward the same destination on the same route, with the same target speed. At that point, it's up to the properties of craft design, driving skills, and some terrain interferences.

Hmmm, you could maybe test this on a small scale by setting waypoints to do laps around KSC, just to see if the concept works. And hopefully witness some good NASCAR-type wrecks ;)

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NoPanShabuShabu

NoPanShabuShabu

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And here I thot I was the only person around to have completely lost their mind. Just curious, how many flat tires did you endure? Welcome to the 'official' list of circumnavigators. Well done.

How many flat tires? For most of the driving, not so much, but at the poles there were a lot due to the nature of the terrain. Luckily Kerbals have extremely long arms and can repair from the top of the rover.

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Xannari Ferrows

Xannari Ferrows

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Hi Xannari. Everything looks good, I just don't have time tonite to create you a badge. In the next day or two, I'll get one up and do a proper post.

Thanks for the approval! And please, take all the time you need. I'd wait a year if necessary.

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Squiggsy

Squiggsy

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Is it supposed to do that? Don't ask me, I'm just the engineer! :P

Yep, definitely supposed to do that, the special "explosion based propulsion systems" that are now fitted into all Kerbal crafts by law.

haha shortly after this, I reloaded after Tanuna glitched through the craft and sploded randomly, and this happened

tumblr_np0dous0JO1r0o48lo1_1280.png

I think this is one of the rules of KSP you know, you speak about explosions, you get explosions.

after looking into it a bit nothign was broken, before I did this save I had removed some linear RCS ports (there were 12 of them! 12!!! and they were doing nothing but taking up part space and slowing my computer down!) and I think I had dropped one of them on the floor, when it reloaded musta just exploded randomly, big explosion for a small rcs port though...

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Squiggsy

Squiggsy

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tumblr_np0ly76DtV1r0o48lo1_1280.png

Ok I didn't consider just how fun the Poles were going to be in the Banzai! I knew this thing could go fast, but when the ground is completely flat....

I decided I'd quicksave and be a bit silly, just put the throttle to full and left it there to see how long it took for me to flip over, i stayed at 145m/s for a long time, slowly increasing to 150m/s and then flipped and sploded.

reloaded and decided that probably 120-130m/s was a safe cruising speed, but after the monotony of the rest of todays journey this is really, really fun.

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Squiggsy

Squiggsy

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The new part of my journey is up, and I have finally met true disaster (it was only a matter of time) the Banzai! is wrecked at the North Pole, thankfully (and quite miraculously) all crew survived, and I am working on finding a way to ship a replacement out there, we were so close to the Saucer at the pole too!

I find it quite funny that this post comes after my "hey look at how fast the Banzai! can go without crashing!!!" it seems I got too used to the speed and carried it over to hilly terrain, that was never going to end well...

The Dawn Racer has a new form...

Ohhh looking lovely! I wish you luck with the latest incarnation!

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PHO3NIX_F1RE

PHO3NIX_F1RE

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After silently following this challenge for some time, I've decided that as soon as my career tech tree allows it, I'll be participating. I have a few rough rover ideas in mind, and I'll almost definitely be going for a Minmus equatorial journey. More to come as and when.

Also, this is is my first post on these forums.

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Xannari Ferrows

Xannari Ferrows

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I've gone ahead with my idea, and released 3 like-rovers on Eve. Each one has it's own crew, and 2 of them will be taking similar routes, so it's a matter of what the drivers want to do from that point. I'll be in command of the last one. I've calculated the target speed of each AI rover for balancing purposes. I'll be going faster, but I'll also need to stop occasionally. No pausing in this race; it's all or nothing.

VUf7FzV.png

Let the race begin!

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Squiggsy

Squiggsy

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After silently following this challenge for some time, I've decided that as soon as my career tech tree allows it, I'll be participating. I have a few rough rover ideas in mind, and I'll almost definitely be going for a Minmus equatorial journey. More to come as and when.

Also, this is is my first post on these forums.

Wheyy always nice to have more people taking part in the challenge! I look forward to seeing your progress

EDIT (adding to same post to save multiposting)

Fengist, I was reading your Circumnavigation logs and saw you posting about the mysterious lights, I have been getting them my whole journey (and have had them while tkaing off from the runway for I don't even know how long) but when I dropped the Banzai! MkII down and got close to the original, I dropped the motherlight

this thing is huge, never had this happen before!

tumblr_np179pzBtt1r0o48lo1_1280.png

Edited by Squiggsy
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cy-one

cy-one

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@Fengist, you can remove from the Mun contestants. I'm currently trying my luck in Career and will quite probably return to the Mun Challenge once I have enough tech for something like that :D

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Squiggsy

Squiggsy

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Part 5 of my journey is up! (in the spoilers) lots has happened, going to take a break for about 12 hours of game time (trying to do it all in real time as best I can) to let the crew sleep since they haven't had more than a few short naps for the last 36 hours, and to get the Polar Explorer to its destination at the South Pole and begin to set up a base there ready for the Banzai!'s arrival. Also if I have time test out an ISRU refueling station that could serve as a waypoint/fuel source for the Banzai! for when it approaches the equator on the opposite side of Kerbin from the KSC.

I don't know if I've said it already Fengist but thank you so much for starting this challenge, I honestly don't think I've ever had this much fun playing KSP, the pure scope of the challenge is just brilliant and the journey is an experience that seems larger than just an in-game thing, it gives me a real feeling of wanderlust and I have enjoyed it so much.

Edit: slightly off topic, but relevant to my journey at the same time, has there ever been a mod that requires kerbals to get some sleep? seems like it would be easy enough to work out, would be similar to USI Lifesupport's way of getting kerbals to become uncontrollable (making them appear to be tourists). there are a whole lot of life support mods and things but I have never even thought about kerbals having to sleep until I untook this mission and realized I'd feel cruel if I didn't give them a chance to rest up after a long drive

Edited by Squiggsy
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Squiggsy

Squiggsy

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No matter which way I face I roll UP the hill with no engines on... :confused:

This happened to me when I did the Mt.Keverest challenge, I think I mention it somewhere a bit further back in this thread, no idea what causes it I just wiggled around for a bit pressing loads of buttons, put the breaks on, wiggled around some more and then it stopped happening.

Although of course if you WANT to go up that hill, then you're just getting a free ride :P

oh yeah and the Banzai! went boom again, didn't get any screenshots of it though and the game crashed just afterwards, in fact the game was crashing continuously for about an hour and a half, and the outputs seemed to show it to be an error with the Banzai! MkII itself, I think all that reorganizing stuff with KIS messed something up along the way, so really its a blessing that I'm moving over to a new craft... right?

oh... I thought it had saved after the crash but apparently not, the Banzai! is mysteriously ok again, tbh though if it carries on crashing I'm going to decomission it and send out a new one anyways and see if that fixes the issue

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Squiggsy

Squiggsy

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Part 6 is up of my journey! making some real progress, though the game has started crashing loads, I have moved across to a fresh install, copied the save and the necessary mods across and everything seems to be working fine so far, but I am still nervous that the problem will persist, it seems to be a memory problem that only comes about when I am focused on the Banzai! ....
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