Rescue a Kerbal on a Solar, Retrograde orbit

[RocketBlam]

I accepted a "Kerbal Rescue" mission, for a Kerbal that was orbiting the sun. "Sounds a little more challenging, I'll give it a try!" I said. So I get a ship up into Kerbin orbit and realize the target is in a retrograde orbit - that is, he is going the opposite direction of all the planets.

Wow. I don't know how I'm going to manage this. To just cancel out my initial orbital direction (that is, head straight for the sun) I need 9k DV from high Kerbin orbit. So I will need even more than that to match the target's orbit. So, something like 21,000 DV just to catch the target, plus about 5k DV to get into HKO.

ETA: I just tried something else. If I intercept the target at his orbit, and then turn around and match his velocity, I can get to him with about 9k DV from HKO. Better, but still a huge deal.

Edited May 1, 2015 by RocketBlam

[Sir Pnakotic]

Well now you know why they needed rescuing. "Hey, [RocketBlam's Space Program], we screwed up REALLY badly..."

[Robotengineer]

Is he on a trajectory that intersects a a planet? You could hope he gets a gravity assist.

[RocketBlam]

He's out near Jool, but it doesn't look like his orbit intersects Jools, and if it does, it is probably something like every 10,000 years.

[TothAval]

i don't know how effective this would be, but maybe you could go on prograde orbit and later rotate it around 180°? i mean if he is near jool this is maybe not so expensive in comparison?

[RocketBlam]

Whew, well I was just going to leave the ship in orbit until something else came along I could use it for. Luckily there's another Kerbal needing rescue around Duna, which is definitely doable with this vessel.

- - - Updated - - -

i don't know how effective this would be, but maybe you could go on prograde orbit and later rotate it around 180°? i mean if he is near jool this is maybe not so expensive in comparison?

This seems to be the best way to do it (I edited the OP to reflect this). But it's still going to take something like 9k DV from HKO to get to him and get him on board. Then, I'm still in a retro orbit and will have to somehow nail the return coming into Kerbin going the wrong way.

[Vanamonde]

Moved to the how-to section.

[problemecium]

If I may also complain, I too have been getting absurd rescue missions that I feel need to be nerfed. I've never sent a Kerbal to the Mun in my current Career, and somehow some other agency stranded one there and expects me to go get him.