Everything feels more top heavy in 1.0

[hermano]

There was another thread where somebody had the same problem you had. There seems to be a bug with the fins you are using. Try any other kind of fin or no fins and check if the problem persists. A TWR of 1.25 to 1.5 should not be a problem.

[SpaceChipmunk]

I only just started playing with rockets in 1.0 (been obsessed with planes), I achieved orbit on my second try.

First try rocket flipped end over end when I went to do a gravity turn. I added fins and was successful the second go (kept my speed below 160 until after the gravity turn), did two full orbits and then landed the pod between KSC and the mountains to the north, closest I ever got to landing a pod at KSC.

If you are travelling too fast and move too far from the prograde marker then you will flip. The air will be pushing you further off the marker so you will flip. The marker shouldn't be needing to catch up with you. Make small movements to the edge of the marker to make the marker come around to the direction you want to go. When in the really thin atmosphere it doesn't matter much how far off prograde you turn.

[moronwrocket]

Sepratrons are still preferable on deeper turns when ejected mass is on the topside - though I tend to avoid them as you should use 4 of them per stack, and each is heavier than a decoupler.

Why 4? I put my sepratrons near the CoM of the empty booster stage. Also, you can pull out fuel (and lower thrust) on a Sepratron, it's just a miniature SRB. I find most times using minimal amounts of fuel and about 20% thrust is enough to push away boosters and not blow up the main stack, even when pointed directly at it.

[Bill Phil]

It might be going too fast too low. The drag gets so high that a slight turn makes you flip, and your control authority isn't enough to right it...

That's my experience, at least. A rocket kept on flipping after launch. I checked the aerodynamics and there was a lot of drag. So I went slower on the next launch and it performed perfectly...

[Tex]

I... don't think decouplers work like that. o.o

Oh sure they will, the fuel is only attached by one of them, though. It may result in an explosion but I don't think it'll be all that big of a problem.

Wow, that was a Kerbal statement if I ever said one...

[T-Bouw]

I second the not-deviating-too-far-from-prograde-thing. A good gravity-turn is made almost by itself if you give the rocket a slight angle in the beginning and throttle correctly.

Hmm, the extra decouplers might not help at attaching the rocket, but they do seem to fill the gaps that are otherwise left by a single one.

This would perhaps counteract the otherwise wobbling of the SRB's hinging around the a decoupler.

[Varsi]

Try using the LV-T45 instead of T-30. Those fins don't move, so the stability they give you is purely passive - no control. The LV-T30 has no gimbal, so the only control you're getting is from the reaction wheel in the pod.

Now, with a low TWR, you're going to naturally begin to tip west, because the world is curved and KSC is flat. Since you don't have any real way to correct for this in that rocket, it will quickly go in a direction you don't want it to and eventually turn right on over to a nose-down attitude.

This one is probably the main problem here. The reaction wheels in the capsule can't fight the aerodynamics alone.