Has anyone successfully recovered empty stages in the stock game?

[Trenchfoot]

I think it would be cool to do. Besides some of the bigger part's descriptions hint on this being how they are intended to be used. Has anyone done this without using mods? How.

Edited May 6, 2015 by Trenchfoot

[cephalo]

I had some parts strewn about the KSC, I was able to click on them and choose 'fly' or 'recover'.

[Trenchfoot]

Intentionally?

[cephalo]

Intentionally?

It might just be because they landed nearby. I once tried to put a parachute on a stage and trigger it with the decoupler, but I never saw the part again. It might still be there floating in the ocean I guess. I have no idea how to recover parts that are far away from everything else.

[Trenchfoot]

I thought the chutes would burn up on re-entry so I never thought to bother. The tracking station should show you what the game calls debris.

[Gaarst]

Parts considered as debris disappear as soon as they are >22 km (not sure) from your active ship when inside the atmosphere. So they will be gone if you just leave them falling and expect to recover them at your return.

What you can do is go to map view and switch the vessel type of your decoupled stages from "debris" to any other (eg: lander, probe...); that way the game will consider them as active crafts and won't delete them while in atmosphere.

Don't take what I'm saying for granted, this is not 100% sure.

[worir4]

Does it count if the rocket blew up and the tanks just happened to land without being destroyed? Because if yes, then yes.

[Trenchfoot]

I've done this with multiple pods for tourism contracts to deploy chutes but I figured out a much simpler way after Jebediah ate it before I could switch back to him. Valentina is my main pilot now...

[Randazzo]

In 0.90 I recovered some LV-N engine nacelles on re-entry (still had to just ditch the main tank) by deploying parachutes first, then decoupling them and the pod. For departing flights it was next to impossible. With the extended physics loading range now it's easier, but my booster stages tend to last too long (and therefore have too far to fall, getting out of range) for it to work.

Last couple of images:

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Edited May 6, 2015 by Randazzo

[cephalo]

I'm not sure if they disappear anymore if they used to. I have flown over some on my way to do temperature checks and they were quite far away.

[Anquietas314]

While I'm not playing strictly stock anymore, I did design and successfully use this reusable launcher in stock before adding the mods:

The payload fraction is pretty terrible (it lifts at most 9 tonnes to orbit, without much room for error when you consider the deorbit burn), but it works. Interesting behavior I discovered: if the airbrakes (used to survive reentry) are not inside the fairing, the rocket is very unstable

[Sonny_Jim]

The trick is to set the parachutes to open at a very low altitude, otherwise they don't land before you end up outside of 22km

[SpeedDaemon]

Interesting behavior I discovered: if the airbrakes (used to survive reentry) are not inside the fairing, the rocket is very unstable

The airbrakes are enabled for pitch and yaw control by default... This can make life Interesting if you're trying to use them for re-entry only on a rocket... Be sure to disable that. I had no problems with having 8 exposed airbrakes on a re-usable crew shuttle rocket after disabling pitch/yaw on them.

[Anquietas314]

The airbrakes are enabled for pitch and yaw control by default... This can make life Interesting if you're trying to use them for re-entry only on a rocket... Be sure to disable that. I had no problems with having 8 exposed airbrakes on a re-usable crew shuttle rocket after disabling pitch/yaw on them.

Yes, but that wasn't the cause. The issue was that the airbrakes raise the center of lift above the center of mass, which I'm sure everyone knows by now is a very bad thing for rockets . In any case, I almost always fly a fully hands-free gravity turn with SAS off, so even if pitch/yaw were enabled, it wouldn't have mattered.

[Motokid600]

Whatever you can bring to orbit ( or close to it ) you can bring back. Either stick probe cores on them or keep them with you through reentry, pop chutes then decouple from the stage.

[Laie]

Has anyone done this without using mods? How.

The answer(s) have been strewn in this thread already, but I'll try to roll it up into a single guide.

The basics:

1. put a sufficient amount of chutes on the stage you want to recover.
   
2. toggle the chutes together with the decoupler
   
3. in a quiet moment, visit the tracking center
   
4. by default, debris is not show. Mouse over the different icons to identify them, toggle debris on
   
5. select any debris from the list (or click on the map), then "recover"
   
6. PROFIT!
   
7. if there is no probe core or other command module, you will get no recovery dialog (and if there is, the parts will not be "debris", but a "probe"). But you still get money, justcheck your bank account before and after recovery.
   

The Problem:

Any pieces that are a) sufficiently far away from your active vessel, and moving too deep in the atmosphere, WILL BE DESTROYED. That means:

• You can easily recover the smaller solid rocket boosters that burn out early in your ascent. They can land safely before you get out of physics range.
  
• You can also recover very late stages that almost made it to space: after your vessel has circularised, open map view and switch vessels to the debris you care about, then watch it land.
  
• Any stages you detach in-between are pretty much impossible to recover.
  

Recovering late stages is a lot of hassle; besides, those tend to fall on the far side of Kerbin for very little recovery value. It can be done, though, and if you're the kind of person who wants to do it just because, you may find it quite enjoyable. Hint: the task becomes much easier if you're launching into a 100km orbit rather than the usual 70-and-a-bit. Another hint: check the impact tolerance of the different engines, boosters and the likes -- some are quite resilient and don't need many chutes to land safely.

[impyre]

I use SSTO rockets with probes on them. Decouple payload in low orbit, and self-deorbit. No debris, no mess.... just recovered funds.

[Reactordrone]

I recover the second stage on my satellite launcher. It makes it outside the atmosphere but not into orbit so I just have the parachutes staged with the decoupler and set to 0.34 atmosphere pressure, then finish the orbital insertion burn of the satellite, switch back to the debris and ride it down.

[arkie87]

Can someone explain to me all the fuss about stage recovery? The game can just pay you more to account for the fact that you cannot recover your ship. Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but the parts are very cheap...

[impyre]

The fuss about stage recovery is that some of us prefer to play with increased difficulty settings: lower contract payouts, higher costs, etc... these things force you to be more economical about how you spend your funds (especially when building upgrades are expensive)... and no, a 60t launch stage is anything but cheap.... especially if you just toss it in the ocean when done.

[Phafor]

While I'm not playing strictly stock anymore, I did design and successfully use this reusable launcher in stock before adding the mods:

http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/713036875444535556/F3A21C487EBFCCABB68F8B3D796DED054B1579C4/

The payload fraction is pretty terrible (it lifts at most 9 tonnes to orbit, without much room for error when you consider the deorbit burn), but it works. Interesting behavior I discovered: if the airbrakes (used to survive reentry) are not inside the fairing, the rocket is very unstable

May I ask you what mod you are using for the: Delta-V, Mass, Thrust-to-Mass Ratio and the Resources?

Edited May 7, 2015 by Phafor

[fjarandag]

IMO liftoff stages are a lost cause in stock game. Even if you attach a parachute to a booster you discard at 500m, it is almost impossible it touches land safely before you travel too far and it is discarded. Use a mod for that if you mind so much.

Middle stages can be separated before you circularize your orbit, and you might have time (I havent tried that on version 1.0. Anyway watching a reentry and adding parachutes for an engine and a few tanks falling far away from the KSC seems hadly worth it).

The orbiting/trans-Munar stage is easily recoverable. If you separate once reentry trajectory, it wont fall too far away from the main vehicle.

I even do not separate and use the 909 engine as a reentry shield and put the pod and the science between the engine and the fuel tanks. Looks silly, but works better for stability and overheating than a conventional setup.

[Anquietas314]

May I ask you what mod you are using for the: Delta-V, Mass, Thrust-to-Mass Ratio and the Resources?

That's Kerbal Engineer Redux. Forum page could do with some screenshots / information, but it's a very nice mod. There's also a crapload of in-flight information available.

[Trenchfoot]

The fuss about stage recovery is that some of us prefer to play with increased difficulty settings: lower contract payouts, higher costs, etc... these things force you to be more economical about how you spend your funds (especially when building upgrades are expensive)... and no, a 60t launch stage is anything but cheap.... especially if you just toss it in the ocean when done.

I'm not quite in the category that you defined here. I just want to play how a real(ish) space agency should HAVE to work. If you were throwing tens of millions of dollars away that could be saved, every launch, You would have taxpayers so far up your hind end... Oh wait, That's not how it works in the U.S. anymore. Anyway-couldn't help that.

I want to learn how to fly leaner and more efficient and I was hoping to get stories of how/if folks recover stages if its feasible.

[arkie87]

The fuss about stage recovery is that some of us prefer to play with increased difficulty settings: lower contract payouts, higher costs, etc... these things force you to be more economical about how you spend your funds (especially when building upgrades are expensive)... and no, a 60t launch stage is anything but cheap.... especially if you just toss it in the ocean when done.

I meant more from Squad's perspective in balancing the game. They could always increase funds (even in hard mode) to make it worth your while not to have to recover stages.

IMO, unless you use a mod to automatically recover stages that enter Kerbin's atmosphere, the problem is unmanageable if you actually want to simulate it (since it will most likely require physics bubble much larger than 22.5 km, which could easily break your system).