Nobbled by the bunny....

[Fraggle]

Well..

oops.

Satellite... Check.

Rechargeable Battery... Check.

Solar Panels... Check.

Enough fuel to get to an 11,000,000 orbit... Check.

lots of boosters... Check.

Initial orbit... Check.

Burn for the 11,000,000 Apo.. .... .... Hello?.. Why you no fire engine?... Fire engine damit!...

Someone forgot to deploy the Solar array in orbit.

No juice in the command module, no worky worky...

Attaching Rabbit to Booster and firing into orbit......

Does the energizer Bunny need a space suit do you think?

Todays mission.... Uh... Fail.

Muct remeber orbital check list in future.....

- - - Updated - - -

Technically it was proof of concept, so not a total failure...

right?....

right?...

lol.

[Commissioner Tadpole]

Heh, we all make mistakes. I myself forgot how many times my probes died because I forgot to deploy solar panels.

[Xavven]

Heh, we all make mistakes. I myself forgot how many times my probes died because I forgot to deploy solar panels.

Really? I've never forgotten to deploy my solar panels. Ever.

(nope... I couldn't say that with a straight face.)

Kerbals on EVA can extend solar panels. I don't know if they have to be engineers since .90 though. Anyone confirm?

[problemecium]

I almost invariably include some OX-STAT panels on my ships.

[Reddeyfish]

another way to keep this from happening is to disable the use of the probe's internal electric charge storage while still in the VAB. When you invariably do forget, re-enabling the probe's electric charge gives you enough charge to deploy the solar panels.

Kerbals only need to be in a command module to deploy solar panels. (the reason you can't do it when there is no electric charge for the probe, not for the panels themselves)

[SkyRender]

That's nothing. I once time-warped a vessel through an SoI change and found that it had no power despite the solar panels being deployed. Why? They were pointed exactly away from the sun during the time warp. Luckily that flight had Kerbals on board, and I was able to reorient the ship by the old get-out-and-push method.

[Sky_walker]

That's nothing. I once time-warped a vessel through an SoI change and found that it had no power despite the solar panels being deployed. Why? They were pointed exactly away from the sun during the time warp. Luckily that flight had Kerbals on board, and I was able to reorient the ship by the old get-out-and-push method.

Nah, that's still nothing. I remember my Moho approach - high speed, long burn with Ions needed for breaking... so I get all my nodes and stuff ready, align, fire the engines.... and 10 seconds later got into the shadow of planet, just to realize that it's not a minor inconvenience - actually majority of my burn trajectory goes through the shadow as I planned entry into a low orbit.... ended up running emergency abort procedure and landing... touched down surface with ~10s of Xenon remaining.

[magnemoe]

I almost invariably include some OX-STAT panels on my ships.

Yes, 3-4 and two small batteries. You don't need more at kerbin unless you transmit data.

[mikegarrison]

Nah, that's still nothing. I remember my Moho approach - high speed, long burn with Ions needed for breaking... so I get all my nodes and stuff ready, align, fire the engines.... and 10 seconds later got into the shadow of planet, just to realize that it's not a minor inconvenience - actually majority of my burn trajectory goes through the shadow as I planned entry into a low orbit.... ended up running emergency abort procedure and landing... touched down surface with ~10s of Xenon remaining.

Yeah, solar power sucks when it turns out your orbital insertion burn happens in the planet's shadow. And for some reason it always seems to happen in the planet's shadow. It's like a natural law.

[Shadows2b]

We need shadows panels

[timsfitz]

Just the other day I launched a hopper vessel to minmus so the guys at my base could get around and do some survey contracts. The hopper ship was in manned and had a probe core. The Ox Stats were only on one side so when I got to minmus the ship was facing the wrong way and lost all power during time warp. Not wanting to revert I jetpacked a Kerbal from the minmus base and actually managed to catch up to the ship as it limped by. With almost no jetpack fuel remaining, he got inside and refuelled. Then he got out and pushed the ship to orient the panels toward the sun. I couldn't believe that crazy plan worked.

Thing is, I know better and normally save some power by turning off a battery. Just forgot to do it. Even so, it's nice to have these little adventures. Good thing the hopper was going slow and low enough to get too, if only just barely.

[brdavis]

Even so, it's nice to have these little adventures.

And some new adventures. Had a contract for the 1st tourist orbital mission, so I went for it. And I was smart enough to strap a couple of batteries to the outside of the Mk1… radial chutes, Stayputnik on top, heat shield below. This worked great up until those batteries overheated during re-entry. The poor tourist did a remarkably depressing imitation of Komarov in Soyuz 1. Absolutely nothing I could do (hadn't preserved the Mk1 on-board battery as an "emergency reserve").

But I've got to say I really *like* the fact that I was bitten by re-entry effects.

[magnemoe]

Yeah, solar power sucks when it turns out your orbital insertion burn happens in the planet's shadow. And for some reason it always seems to happen in the planet's shadow. It's like a natural law.

LOL, remember sending an rover to Mun for testing, it only had solar panels on the top where they would be most useful and also protected.

Launch towards the full Mun, effect was that the panels was pointed away from sun all the way and I was on an impact trajectory.

One other mission was saved as it was manned, this had plenty of solar but the last part going to Mun was eclipsed by Kerbin followed by the shadow of Mun, I was able to save it by buring the LV-N a short burst to get some power who I used to turn the ship, I could then do the circulation burn and get electricity at once.

[KerikBalm]

Yeah, solar power sucks when it turns out your orbital insertion burn happens in the planet's shadow. And for some reason it always seems to happen in the planet's shadow. It's like a natural law.

Basically, it is... because if you want to enter a prograde orbit (ie with the planet's rotation), and you want ot do a low energy transfer... you'll be coming in along the backside (unless its a planet like Venus, which rotates very slowly retrograde)

[moronwrocket]

Any kerbal can open solar panels. I got burned by a Mobile Science Lab attached to a Probe Core. I didn't have enough solar panels on it, and so when power went out, I could not shut off the MSL or lights. I EVA'd out, but could not shut off the lights externally, or disable the MSL. Had to cheat some EC into the vessel and burn for re-entry so Wehrner could redesign it.

[Maolagin]

Yeah, solar power sucks when it turns out your orbital insertion burn happens in the planet's shadow. And for some reason it always seems to happen in the planet's shadow. It's like a natural law.

Uh yeah, in the case of Moho it IS natural law. If you're transferring to Moho from a higher orbit then your craft is overtaking the planet. Usually you want to capture into a prograde orbit. If you are overtaking, then the prograde side of Moho is the one facing away from Kerbol. You want to do your burn in sunlight, aim for a retrograde or polar orbit instead.

[StrandedonEarth]

I piggybacked a Gilly probe onto an Eve station, decoupled and landed it on Gilly. I had locked out the probe's internal charge in case I forgot to deploy the panels. Sure enough, sending back science data drained the external batteries, which is when I realized I hadn't deployed the panels. When I unlocked the core charge, the antenna sucked up all ten EC before I could deploy a panel, and the probe was still dead.

A later survey mission re-activated the probe