Eve Rover Mission Idea

[The-MathMog]

Hey guys. Just wanted to share, my last creation. That is capable of getting a decent sized rover safely to Eve. This is mainly to give some inspiration of how it can be done, if someone is not sure where to start from.

I pretty much started out with just how I wanted the rover to look like. The standard, 2x2 and 1x1 structural panels, wheels, solar panels, experiments behind them, and a probecore in the middle. Even added a ladder and a commander seat, if I ever get to bring a few Kerbals to Eve too!

On top of it, I then added a parachute structure, that would aerodynamically bring the rover in position for a suitable landing, after all the other parts of the rocket, had been discarded.

Just a simple decoupler and a "capital I" of cubic octagonal struts. And the parachute top, can just be thrown off after landing.

From the backside I then added a structural pylon, that I could base the rest of the rocket out of. I then turned the rover around (Shift + Click to grab the whole rocket, then A,S,D,W,Q,E to rotate).

Added a Large Reaction Wheel Module, to help keeping it straight during decent, then a fairing just for the rover, to help protect it even more. Below the fairing I then added another cubic octagonal structure, to support not only 1 heat shield, but 5. I found out that the rover was too big, to only need 1 big heat shield. So the cubics, are going out in 4 times symmetry, that then each supports a medium sized heat shield, extending the area protected by the shielding!

Then from there it is just basically a normal rocket.

A decoupler, with another fairing under it (To shield off the heat shields too, it adds on quite a bit more mass, but I find it suitable.)

A big fuel-tank, with 2 nuclear engines. 1 on each side.

Then under that, two big Kerbodyne tanks, with a mammoth as main-thrust.

And then 4 orange fuel tanks + mainsail engines on the side. I added "I-beams", to separate the tanks and engines a bit more from the inner stage, as I could run into trouble at launch, as they could collide with the main engine when decoupled. And I then added in some separators between the decouplers and the beam, and again between the beam and fuel tank, to make sure, it all fell apart when decoupling (Just for even more safety measures).

And as a final pinch? Moar solid rocket boosters!!

Here is just as an end-note. The only mod that I use that might affect this, is "Joint-reenforcement", but that can just be accounted for with extra struts, between the upper reaction wheel module and the rover. Between the structure that holds the heatshields and the fairing. And then just some extra here and there, but nothing too overwhelming.

Also, I found out that this almost had TOO MUCH fuel (somewhat at least). I had a lot more fuel for the nuclear engines than I expected, but that actually turned out better. First I didn't plan for going into a stable orbit around eve first, but rather just going straight in. But with the extra fuel, I could actually do that, and plan my landing spot even better, avoiding the oceans.

Only issue with that, is that the nuclear likes to overheat a lot, so it took a few orbits, to actually bring it down close to Eve.

But the heat shields definitely have enough ablator to go directly in, as I only used a bit less than a half, of the main shield.

I hope this post isn't completely useless, and does inspire some people on how to bring down a rover at eve, even accounting for the deadly heating

[SHiftER2O]

Aaaand now to get out XD

Great job man! Would give you rep if the forums let me

[The-MathMog]

Aaaand now to get out XD

Great job man! Would give you rep if the forums let me

Haha yeah, though this is primarily an unmanned mission, and that I don't need to bring the rover back, that is a whole other cow to tackle! I am doing this in career mode, so it will be quite a while until I attempt something like that, even though I could probably manage it with the 4.000.000 funds I have atm! But thanks!