Kerbol Probe

[WOODY01]

I ran a mission today to gather science from low Kerbol orbit. Since this was my first mission gathering data at such a low altitude from Kerbin's sun I decided to search for information to help me plan the mission. Google turned up a lot of out dated information since I was reading people were diving down to really low altitudes.

So hear is a little of what I learned in a somewhat brief mission summary:

Garnet Ocher Probe:

DV: 6377

Mass: 39.9 t

Parts: 39

Cost: 154,560

Science Gained: Aprox 985

Probodobodyne HECS

Electric: 4x Gigantor Solar Arrays for heat mangement and power generation, Z-1K Recharable Battery

Engine: MRS QUAD Nuke

Payload: 2x Micro Goo, 2x US Materials Bays, US GoreSat, US

Magnetometer, US MultiSpectral Imaging, US Solar Partical Collector, US Orbital Telescope, US RPWS, PresMat Barometer, 2Hot Thermometer, Kerbal Dust Experiment, Kerbolic Magnetic Imager, Super Technical Electronic Ranged Emissions Observer

Approx Max engine run time before part failures due to overheating 9 ½ minutes in Kerbin SOI. Data for safe burn times was gathered from the Peal and Kerboom probe test platforms.

Performed two burns to escape Kerbin’s SOI separated by two hours .

Ran high orbit experiments 12 hours after leaving Kerbin’s SOI

Two more burns performed to lower PE for Kerbol orbit to 650,000K. First burn was timed 2 hours before AP and the second at AP.

999,999K Begin running low orbit experiments, Gigantor Solar Panels still able to dissipate enough heat to keep part tempature somewhat stable. Tempature of parts rising slowly

Avg part temp: 1147 Thermometer reading: 1171

900,000K Effectiveness of solar panels to radiate heat begin to fail noticeable difference in tempature rise increasing.

755,500K 2xGigantor Panels orientated towards the sun overheat, temp at failure unknown part not being monitored.

Avg temp of parts 1149

750,000K Avg PartTemp: 1150 Them reading :1174

749,305k Probodyne HECS fails/ entire probe explodes, mission summary list only two part failures.

Of course this numbers are prone to error since I did not have any way to monitor all the parts at the same time except with the color overlay. I was really surprised the solar panels were the first to go since i thought they would radiate the heat away better then any other part.

[Foxster]

Been doing some Sun diving myself recently and a couple of tips are:

Check the max temp of all the parts before launching and don't take anything with less than 2000°. So the RC-001S rather than the Probodyne is good.

Use a fuel cell and take along LFO for it rather than use solar panels.

If you want to go stupidly low then try something like this and keep the heat shield pointed at the Sun all the time once you reach your target orbit. Remove the ablative from the heatshield before launch to save a lot of weight, it won't help for long near the sun...