Kerbin Station Kit

[Scarecrow88]

Please find enclosed all you need to to put a station in to orbit around Kerbin

Brought to you by : Independent Kerbal Exploration Agency (some assembly required.)

Download zip file of craft

The zip file contains 5 craft comprising, in the order that they should ideally be launched:

Kerbin Station which forms the core of the station and comprises a habitation module and science lab

Station Comms Tower which adds an observation module, attachment points for the lifeboats, and the communications array

Lifeboat this craft actually includes 2 lifeboats, enough to evacuate 4 crew back to the planet surface

Refuel Frame is a basic skeleton to which the refuelling tanks can be attached, as well as providing two standard docking ports for visiting craft

Fuel Supply is the craft that supplies the station with one orange jumbo tank of rocket fuel as well as a large RCS tank. The station has 4 ports to accommodate the fuel supplied by one of these ships.

All ships are fairly easy to fly, with plenty of fuel to reach a 250k orbit, with enough left over to safely de-orbit the 2nd stage engine.

Recommended to follow a standard flight profile, with the following suggestion in mind to reduce debris; once initial apoapsis has been set and the craft is out of the atmosphere, use the abort button to jettison the nose cone and stage to release the fairing on those craft that have them, before performing your circularisation burn.

The basic station core craft on the pad

Station core in orbit before detaching the 2nd stage engine for it's de-orbit burn. The solar panels are toggled with action group key 3

Comms Tower rocket on the pad

Comms rocket approaching the station. Recommended it uses the docking port nearest to the habitation module

Station with comms tower attached, and antenna deployed (action group key 4 to toggle the antenna)

Lifeboat rocket on the pad

First approach to the station, with two lifeboats ready to be attached

Both lifeboats in place, one on each side

Fuel rig rocket on the pad

Fuel rig attached to the station. Large senior ports are for fuel tanks, the 2 standard size ports are for visiting craft. It is recommended that the fuel rig is attached so that the fuel tanks will be

parallel to the solar panels. This ensures that the standard docking ports have as much room as possible for any large craft visiting. If the fuel rig is attached 90 degrees either way, you run the

risk of fouling the solar panels when trying to dock visiting craft.

Fuel rocket on the pad

This is the 4th flight of a fuelling rocket, putting the final tank in place. Space between tanks is fairly tight, so you need to be careful when docking tanks next to those already in place.

The finished station

I hope some of you may find this useful if you are struggling to design your own stations. At the very least it may inspire you to have a go at putting together your own stations.

Edited September 3, 2015 by Scarecrow88

[Warzouz]

I like space station. I build something like that around Laythe to explore Jool's moon back in 0.9. I had a great time.

BTW, you could fire a single mission which would lift all that stuff into LKO. Simply integrate your tanks into your station (I lifted a double (or triple, I don't recall) biggest 3.75m tanks + science + habitat + com + energy + multiple docking). You can refill the station by docking a tank and transfer fuel.

This can be lifted by a 4 or 6 mammoth rocket. The cheapest way is to recover the LKO stage. I don't know ay cheaper way to do it.

Edited September 4, 2015 by Warzouz

[Scarecrow88]

Yeah, I just enjoy the rendezvous and docking part. In the past I set about making a bunch of modular parts that could be used to build stations in differing configurations. This station build was influenced by that process.

[StormKat]

Scarecrow88, I'm not seeing any pictures...

Will you be posting these craft to KerbalX?

[Warzouz]

Yeah, I just enjoy the rendezvous and docking part. In the past I set about making a bunch of modular parts that could be used to build stations in differing configurations. This station build was influenced by that process.

You're right. I find docking to be very relaxing. Sliding at low relative speed until you're alligned and give it a litle push to dock is ... nice.

(I don't like rendez-vous part though)

[Major SNAFU]

Looks good. Will work with it this weekend.

[Jon144]

Simple station and rockets but all goes together pretty beautifully!

[Scarecrow88]

Looks good. Will work with it this weekend.

Let me know how it goes. One thing I forgot to mention in the original post is that I use Kerbal Joint Reinforcement mod, so I have no idea how these craft fly without it. The core station craft has a bit of weight at the top, as does the fuel rocket, but hopefully they won't act like bits of wet spaghetti without KJR to help them.

Scarecrow88, I'm not seeing any pictures...

Will you be posting these craft to KerbalX?

Not sure why the pictures aren't showing for you, as no one else has reported a problem with them. No idea what KerbalX is, so I guess I won't be posting them there.

[StormKat]

My work network is probably blocking it for some stupid reason.

You need to check out KerbelX: http://kerbalx.com