Hullo Kerbin, this is ...

[Kordolius]

A new player, based in Normandy, France.

I planned to subscribe to this forum while I buyed this great game a month and a half ago.

And then... Whoa ! Already 230 hr played !?

Well, I'm late, but here I am.

First of all, I want to thank Squad Team for their work and praise them for making this game. I'm born the very year Apollo 11 mission set foot on the moon, and as a child, and then a young adult, I've always been fascinated by space exploration. This game reactivated the virus. Badly.

Note : : Will publish pictures of my craft later, as I cannot access them at the moment. Edit : Images added

My experiences, sofar, are (in a science game context) :

- Trying to build an orbiter, and managing, after many tries, to satellize and de-orbit Jebediah Kerman. Even managed not to forget to set a parachute onto the command module. Then same ol' Jeb took a trip to the Mün for a flyby, and got back alive to tell his story.

- Played a bit with a basic plane to collect Science on Kerbin biomes. Many crahes later, I managed to learn landing... errr... devise a correct landing procedure, and landed a plane on Kerbin polar caps. A few kerbals where hurt, but the first thing I try to add to my designs is an escape system. Actually, the only thing I thing I master now in this game is safety systems design. Well, Call me softhearted, but I really don't like loosing a kerbal. Even in a science game.

Then I found that I wanted some difficulty, and added a few mods to my game, notably FAR, KJR.

- Tried to optimize my basic plane (FAR). Still not satisfied with the result - many control issues, and I bump on control settings questions (will post about it on questions forum). But, I've catched - with a lot of help gathered from these forums - how to set CoM / CoL, use spoilers (now I can land ! Well, it looks less like a crash), and use the FAR stability tabs to validate my designs.

Basic Science and Test Plane, in flight :

- I then got enough of plane problems, and sended Valentina Kerbal to the Mun, then Bill Kerman to Minmus. Apollo-style design (wanted to learn docking procedures). Learned the art of docking, and before that the art of RCS systems fine tuning. Thanks a lot to the guy who created the ingame tutorial. In the same time, I mastered dV calculations (Have made my own spreadsheet, then discovered KER mod. Well, that validated my spreadsheet, and now I use KER. Great Mod!)

Minmus Mission on launchpad (A bit overdid it with dV ^^ ):

- After that, I started to plan a future unmanned mission to Duna, so I began building a small rover, for science and for fun. The idea behind it is to stack it inside a 2.5m structure (service bay or fairing). So was born the C.R.A.B., a 6 wheel multipurpose science Rover (Pictures later). Tested it thouroughly on kerbin (it also fits in a Mk2 bay).

C.R.A.B. Rover

Jeb piloting

- Once the rover was tested, with still Duna (and, why not, Eve / Moho) as a long term goal, I designed a payload including a scan sat, a skycrane, and fairing encased C.R.A.B rover behind a thermal shield. Then I successfully tested the package by deploying Scan Sats and Rover to Mun, Minmus. Moaaar Science ! And the opportunity to play with ore ressource scanning... and that idea that a refueling base on the Mün or Minmus could be a great idea for later.

Duna I.0 payload :

- That was enough a refreshment to motivate me to tackle plane design again, and I set my first ambitious goal : building a functional VTOL science plane. With the small plane experience, I quickly converged to a Mk2 based design, incorporating the C.R.A.B. as a science platform. After a lot of cras... err... pilot problems, I finally found a way to manage a procedure for transition between horizontal phase and vertical hovering (with or without landing) using vernor engine and SAS to help the craft to remain stable through this transition. That was by far the main hurdle I had to jump.

VTOL Science Hopper:

Zoom on the C.R.A.B. Bay :

- Actually, I'm flying a Big mission on the Mun, Apollo style, with a 2.5m lander and 2 Kerbals on it. The launch was great, and the ship in en route for the Mün. The lander has a full science service bay, and I plan to deploy a C.R.A.B. rover from another 2.5m Service bay to explore around with a science specialist aboard. I already identified an interesting (good Ore%) zone near a Mün canyon. I expect a tricky landing.

Edit : Landed !!!

The next planned steps are :

- Send Duna I.0 mission to deploy scanning sat and CRAB rover around the red planet (waiting for a good transfer window at the moment)

- Explore Kerbin with my VTOL plane, with a desert mission and a south pole landing.

- Experiment with mining on the Mun (canyon landing site or another).

Edited October 20, 2015 by Kordolius
Images added

[Starhawk]

Hello Kordolius, and welcome to the forums!

That's a wonderful first post and I'm very pleased to have you aboard. You're not late at all.

An impressive list of achievements and obstacles faced so far.

I look forward to seeing some pics from your missions.

Happy landings!

[Dman979]

Welcome! I too want to see pics. Impressive!

[Kordolius]

Thanks, added the pictures.

Err.... The initial post disappeared. Probably temporary pending moderator validation.

... I hope so ...

[sal_vager]

Automatic moderation is a pain in the behind, sorry, your first 3 posts are auto moderated, you should be fine now

[Shark4558]

Hello Kordollius!,welcome to the forums.

Your project looks very interesting, especially the scientific VTOL, you could turn your VTOL into an unmanned aircraft,and use it in Duna (the red planet) but if you use a aircraft in Duna, you would have to replace the Jet engine by a rocket, jet engines dont work on Duna ...

seriously, it must be incredible to deliver the rover to Duna using an aircraft, I still have not done it ...

[Kordolius]

@sal_vager : No problems, have some experience in moderating forums and guessed right. Thanks for clarification !

@ Shark : I had something like that in mind when designing a science rover that can fit in a Mk2 bay.

Not with this plane, though, I'm still struggling with subsonic stability, and my first (really for fun) attempt at an SSTO craft finished ... well ... badly. Lots of things to learn before tackling this goal seriously.

[KSACheese]

Welcome to the forums, and good luck with that Duna mission!

[NathanBros]

Welcome to the forums Kordolius, enjoy your stay!