The Elcano Challange and Easter Egg hunt (SPOILERS!!!)

[Just Jim]

SPOILER ALERT!!!

This mission is visiting the Mun's Easter Eggs.

If you want to find them yourselves, you may not want to read this.

SPOILER ALERT!!!

To kill some time until the next update, I decided to try my hand at the Elcano challenge and attempt to circumnavigate the Mun. But I also want to do it with a twist. I want to turn this into an Easter egg hunt. I’ve only found one of the Mun-eggs so far in my career game, the Armstrong memorial. There are 7 more out there. I know their approximate locations, and I'm going to try and find them along the way.

Yeah, maybe I'm nuts.

Actually, the biggest reason I'm doing it this way is simply to sightsee. The Mun is beautiful, and full of surprising views, and I hope to have many, many interesting sights to share in this log.

I spent the last two days setting everything up. First step was landing a new rover near the Armstrong memorial, my starting and returning point. This is a stock rover design I've had great luck with. She has a really wide wheelbase and very low CoM, plus a couple extra steel plates in the bottom to add a little more weight.

Next was land my flagship, the Annabel Lee, and transfer Val, Bob and Bill to the rover. Jeb will remain with the ship, refuel, and return to coordinate from orbit. He will also be available for a fast rescue mission, if needed. Annabel Lee is stock plus 2 parts from the asteroid-day mod.

I also redirected one of my survey platforms into a very low 10km orbit for aerial recon. These platforms are stock and have a huge amount of xenon fuel, more than enough for my needs. And looking down at the landscape, I'm definitely going to need an eye in the sky to get thru this.

So everyone is set, our teams first anomaly is not far away, south and a little west.

But the sun is beginning to set, so tomorrow at dawn the adventure begins.

Edited June 23, 2016 by Just Jim

[nsgallup]

Mun has awesome terrain even though it looks bland from orbit

[xendelaar]

Nice report. I can't wait until the next update is uploaded. Your ship and rover designs are awesome btw

[Just Jim]

Spent our first day climbing out of Northwest Crater. Only travelled about 8km, but also climbed nearly 2km.

Rover handled OK, and seems to climb hills good enough, but I'm seriously wishing had something bigger and heavier.

[SpaceplaneAddict]

Good report so far, and kudos to you.

[xendelaar]

Spent our first day climbing out of Northwest Crater. Only travelled about 8km, but also climbed nearly 2km.

Rover handled OK, and seems to climb hills good enough, but I'm seriously wishing had something bigger and heavier.

http://i.imgur.com/0rxXEcd.jpg

downward thrusters could also help

[Just Jim]

This morning disaster struck.While Val, Bill and Bob were planting a flag, the rovers brake gave out and she rolled down a hill, then a cliff. then a steeper cliff, and into a crater.

The results were not good.

Desperate, Dr. Werhner von Kerman suggested using an untested prototype of a much larger rover, knick-named the Chariot by the folks in engineering.

When Gene pointed out there was no delivery system, Bob, who was listening in, suggested using two of our big space station skycranes.

Dr. von Kerman muttered, “It just might work."

Edited June 23, 2016 by Just Jim

[SpaceplaneAddict]

That is big.

[Just Jim]

First day driving the Chariot, and I could not be happier! Traveled 10km, mostly uphill at a 10m/s average with no slipping or sliding. The extra thrusters really paid off. The only issue is anything past about 10 degree slope and she starts to lose speed. But pop the translate forward thrusters every few seconds and she maintained her speed to as much as 30 degrees!!! (I didn't encounter anything steeper.)

Only issue, and this just presents an interesting twist, is the thrusters eat more fuel than I first anticipated. But not so bad as to be a problem. It just means I'll have to stop and refuel more. It also means I need to stay in ore rich areas, which may change my travel plans.

Anyway, after the first day it's time to shut down, drill and re-fuel. Tomorrow we should make it to midland crater.

Edited June 23, 2016 by Just Jim

[lajoswinkler]

Wow, you love big things. I never used those huge wheels, but they look so applicable for such large processing facilities.

[Just Jim]

Mission Report: Day 2

Unlike yesterday, today was mostly downhill, and the team made excellent progress. I couldn’t be happier with how this monster handles. The thrusters make all the difference in the world, and she was able to top out at 20m/s going about 10 degrees downhill and stayed stable!!! I’ve never had a rover stay stable going that fast on the Mun.

Then she did a couple really scary 30-degree descents, and the thrusters were a godsend! The forward thrusters make excellent brakes, and the couple times the wheels tried to come off the ground were quickly corrected with the downward thrusters. Scary as it was, she did fine. The only thing I need to watch is making sure to top off the fuel tanks before and again after a long descent.

So the team has gone about 40km south so far, and found their first blip, which appears to be a buried monolith. They planted a flag to mark the location for further study, and are now heading southeast out of this huge crater, then hooking back northeast. I need to go northeast, and then east to farside crater before heading south in order to avoid a really long stretch with no ore.

[xendelaar]

Awesome rig! I've never seen all anomalies on the mun, so I kinda want to find them myself one day... but this report is so darn interesting hehe. Keep up the good work.

40km... it seems like you've got a long way to go!

[Just Jim]

Awesome rig! I've never seen all anomalies on the mun, so I kinda want to find them myself one day... but this report is so darn interesting hehe. Keep up the good work.

40km... it seems like you've got a long way to go!

Thank you, and yeah, I'm just getting started. But my first couple days were in really bad terrain, so I didn't get very far. I did this on purpose to test her out, and based on how well she's handling, I'm beginning to think I just may be able to pull this off.

My estimate to completion is about two months (real time)

- - - Updated - - -

Oh, quick correction on my course. I got my big craters mixed up. I'm currenty headed north to the east side of Northwest crater, then heading east to East Crater, not Farside Crater. After that I will circle around East Crater and head south to the pole. This will put me in a much richer area for mining ore all the way to the pole than if I just kept heading south now.

[Just Jim]

Note: I have made a decision about the Easter eggs. While I will definitely post screenshots when I find them, I will NOT be posting their exact coordinates, nor marking them with flags. I don’t want to take all the fun out of it. Obviously they’re somewhere along the route I’m taking, but I’m only showing the bunny trail. Where he dropped the eggs is still up to y’all to find.

I’ve also re-named my rover The Chariot.

Mission report: We have traveled out first 100 kilometers. The rover is performing excellently, and Bill did a complete inspection when we stopped with no damage to report. Someone please relay to Dr. von Kerman he was right about adding the extra struts!

Total driving time, not counting re-fueling, is about 5 hours game time. Depends on the terrain. Right now I’m on the midlands where it’s nice and smooth and making excellent time without burning much fuel on thrusters.

Refueling time depends on the available ore. Inside the Midland crater had a much higher concentration and took much less time to drill than where I am now. It takes a little less than one ore-tank load to convert and totally fill all the fuel tanks. Luckily I can time advance thru this part.

Oh, I don’t think I posted…. She holds 720 units of liquid-fuel, 880 oxidizer, and 800 monopropellant. Best guess is it gives me about 10 minutes total burn time if I held down all the thrusters at once… I think? There are 20 total thrusters arranged around her, so it’s not as easy to calculate the burn time as one rocket engine.

The really good thing is I’ve been monitoring the short band ore scanner as I’ve been driving around, and even though the ore count is lousy where I am, so far I’ve seen no areas of complete zero ore. This is very encouraging!

Lastly, I’ve been planting flags at 10km intervals, and now there’s enough to start to make out my travel route.

[xendelaar]

I wonder how much delta v it takes to complete the mission.

Why did you bring a ladder on the rover? You can just use your jet pack, non?

5 hours. .. Wow you've got some stamina mister. How doyou keep yourself motivated?

[Just Jim]

I wonder how much delta v it takes to complete the mission.

Why did you bring a ladder on the rover? You can just use your jet pack, non?

5 hours. .. Wow you've got some stamina mister. How doyou keep yourself motivated?

The ladder just fit the look I suppose

As for the stamina, thanks, but I'm taking breaks between flags. Also this rover is much more fun than anything I've sent to the Mun. I'm really enjoying driving it around

And if I get bored, I can always take a break and play with spaceplanes or something... lol

[Just Jim]

Mission report: The crew continued up along the eastern rim of Northwest crater, but soon found themselves entering an area of steep cliffs, canyons and deep, dangerous craters, and they were eventually boxed in and forced to change plans. Jeb, high in orbit, confermed the only real safe way out was to turn east, so the decision was made to head east across the midlands to, ironically enough, East Crater. Satellite scans show a rich band of ore running from East Crater both north and south to the poles, and this should greatly increase our refueling efficiency.

One thing of special note: While trying to maneuver out of the cliffs and craters, the crew made a facinating discovery. A huge arch of solid stone protruding from the ground! As they got close it's massive size became apparent; a dozen rovers could fit under it!!! Bob and Dr. von Kerman can't stop talking about it!

East crater is aprox. 150 km from our current position across the midlands, which are fairly flat and easy to drive on. I expect to ETA in about 2 days (realtime) with no problems.

[Just Jim]

Quick mission report, day 12: Team has traveled 260km, and is now close enough to pick up the signal from our old base inside East Crater. This base has been deserted the last 50 years, and mission control would like the team to swing by and check up on it. Now a decision needs to be made as to the safest way to enter the massive East crater.

[Just Jim]

Mission update: The team has now traveled over 300km and has reached the great east crater safely. They are now circling the rim to find a safe way down into this massive crater. During the trip Bob and Dr. von Kerman have been on the radio discussing different ideas and theories into the origin of the great stone arch the team encountered earlier. Mainly how such a structure could form in a non-atmosphere environment. With no wind or rain to carve the stone, it's formation is quite puzzling. The only thing everyone in the science departments can agree on is this Arch is most likely a one-of-a-kind freak of nature, and the odds of finding something even remotely like it in our solar system, or even the galaxy, are astronomical.

[Just Jim]

OK, 1.0.5 just came out, and as much as I hate to do this, I think I'm going to have to stop where I am. I really, really want to start a new career with the new contextual contract system, sorry. I will attempt this again when I can in my new game.

[Gman_builder]

On ‎10‎/‎30‎/‎2015 at 6:44 PM, Just Jim said:

This morning disaster struck.While Val, Bill and Bob were planting a flag, the rovers brake gave out and she rolled down a hill… then a cliff… then a steeper cliff, and into a crater.

The results were not good.

Desperate, Dr. Werhner von Kerman suggested using an untested prototype of a much larger rover, knick-named the Munbeast by the folks in engineering.

When Gene pointed out there was no delivery system, Bob, who was listening in, suggested using two of our big space station skycranes.

Dr. von Kerman muttered, “It just might work…ââ‚

There's a MK2 probe core in there you should have been able to control the rover.

Or is this just a conspiracy to cover up YOU WANTING A NEW ROVER

 

 

[Just Jim]

42 minutes ago, Gman_builder said:

There's a MK2 probe core in there you should have been able to control the rover.

Or is this just a conspiracy to cover up YOU WANTING A NEW ROVER

 

Wow... I had totally forgotten I started this thread.  But to answer your question, yes on both counts.... it did slide and roll down the hill, and I did want a newer one anyway, so I made no real attempt to save it.

And now that you've reminded me of it, I have an important update...

I did it!!!  I'm quite finished, but didn't say anything about it because it's part of my Emiko story, and I haven't quite caught up yet.  But considering I made it 90% in the story so far, I'm thinking it's no big spoiler for the readers.

So here's one of the maps...  I'll post a much longer, detailed report of the trip once I've written the last part into Emiko.

 

 

[Thalamask]

Great read, mate. I hope you're going to post this into the Elcano Challenge thread!