Eve aero-capture, aero-braking and safe landing in one pass

[Foxster]

Showing that an unpowered Eve encounter through to landing is possible in a single pass...

[imgur]lffGn[/imgur]

This craft came in from Kerbin on a typical hyperbolic orbit that would take it out past Eve unless corrected. The engines were just used to correct the Pe to 70km. Monopropellant O-10 "Puff" engines were used because they work OK even if their nozzles are obstructed i.e. they can be used from behind the heatshield.

The only "secret" here is that everything must be occluded by the heatshield, including the air-brakes. Hence their rotation on the top of the capsule so that when deployed so they don't stick out into the atmosphere on the way down, otherwise they would heatplode and the rest of the craft would not slow down and it too would heatplode.

This craft didn't get anywhere near overheating and just one encounter with Eve was required to achieve a landing.

[juanml82]

The problem now is getting the kerbonaut back to space :P

[Foxster]

[quote name='juanml82']The problem now is getting the kerbonaut back to space :P[/QUOTE]
Oh, that's not too hard. That was just a demo craft I threw together to show clearly how to do it. Here's a stock craft that will do all that and can return to orbit from sea level too, though it does take two orbits of Eve to get a landing...

[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/HtoAKF4.jpg[/IMG] Edited November 18, 2015 by Foxster