Kerbfleet: A Jool Odyssey-END OF CHAPTER 21! (and hopefully not so many talking heads in 22!)

[Foxbat]

On 2/26/2016 at 9:42 PM, Kuzzter said:

Oh no, what have I done! Foxbat, there are so many better cargo SSTOs out there than the Derpstar! When my kids see it they both laugh and go "Derp derp derp". But I'm glad it worked for you  Maybe the Mark II will be more successful.

LOL.  I'll take inspiration from a derpy Kuzzter design any day.  ("Derpy....by Kuzzter...at fine spacecraft dealers everywhere"). I installed a full sized cargo bay on my standard Mk III hull and the cockpit and engines were in different time zones .  Sifting through the expert advice in these pages has greatly improved my overall design & build thought process.

[Mister Dilsby]

Things are going well, but I think I'm not going to be in position for an update for a bit. (one can only do so much when the source material is a 3x repeated SSTO mission involving probes  ) At this point the Derpstar Two ("The Second Derping!") has made orbit and "ripple fired" its cargo of three scansats to intercept Intrepid. Had to do it this way as I was "bingo" LF in the correct sense, that is I had enough to de-orbit and maybe do a powered landing, but not to intercept Intrepid and then do so. 

Challenge was juggling the burns among three scansats in such a way I--er, Dilsby-- didn't have to be in two or more places at once, but I ended up with a nicely staggered formation like this:

...this all happened on the night side (another good reason not to try to make a comic out of it) and I've enhanced the brightness so you can kind of make out the active probe in the foreground. That one is now safely docked in R-bay, with the second one holding station at 600 meters and the third just completing its final intercept burn.

Next up we'll see how Samantha does landing an (allegedly) improved Derpstar with significantly less LF in the tanks. What happened to the fuel? Well, operator error. The Derpstar's test run ended up in orbit with 800 m/s to spare, but when I did it for reals I had less than 200. In the latter, I climbed too steeply from 8-15 km and failed to build up enough speed, then climbed too shallow from 15km to 22km trying to get to 1350, and spent too much time in mid atmosphere. 

Anyway, she'll get to try it again, assuming her second landing is at least a "good" one. Next flight will carry the fourth and final scansat, plus the two Jooldiver probes, and then she's scheduled for one more to bring up Kenlie, Gumdrop Two and maybe a rover. I'll see what pics I have in the file after all that and put together some kind of story  

Edited February 27, 2016 by Kuzzter

[Starhawk]

7 minutes ago, Kuzzter said:

operator error. The Derpstar's test run ended up in orbit with 800 m/s to spare, but when I did it for reals I had less than 200. In the latter, I climbed too steeply from 8-15 km and failed to build up enough speed, then climbed too shallow from 15km to 22km trying to get to 1350, and spent too much time in mid atmosphere. 

The very challenging aspect of spaceplanes now is the ascent profile, at least for me.  There is a fairly narrow window of velocity/altitude that must be hit or not to space you will go. 

A fairly small divergence can mean several hundred m/s difference in delta-v, as you point out.

I wish both you and Samantha,,,

Happy landings!
I'm sure Samantha has enough concerns for the both of us.

[Geschosskopf]

19 hours ago, Kuzzter said:

 At this point the Derpstar Two ("The Second Derping!") has made orbit and "ripple fired" its cargo of three scansats to intercept Intrepid. Had to do it this way as I was "bingo" LF in the correct sense, that is I had enough to de-orbit and maybe do a powered landing, but not to intercept Intrepid and then do so. 

Yay, a flotilla!

Just remember, unless the probes have enough fuel to capture at Jool on their own, you have to riplle-fire them during Intrepid's capture burn, not at the edge of Jool's SOI.

......

Next up we'll see how Samantha does landing an (allegedly) improved Derpstar with significantly less LF in the tanks. What happened to the fuel? Well, operator error. The Derpstar's test run ended up in orbit with 800 m/s to spare, but when I did it for reals I had less than 200. In the latter, I climbed too steeply from 8-15 km and failed to build up enough speed, then climbed too shallow from 15km to 22km trying to get to 1350, and spent too much time in mid atmosphere. 

Anyway, she'll get to try it again, assuming her second landing is at least a "good" one. Next flight will carry the fourth and final scansat, plus the two Jooldiver probes, and then she's scheduled for one more to bring up Kenlie, Gumdrop Two and maybe a rover. I'll see what pics I have in the file after all that and put together some kind of story  

Given Air Service landings, at what point does it become more economical to launch probes with disposable rockets instead of disposable spaceplanes?

 

[Mister Dilsby]

21 hours ago, Starhawk said:

The very challenging aspect of spaceplanes now is the ascent profile, at least for me.  There is a fairly narrow window of velocity/altitude that must be hit or not to space you will go. 

Quite true, and I'm a little embarrassed to admit it but I'm actually starting to like the Derpstar. Here's the Mk2 ascending with the second load of probes:

Swapped the conical tail for the goofy Mk3-Mk2 adapter which I always thought too derpy to use, but here, well, you get it. Also a fifth RAPIER rather than TRJ. I left the tail of the adapter bluff so I'd have a place to put linear thrusters. Also, speedbrakes are up on the tail per recommendations. (thanks guys!)

Still flying the last missions and won't post an actual comic page until I'm about ready to leave LKO, so here's a little more docking pr0n to tide you over:

L and R pod forward bays are both open: Scansat 1 is in lower R pod, Scansat 2 approaching. You'll note I took some tanks off in the final config and I did go with the 10-linear 2-O10 layout. Was interesting to have to fire the engine when I needed a -X translation, but it worked and I like the look of them. Vacuum dV appears to be quite sufficient.

 

1 hour ago, Geschosskopf said:

Yay, a flotilla!

Hm, not sure we can call it a flotilla if the interplanetary transfer is all in one piece and the craft don't separate until they are just about to reach their objective. Hopefully it will look cool enough to count as a (peaceful and scientific) macross missile massacre

Quote

Given Air Service landings, at what point does it become more economical to launch probes with disposable rockets instead of disposable spaceplanes?

O ye of little faith

No fuel? No power? No problem! You'll have to wait a bit to see how "good" her second landing was though.  

[TaintedLion]

Hey Kuzzter,

if 1.1 comes out before you finish Jool Odyssey, will you complete it in 1.0.5, or will you wait until all the mods you use are updated to 1.1?

[Mister Dilsby]

Just now, TaintedLion said:

if 1.1 comes out before you finish Jool Odyssey, will you complete it in 1.0.5, or will you wait until all the mods you use are updated to 1.1?

A really good question. I'd like to move the save to 1.1 and continue the mission in the latest version as soon as it's practical to do so. Hopefully the promised performance improvements will be effective in cutting down lag as I continue to dock probes and the combined craft part count soars through the mid-600sies.

It would not be practical to update if, of course, any part of Intrepid no longer loads or operates as intended. I am really hoping I don't have to do anything crazy like handbuild a craft file to keep going, but I might prefer that to having to launch and assemble the beast again. 

Assuming the Intrepid still loads and functions in 1.1 (or 1.1.2 or whatever the first truly stable version ends up being) you can expect Bill to sense "a great disturbance" of some kind once the critical mods are updated. 

[ExplorerKlatt]

@Kuzzter could you list all the mods you are using?

[Mister Dilsby]

22 minutes ago, ExplorerKlatt said:

@Kuzzter could you list all the mods you are using?

Off the top of my head, the ones you see in gameplay are:

Environmental Visual Enhancements (EVE) Astronomer's Pack
Kerbal Alarm Clock
Kerbal Engineer
USI Life Support
USI Core (for the fission reactors)
Planetary Base Inc.Systems (habs, science lab and some life support parts)
Nebula Decals 
Wild Blue Industries awesome plasma TV screen

And behind the scenes:

Kerbal Animation Suite
Enhanced IVA
Hyperedit (everything I show in the comic is done legit, but sometimes I need use "stunt doubles" for it to look good  )



 

[Willbl3pic]

14 hours ago, Kuzzter said:

A really good question. I'd like to move the save to 1.1 and continue the mission in the latest version as soon as it's practical to do so. Hopefully the promised performance improvements will be effective in cutting down lag as I continue to dock probes and the combined craft part count soars through the mid-600sies.

It would not be practical to update if, of course, any part of Intrepid no longer loads or operates as intended. I am really hoping I don't have to do anything crazy like handbuild a craft file to keep going, but I might prefer that to having to launch and assemble the beast again. 

Assuming the Intrepid still loads and functions in 1.1 (or 1.1.2 or whatever the first truly stable version ends up being) you can expect Bill to sense "a great disturbance" of some kind once the critical mods are updated. 

You might have to set up some relay satellites in case Kerbin goes behind Kerbol, or there goes your science transmitting!

[Mister Dilsby]

Almost there! Just finishing the ?!!@$ rover so it actually fits in the bay, and we'll be ready for the very last supply flight!

Edited March 1, 2016 by Kuzzter

[Starhawk]

Great song!

Samantha is great and so is the Derpstar Two.  It's clearly a good ship and I don't think it's that derpy, no matter what your kids say. 

And, of course, Dilsby Rocks!

Happy Concerned landings!

[Mister Dilsby]

9 minutes ago, Starhawk said:

Samantha is great and so is the Derpstar Two.  It's clearly a good ship and I don't think it's that derpy, no matter what your kids say. 

Thanks, and I am forced to agree about the Derpstar. De-orbited with the tank dry, lost power on the way down but pulled off an effortless glide landing within sight of KSC. Second time I figured out the flight profile and intercepted Intrepid with fuel to spare. On landing, overcorrected the undershoot from the previous flight and missed by a lot, but managed to turn and fly to Overshoot Island without much issue (other than coming in a bit too fast, bouncing back into the air at 40 m/s and nearly ending up in the water ) All in all, a very good weekend for the Air Service.

Edited February 29, 2016 by Kuzzter

[Starhawk]

3 minutes ago, Kuzzter said:

All in all, a very good weekend for the Air Service.

That's very good to hear.

Sadly, my game was subject to multiple serial Kraken attacks on the weekend.  It repeatedly crashed as I tried to switch ships.
At this point I'm seriously hoping I don't have to go all the way back to launching the entire flotilla again.  But it may come to that.  Time will tell.

Happy Concerned Frustrated landings!

[GDJ]

Walt.....Kerbal of the hour.

Tickets go on sale at the Admin building....prices are 2 hot snacks for adults, one for kids.....free for Kerbals under the age of 1 month.

"Rebel Rebel
You tore up Dres
Rebel Rebel
The ground tracks are a mess!
Rebel Rebel
But you all know,
I got hot snacks, and you love them so!"

Edited February 29, 2016 by GDJ

[Geschosskopf]

52 minutes ago, Kuzzter said:

Almost there! Just finishing the ?!!@$ rover so it actually fits in the bay, and we'll be ready for the very last supply flight!

Wow, that's a lot of work.  First, teaching Walt to rock, 2nd writing a song, and 3rd, the grindiness of all the SSTO flights and dockings

[Dman979]

6 hours ago, GDJ said:

Walt.....Kerbal of the hour.

Tickets go on sale at the Admin building....prices are 2 hot snacks for adults, one for kids.....free for Kerbals under the age of 1 month.

"Rebel Rebel
You tore up Dres
Rebel Rebel
The ground tracks are a mess!
Rebel Rebel
But you all know,
I got hot snacks, and you love them so!"

It's a god-awful launch event
but it pays the Space Program's rent.
All the tourists are yelling no,
But Jeb is yelling go

But the stars are nowhere to be seen
as she walks to her console screen
to the cam with the clearest view
as she's watching Flight 15

But the launch is an awful bore
for she's seen it ten times or more
She could see through the probe core's tools
her boss tells her to focus on

Kerbals dancing on the launchpad
Oh man look at those green guys go
It's the freakiest show
Take a look at Deeman
talking to the wrong guy
Oh man wonder if he'll ever know
he's in the top-grossing comic
is there life near Jooooool

It's on Kerbin's floating brow
The Intrepid is in space now
Now the launch clamps are struck away
we're launching into the day

see the Kerbs in their rocket ships
from the ocean to the helipads
Kerbulus is out of bounds
to runway technician clowns

But the launch is an awful bore
for I've seen it ten times or more
it's about to be docked again
as I show you

Kerbals dancing on the launchpad
Oh man look at those green guys go
It's the freakiest show
Take a look at Deeman
talking to the wrong guy
Oh man wonder if he'll ever know
he's in the top-grossing comic
is there life near Jooooool

Edited February 29, 2016 by Dman979

[GDJ]

Not bad Dman979...not bad at all.

[Scotius]

Walt must be a hit at KSC parties I can just see him blasting sick riffs from the top of water tower

[GDJ]

4 minutes ago, Scotius said:

Walt must be a hit at KSC parties I can just see him blasting sick riffs from the top of water tower

Yeah, he probably does a mean Kirvana cover.

[FyunchClick]

And the songs keep getting better and better... well done all.

Since we're on a bit of a Bowie stint, let me leave you with this.

 

[GDJ]

6 minutes ago, FyunchClick said:

And the songs keep getting better and better... well done all.

Since we're on a bit of a Bowie stint, let me leave you with this.

 

Only 47 Kerbals were killed? Ahh well. Progress is pain.

[GDJ]

Oh, and if you all look up Beastie Boy's "Intergalactic" music video, tell me that just doesn't scream "Kerbal Space Program".

[SpaceplaneAddict]

le beep, le beep, le beep, le beep.... 

NANANANA-NANANANA-NANANA- ..... 

R.I.P

I support a funeral for the lost Eve probes.

 

[FyunchClick]

3 hours ago, GDJ said:

Oh, and if you all look up Beastie Boy's "Intergalactic" music video, tell me that just doesn't scream "Kerbal Space Program".

What I think really hasn't been covered yet for kerbfleet music wise is a Saturday morning cartoon leader.

Maybe something to the (admitedly horrible) tune of Mask?

Keeeerbfleet enzins,
Working all the time, flying blind (flying blind!),
Stuuuurdy drillers,
That'll start refine, soooon as they arrive (at the site!),
Bob is gonna plan the mission,
Val has got such, su-per-vi-sion,
K-k-k-kerb. (fleet!),
is the mighty power that will fly to space,
K-k-k-kerb. (fleet!),
noone knows what lies for them near Jool in wait,
K-k-k-kerb. (fleet!),
Always trying to-go-home on vaaapor trails,
Come see that big ole ship,
Fly away!

-

Let it be noted I detested the cartoon as a kid, but the leader has all the right stuff for a classic SMC.