How do you get a kerbal (by himself) to fly home

[JackBush]

Yet again, I'm stuck on Mun with too little fuel. I've tried everything. But I read somewhere that the Kerbal can get himself back to Kerbin just on his own power. Possible from Mun? Or do I need to send a couple of buckets of gas? And how do you do that? (How do I find the stranded Kerbal?)

[Pecan]

The EVA RCS packs that Kerbals wear has 600m/s dV, IIRC, which isn't really enough to get back from the surface of Mun.

When you send a rescue ship just look in map mode for the landed vehicle or Kerbal on EVA, if he's got out.  If you can't see EVA Kerbals then move your mouse to the top of the display in map mode and make sure they're selected.

ETA: Actually landing anywhere near the Kerbal might be difficult.  MJ's landing guidance does a good job *grin*.

Edited December 14, 2015 by Pecan

[JackBush]

Thanks for that. If I want to send him some fuel (I don't have any pods big enough for two yet) do I have to send an engineer to put it in his ship. Or how does that whole thing work. Point me at a tutorial if you know of one..

Edited December 14, 2015 by JackBush

[Superfluous J]

You CAN get your Kerbal into orbit of Mun from the surface, and then you don't have to land near him. It's tight, so I suggest burning all the rocket fuel to get him going to start. Then hop out, grab all the science (!) and jet pack into orbit.

Then all you have to do is rendezvous with your rescue ship.

3 hours ago, JackBush said:

Thanks for that. If I want to send him some fuel (I don't have any pods big enough for two yet) do I have to send an engineer to put it in his ship. Or how does that whole thing work. Point me at a tutorial if you know of one..

There is no fuel transfer in the (stock) game. The rescue ship will need an open seat for your Kerbal and enough fuel to get itself back to Kerbin. You'll leave the stranded ship on the surface. Or let it crash if you do what I outlined above.

And you don't need pods big enough for 2. Just bring an extra - empty - pod.

Edited December 15, 2015 by 5thHorseman
typo

[Snark]

A kerbal EVA pack is enough to get all the way home from the surface of Minmus.

It's barely enough to get to Munar orbit from the surface of the Mun, but borderline.  I wouldn't care to try it.  It's not enough to go all the way home from the surface of the Mun.

If you're already in orbit around the Mun, it's enough to take you home.

Note that "go home" isn't as simple as it used to be, pre-1.0.5.  It used to be that a kerbal could re-enter Kerbin's atmosphere without a problem, fall out of the sky, and plop onto the ground unharmed.  With 1.0.5, I think it's now pretty much impossible for an unshielded kerbal to re-enter Kerbin's atmosphere without getting fried.  So you'd better have a rescue ship on hand to snatch the kerbal before he hits atmosphere.

If you have an intact ship on the Mun that simply doesn't have enough fuel to get back to orbit, here's what I would suggest:

1. Take off from the Mun and burn until it's out of fuel.  You want to be as fuel-efficient as possible: immediately upon liftoff, crank it over to near-horizontal (pointing eastward) so that its nose is just barely over the horizon, so you're putting nearly all your thrust into accelerating sideways.  You want your trajectory to be so low that you're practically scraping your toes.
2. When you run out of fuel, kerbal goes EVA, takes any science out of the command pod, and continue thrusting prograde.
3. Circularize your orbit using your EVA pack.
4. Then send a rescue ship from Kerbin that has an empty crew slot.  It doesn't have to land on the Mun, just rendezvous with your orbiting EVA kerbal and let him come aboard.  Then head home as per usual.