Lightest craft to catch the first Moho transfer window (updated)

[Jetski]

So there's a Moho transfer window open very early on in a new career.  Day 10, hour 12, earth time.  This is a hard one to catch, as tech levels are quite low generally at this point.  My challenge is this:

1) Catch that first transfer window in a fresh career (puts you on Moho around day 32, at least in my attempt). 

2) Use the tech you have available to you at that date.  This could be a lot or a little, depending on how fast you can climb the tech tree.  It may even be possible to finish the tech tree by day 10, if so nice job, you probably will crush this challenge.  I barely got fuel lines and solar panels by then.

3) Successfully transmit science from the surface of Moho, post a picture showing lander with timestamp visible.  More pictures are better.

4) Do it with the lightest craft you can.  Leaderboard is based on launchpad weight.  If anyone wants to try, bonus for returning anything from Moho surface to Kerbin surface, subtract that from your launchpad weight.  Separate category for ISRU.  Lowest score wins.

5) Stock only please. No mods except informational (KER/Mechjeb OK) or visual (EVE, Planetshine, etc).  Any mod that alters performance, engines, or science is not a legit attempt.

6) Note in your submission whether you started your career on Easy, Normal, or Hard.  It likely won't affect your ship, but will make a difference how fast you progress through the tech tree.  My test run was on Easy, and took about 4 hours start to finish IRL.  I'm working on an attempt in Hard, but it will take a LOT longer to get set up. 

7) Update Bonus Rule: anything returned to Kerbin that touched the surface of Moho gets a x2 multiplier.  100 tons on launchpad, 48 tons makes it back x2, total score = 4.  Would be interested to see how anyone handles this as a round trip.

LEADERBOARD

EASY MODE:

ManEatingApe - 3 tons on pad, nothing returned to Kerbin = total score 3.0
burned through the tech tree fast to get ion drives, sent a tiny probe on a one-way mission.

Jetski - 384.4 tons on pad, nothing returned to Kerbin = total score 384.4

NORMAL MODE:

Nefrums - 2.5 tons on pad, nothing returned to Kerbin = total score 2.5, great job running through a new career, tiny ion lander also.

ManEatingApe  - 12.5 on pad, 1.91x2 returning= total score 8.68, first successful roundtrip with Jeb!

HARD MODE:

Jasonden - 30.77 tons on the pad, nothing returned to Kerbin = total score 30.77.  First completed mission on Hard mode, went with chem rockets instead of clawing up the tech tree for ions, super light probe, Terrier and Ant engines used to good effect.

 

Here's the window you are trying to catch.  In Kerbin time, it's  Year 1, day 39 at 1:06:09 (thanks Nefrums)

I'll give you a few days leeway in case timing is tight, but you must have made your transfer burn by day 42 or it doesn't qualify.  Fair warning, burning late will make your window MUCH less efficient, it's possible to spend an absolutely absurd amount of dV getting to Moho outside of a decent window.

Target Body	Depart Date (EARTH TIME)				Ejection Angle	Ejection DeltaV	Ejection Inclination	Plane Change DeltaV	Capture DeltaV (100km)	Total DeltaV
	Y	D	H	M
Moho	1	10	12	0	-140	2431	-19.41	0	2762	5193

 

My attempt on Easy mode:

Edited January 17, 2016 by Jetski

[Nefrums]

This sound like a fun but rather lengthy challenge. I'll might try it

Converting a 24 hour day to a 6 hour day is just multiplying by 4. 

Accoring to KSP Launch Window Planner by alexmoon the first window is:

Departure: Year 1, day 39 at 1:06:09,   Arrival: Year 1, day 130 at 5:31:39 (Kerbin time)   Total Δv: 5,253 m/s

 

[Jetski]

2 hours ago, Nefrums said:

This sound like a fun but rather lengthy challenge. I'll might try it

Converting a 24 hour day to a 6 hour day is just multiplying by 4. 

Accoring to KSP Launch Window Planner by alexmoon the first window is:

Departure: Year 1, day 39 at 1:06:09,   Arrival: Year 1, day 130 at 5:31:39 (Kerbin time)   Total Δv: 5,253 m/s

 

Thanks, I'll add this to the OP. Best of luck.  Interested to see a better solution than I came up with

Edited January 8, 2016 by Jetski

[Nefrums]

I've started a new career game to try this challane. It is fun to try to get enough science in only 39 kerbin days.

I'm currently at day 5 and have two landers heading for minmus and one for the mun. Will send more as soon as I rescue enough crew for them.

It is also hard to get enough credits to upgrade the RnD building.

[ManEatingApe]

Great challenge @Jetski, I really like the idea of having to carefully manage contracts and struggle with cash to upgrade your facilities, all the while racing against the clock. Careful with that time warp! 

Some minor suggestions:

• To avoid any ambiguity specify an exact latest date that you have to launch your Moho mission before e.g. Day 40 @ 0:00
• Separate entries by career difficulty as it makes a big difference!

Just in case you're not already aware, there are 2 other good challenges that can help you with prepare for this one:

• Caveman (current) and Caveman (Original) force you to launch missions with primitive facilities and severe part and weight limits.
• Mun and back as light as you can has a great range of lightweight designs at various tech levels.

Some other observations:

• Science Kerbals can reset experiments, eliminating the need to carry duplicates.
• Minimus is a little harder to reach than the Mun, but is much easier to land on, move around on and leave.

To get the ball rolling, here's my entry, 3 tons on the launchpad in Easy mode

Landed on Moho

It took 3 missions to prepare. The 1st was a suborbital flight and the 2nd a quick jaunt to Kerbin orbit. The 3rd mission was the keystone, a biome hopping mission to Minimus that returned 3,672 science and allowed me to unlock most tech nodes on Day 19.

Full Album

On 'Easy' cash wasn't an issue, the facility upgrades are cheap and the World's First awards give you enough funds that you don't have to grind any extra contracts. However 'Moderate' is a whole different ballgame. Cash is really tight and you have to choose really carefully which facilities to upgrade. I'm not finished yet but it's going to be tough 

For example these tables compare progress from 3 missions on "Easy' vs 'Moderate'

Easy Career

Mission	Science	Funds
1	128.6	545,349
2	301.0	449,597
3	3,672.0	1,034,472

Moderate Career

Mission	Science	Funds
1	49.3	130,270
2	79.6	183,320
3	251	333,870

 

Edited January 10, 2016 by ManEatingApe

[Jetski]

@ManEatingApe, Fantastic job! I'll post you on the board under Easy mode.  Good point on clarifying the time limit, editing OP now.  That's a great ship, Moho really lends itself to ion exploitation with all that sunshine

 

Edit: my new career save on Hard mode is progressing slowly.  Really a struggle to get things upgraded, I'm about 1 hour in game time (3+ IRL) and finally have a Mun flyby on the way.  Been taking the crappy tourist contracts and gear testing, saving up for better buildings.  I didn't realize how much I normally use timewarp to speed through stuff, recycle contracts, and generally do one thing at a time.  Feeling the time crunch

Edited January 10, 2016 by Jetski

[Nefrums]

I finished my entry on normal difficulty.

 

I did the the following missions in my career game:

Day 1:

1. some science gardening on the launchpad and runway.
2. A rocket out of the atmosphere.
3. A driving trip round KSP
4. Mun flyby.

This gave enough silence to make mun/minmus landings possible

Day 3 i launched landers to minmus and mun.

During this time I also launched two trips to orbit the mun with 4 tourists aboard, and made 5 rescue missions that each rescued 2 kerbals from LKO.  This in combination with the mun/minmus landings gave the funds to upgrade the RND etc.

Here are some of the ships that i used:

Note that for 1k dV extra a minmus trip can be done in half the time.

Day 17 I was ready to launch the probe to moho.

This is the 2.5 t probe:

 

[ManEatingApe]

@Nefrums Nice work, such a tiny craft! (I probably shouldn't have included 500kg of snacks on my probe )

It looks like it will be possible to unlock ions on 'Moderate' also, so just 'Hard' remains to be conquered.

Some quick testing in Sandbox mode showed that as a fallback plan a Panther lower stage/Terrier+Ant upper stage craft should be able to reach Moho for about 15 tons on the runway. This would only require upgrading R&D to level 2 and 673 science to unlock necessary nodes.

 

[Jetski]

@Nefrums great job, that weight is going to be hard to beat.  You go on the board as our first Normal mode winner.

Also I added a bonus multiplier in case anyone wants to try this as a round trip, X2 for anything that makes it back to Kerbin.  Probably too low a multiplier, but it may change if anyone actually pulls it off.

 I nearing the end of day 2 on my Hard mode attempt.  It's really making me work hard, this is comparable to my first run through BTSM.  Actually doing low-level tourist contracts, observational surveys, all to open the important upgrades.  I think I could make it to Moho now with Terriers (just unlocked fuel lines) but going for the low weight high-tech route.  Some pics of starter craft I'm using.

 

Edited January 11, 2016 by Jetski

[ManEatingApe]

Just completed the challenge on 'Moderate' difficulty. The time pressure was more acute but I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Funds rather than Science was the limiting factor, by Day 25 there was enough science to unlock Ions but the funding didn't arrive until the nick of time on Day 36

As the the contract rewards were so much less and upgrade costs so much more than on Easy, multitasking was key. Each mission had multiple contracts, (for example Tourists, Mun Landing and Mun Rescue) and multiple missions were on the go at any one time. The Mk1 cabin came in really handy for packing in tourists and rescued Kerbonauts.

Things could get a little hectic:

Some tourists got more than they bargained for:

Just for fun I sent Jeb on a round trip mission:

It was a little porky at 12.5 tons out and 1.91 tons back. I was being generous with the Xenon to give Jeb an easy time, so plenty of room for improvement.

Full details in the album:

@Jetski How is your hardS attempt coming along?

Edited January 16, 2016 by ManEatingApe

[Jetski]

Great job, first return trip!  I'm suffering on Hard, actually took a break and played around with EPL in a different save to improve morale. It was pretty much crushing to make even a tiny mistake with no revert. I have upwards of a dozen flights going, maybe halfway through the tech tree, day 5. Hoping there's enough Sci around to get to ions.

[ManEatingApe]

Yep, the lack of revert makes 'Hard' exponentially more difficult than 'Moderate', even without taking the reduced awards into account.

Science shouldn't be an issue, it'll be the cash to upgrade the R&D centre to Level 3 that'll be tricky to acquire.

Anyhow, hang in there!

[Jasonden]

I've got a mission finished on Hard:

I was really struggling to get enough money to upgrade facilities in time -- but then I realized that I had more time than I thought as the Day-40 window is later than my Kerbal Alarm Clock had said that the window was  This is all-rockets.  I didn't have the science to get beyond chemical rocket propulsion.  Well, maybe I could have done jets but I never use those things.

Edited January 17, 2016 by Jasonden

[Jetski]

@Jasonden Nicely done!  I'm considering just running a chem rocket mission myself, as the Hard tech tree is really dragging on.  Posting you on the board as the first Hard finisher. Great use of careful orbital planning.

Just out of curiosity, how long did this take you IRL?  It feels like forever on my save,  but I'm not the best mission planner apparently.

Edited January 17, 2016 by Jetski

[Jasonden]

6 hours ago, Jetski said:

@Jasonden Just out of curiosity, how long did this take you IRL?  It feels like forever on my save,  but I'm not the best mission planner apparently.

I'm almost embarassed to say...  but it was several days at several hours/day.