Big or small ?

[Jarin]

Both. I'll never lose my love of giant motherships and bases, but there's just something soothing about launching a tiny satellite into orbit with a single SRB as a primary lifter.

[Norcalplanner]

Mission requirements > ease of use > cost > part count > a particular size

[Guest]

10 hours ago, OhioBob said:

The largest rocket I ever built could lift a payload of around 140 t.  If I need to lift more than that, I tend to prefer multiple launchers with orbital assembly and refueling.

190 tons is my personal breakpoint in the toy solar system before I start going for orbital assembly.  Reason being someone, can't remember who, pointed out that three Mammoths and a Rhino will put that much into LKO, and the LV is incredibly easy to build for that.

Haven't had a need yet, which is good because orbital assembly is kind of tedious after three years play...

[superstrijder15]

Because of the lag with part count I haven't even maxed the VAB yet, if I see it says to many parts I just change my payload, so 'relatively low part count'it is, but that doesn't mean small, lifters lifting 2.5 red tanks to LKO are still possible.

[Triop]

Small, low part count, no lag, light, fast, usefull . . .

[RocketBlam]

I prefer small myself. I find it much more difficult to build a small SSTO than a large one.

Still trying to make a single-engine Laythe lander... hmmm....

 

[Aetharan]

When it comes to engineering, I'm afraid that I have a bit too much of my father's teachings ingrained into me:  Always over-build.  Of course, he was speaking as a musician and electrical engineer.  "If you have to turn the amps above 75%, you're not using a powerful enough set for the house."  "Always install wiring rated for at least twice the highest amount you ever expect to need to power through it."  Things like that.

How does that translate to rockets?  I'm annoyed when my builds require going above 2/3 throttle to achieve liftoff.  My final launch stage almost always ends up accidentally having enough delta-V left over to double as at least a transfer stage to the Mun.  I almost always build landers and crew pods with emergency engines sporting at least 500 m/s worth of fuel, and preferably twice that.  Since I've started playing with life-support, I try to make sure that the ship has either twice the supplies needed for its maximum crew for the intended mission length, if not finding a way to close the cycle entirely.

Needless to say, this tends to mean ships heavy enough to be quite a strain on my poor laptop.

[OhioBob]

46 minutes ago, Aetharan said:

I'm annoyed when my builds require going above 2/3 throttle to achieve liftoff.

I'm just the opposite.  If I'm running my engines at anything less than 100%, then I'm annoyed that I'm wasting money on engines that are too big.

[superstrijder15]

On 14-3-2016 at 5:20 AM, OhioBob said:

I'm just the opposite.  If I'm running my engines at anything less than 100%, then I'm annoyed that I'm wasting money on engines that are too big.

I use SRB's on my first stage, my engines start at 100% and TWR of about 1.3, but as the kickback's lose fuel I throttle down the main engine in an attempt to keep the TWR below 2, till their turned of and my boosters give me a TWR which sometimes goes to like 5.

 

On 14-3-2016 at 4:27 AM, Aetharan said:

My final launch stage almost always ends up accidentally having enough delta-V left over to double as at least a transfer stage to the Mun. 

My gilly lander has used it's first stage for transfer to eve, and then the save file crashed with ~1000 m/s deltaV left in the launcher, 2200 in the transfer stage and 3k in the ion lander

[justidutch]

In my kareer save I go as cheap as possible, which usually translates into 'small'.  But because I also have grandiose dreams, I have a sandbox save in which I restrict myself only by part count (about 350), which can translate into 'where did that moon come from?'

[max_creative]

More is more because it makes bigger fireballs in the sky when they blow up.

[moogoob]

I go... medium. My most-launched rockets are... size 2, so Mainsails or Skippers. My shuttle, the Nastybird is mk2 as well. Probes tend to include size 1 fuel tanks and other extraneous junk. So, yeah. Medium.

[problemecium]

Yes. Definitely big or small.

Unless medium fits the bill better...