Serial Space Station: Add your own module! (Closed - check out the new Community Space Station thread instead!)

[Jetski]

Hi all, just got back.  The station looks pretty spectacular, and nice Duna mission.  

To answer a couple of questions:

9 hours ago, JebsDead said:

Jetski,

Can we get a ruling on construction in orbit?  You said KAS is allowed.  Is that just for station maintenance or can we reconfigure ships?  I fudged a little on my Duna lander.  I was planning to steal docking port seniors from the station and mount my mining rig under the engines.  

There are 3 types of missions permitted.  

One is to add a module to the station, 5 parts max + 2 docking ports.

 Another is to add to a spaceship (for example the Jool ship) 8 parts + 2 docking ports.  

The third is a station maintenance mission, the only time KAS/KIS use is permitted in the save.  On a station maintenance mission you may move anything you like but not add parts: build a ship, move a module, get rid of extra docking ports and KAS attach parts together.  All mod parts must be deorbited of course or the save will be broken.  

You must wait for another player to contribute between missions of any type.  This is specifically to keep a single player from adding a high part count ship or module to the station by launching several modules in a row and KAS welding them together.  If you want a big ship, get people to help you!  Have another player launch the drive section.  Share designs and screenshots! That's the point of this challenge

7 hours ago, Jaffa Cookie said:

Yes, Ksp loads the persistent file, that's the actual save file. If you don't it will come up with a error I believe saying that one of the saves is a bad save and should not be their because it's bad. (and then get's rid of it).

Have a look into your other save files, You'll have a "persistent.sfs" file in their, The other ones are quicksaves (saves, but not the main one) (Saves the current state so it can load it anouther time later on.

 

This isn't quite right - please read the OP for instructions on sharing the save.  If the explanation there isn't making sense, let me know and I'll be happy to explain further.

 

Also, for the moment, I have the save.

[Venusgate]

3 minutes ago, Jetski said:

On a station maintenance mission you may move anything you like but not add parts: build a ship, move a module, get rid of extra docking ports and KAS attach parts together.  All mod parts must be deorbited of course or the save will be broken.  

So, for example, one can send up 8 parts and dock them, wait a turn, send up 8 more parts and dock those, wait a turn, and then send up a maintenance mission to KAS weld those two sub-assemblies together? Or do all modules/sub-assemblies of the ships and station have to be assembled via docking ports?

[Jetski]

15 minutes ago, Venusgate said:

So, for example, one can send up 8 parts and dock them, wait a turn, send up 8 more parts and dock those, wait a turn, and then send up a maintenance mission to KAS weld those two sub-assemblies together? Or do all modules/sub-assemblies of the ships and station have to be assembled via docking ports?

Basically, yes, this would be a very single-player approach, and technically within the rules.  I won't hassle you about it.  A drawback is your modules may be stripped for parts by someone during the wait.  A better method would be to coordinate with one or more other players and get it put together quickly

All modules must initially be assembled using docking ports, as KAS attach is only used during maintenance missions.  During a maintenance mission, you can later remove the ports if you like.

 

OK, so here's the latest save.  It was well and truly broken on the latest version, but I was able to salvage the station after the Duna mission.  The excellent Duna ship was unfortunately lost in the conversion, but the flags are still standing for now.

The asteroid is apparently made of quicksand - here are some images:

 

Really what needs to happen now is a major station maintenance mission to consolidate the station and remove the asteroids.  It's been nice to have the class E to connect stuff to, but the Klaws are getting too glitchy.  I suggest launching a fairly powerful tug, and detaching each section from the asteroid and connecting it all together with docking ports or KAS, and releasing our two captive asteroids into LKO.  I suspect there will be losses in the process, as several sections have been more or less swallowed by graphics glitches in the rock.  Any volunteers?

[JebsDead]

Ok, cool.  Sounds like I played by the rules.  

Flight tests show that the Eagle (small lander) can land on Laythe but not with enough delta-v to make orbit again. The NSAE Protector has the TWR to do manned landings everywhere except Eve, Tylo and maybe Moho (maybe with some tricky gravity assists.)

I invite anyone to fly the NSEA Protector somewhere else.  It's currently in Ike orbit.  I only request that you don't crash it and that you leave it in a stable orbit with a full tank of gas.  

NSEA Protector notes: 

• There is no RCS so don't disconnect the lander unless you can dock without it.
• If you use the lander it has no power generation so watch your battery and turn off SAS when you don't need it.
• You need to enable fuel cells when mining (and disable them when done.)
• The top tank and the tank under the command pod hold way more oxidizer than needed.  When mining don't generate more than 220 units total of oxidizer.  That's a full tank on the lander plus one refill.   

Edited May 18, 2016 by JebsDead

[Venusgate]

3 hours ago, JebsDead said:

Ok, cool.  Sounds like I played by the rules.  

Sorry I doubted you

[JebsDead]

I can do a maintenance mission in the next day or two.  I'm envisioning using the big fuel capsule as the station core.  Scavenging docking ports and adding them all around.  I think the ships will survive detaching.  They look buried in the rock but it's just a visual clipping bug.  For sure we need to get rid of the E asteroid.  It's too big and makes it hard to see the whole station or select parts.  

[JebsDead]

Wait, so what happened to the Duna ship?  did you delete it on purpose or was it lost in save file reconfiguring?  Can I put it back?

[hoowuth]

Wait I'm confused. I know and can get the save working but I don't know how to save it and what to share here from the save folder.

In my understanding you are supposed to save the game in the KSC as serial station and then share the KSS.sfs (not the serial station as you saved it) here.

@Jetski Please explain it further.

Edited May 18, 2016 by hoowuth

[JebsDead]

49 minutes ago, hoowuth said:

Wait I'm confused. I know and can get the save working but I don't know how to save it and what to share here from the save folder.

In my understanding you are supposed to save the game in the KSC as serial station and then share the KSS.sfs (not the serial station as you saved it) here.

@Jetski Please explain it further.

• download KSS.sfs to ...\Kerbal Space Program\saves\<your sandbox game>\KSS.sfs
• Start the game and press alt-F9 while flying a ship
• fly your mission
• press Alt-F5 and save as KSS (it gets saved a KSS.sfs on disk)
• upload/share a copy of ...\Kerbal Space Program\saves\<your sandbox game>\KSS.sfs

 

Edited May 18, 2016 by JebsDead

[KAL 9000]

 Waiting for permission for the Laythe SSTO. @Jetski, a test in a different save showed that KAS/KISing/docking the SSTO together in orbit is impossible, due to clipping issues. It does not fly properly without those clipped parts being clipped, which is a problem: The only way to get this to the Jool ship is to launch it in a >8 part piece. Which means that I need this one exception in order to add it. So, yeah... Can I get just one exception to send this up? It's a reliable SSTO that handles like a dream, and works on Kerbin and Laythe. So: Go/No Go?

[Venusgate]

Alright, I tried my best in the two hours I had to start migrating parts off the Class E. Incidentally, I think I know what's causing the quicksand. I think the rotation momentum is switching between the Class E's core and the station as a whole inbetween warp accellerations.

Anyway: KSS.sfs

 

[Venusgate]

4 hours ago, KAL 9000 said:

It does not fly properly without those clipped parts being clipped, which is a problem: The only way to get this to the Jool ship is to launch it in a >8 part piece. Which means that I need this one exception in order to add it. So, yeah... Can I get just one exception to send this up? It's a reliable SSTO that handles like a dream, and works on Kerbin and Laythe. So: Go/No Go?

Can you add two halves of a transfer stage to the top and bottom ports, and just drop them in the upper atmosphere?

[Jetski]

@Venusgate great job, the conversion is well on its way.  Still more station maintenance to do if anyone is up for it.  Let's get rid of those asteroids!

6 hours ago, JebsDead said:

Wait, so what happened to the Duna ship?  did you delete it on purpose or was it lost in save file reconfiguring?  Can I put it back?

Sorry, I was hacking around in the savegame and I completely mangled the Duna ship.  When I loaded the save up, none of the ships were flyable from the Tracking Station, and I did some hacking from previous saves to fix it.  Feel free to add it back if you can without nuking the save - I'll even allow HyperEdit for this one, as I was the one that killed it   In general I want to keep the number of ships that aren't involved in the station to 1 at most - otherwise this becomes pretty unmanageable.  I'll ask that someone returns it or deorbits it before we send the Jool mission.

5 hours ago, KAL 9000 said:

 Waiting for permission for the Laythe SSTO. @Jetski, a test in a different save showed that KAS/KISing/docking the SSTO together in orbit is impossible, due to clipping issues. It does not fly properly without those clipped parts being clipped, which is a problem: The only way to get this to the Jool ship is to launch it in a >8 part piece. Which means that I need this one exception in order to add it. So, yeah... Can I get just one exception to send this up? It's a reliable SSTO that handles like a dream, and works on Kerbin and Laythe. So: Go/No Go?

Sorry @KAL 9000, I don't want to change the rules to allow a specific ship to go.  This is a design and cooperation challenge more than anything, and the purpose is to encourage innovation within the part count allowed (difficult I know).  If the ship can't work, it's back to the drawing board.  It's possible to design a Laythe lander within the constraints of this challenge (I posted a doable version a few pages back), but an SSTO may be too difficult.  Prove me wrong, and make something new that works!  Remember, if you make a 2 or even 3 module ship connected by Jr. ports, you can request a KAS mission to remove the ports later - maybe someone else has mad KAS or design skills and can make it work.  Make a friend, get help

Also, I'm updating the OP now with the latest savegame, cleared for next mission.

 

 

6 hours ago, hoowuth said:

Wait I'm confused. I know and can get the save working but I don't know how to save it and what to share here from the save folder.

In my understanding you are supposed to save the game in the KSC as serial station and then share the KSS.sfs (not the serial station as you saved it) here.

@Jetski Please explain it further.

1. load KSP, make a fresh Sandbox save called KSS
2. download the KSS.sfs file
3. save it to your "ksp\saves\KSS" directory. 
4. Go into your KSS sandbox save within KSP, go to Space Center, and Load Saved game
5. you should see "KSS" as one of the options (also persistance and quicksave), load it up
6. You are in the correct universe to do the challenge.  Get to it!
7. When you finish, go to Space Center and Save Game as KSS.
8. Go find your savegame file, should be "ksp\saves\KSS\KSS.sfs"
9. upload that file to a file sharing site of your choice (I used Dropbox)

I updated the OP, some of the filenames were a little confusing.  You should always be saving a file called KSS.sfs, that brings up the Space Center when it loads (not immediately loading the ship).  Then you go to tracking center to load the station.  And when you save it for the next person, go to Space Center and save it there before sharing, don't play games renaming or sharing the quicksave or persistent.sfs, it gets too confusing for new players to sort out.

[JebsDead]

I've been seeing the unflyable ships too when loading save files from some players.  Not sure if it's tied to specific users.  The quick fix is to hyper edit a part within physics range then terminate the flight (of  the hyperedited part) in the tracking station.  After that you'll be able to fly the KSS.  Does anyone have any idea why this happens? 

 

[KAL 9000]

I'm designing a QBEsat+deployer within the limit, to be released around Jool!

Edited May 19, 2016 by KAL 9000

[Jetski]

6 hours ago, JebsDead said:

I've been seeing the unflyable ships too when loading save files from some players.  Not sure if it's tied to specific users.  The quick fix is to hyper edit a part within physics range then terminate the flight (of  the hyperedited part) in the tracking station.  After that you'll be able to fly the KSS.  Does anyone have any idea why this happens? 

 

Or you can set a part on the pad, and then use Map view to switch from it to the KSS. 

[KAL 9000]

The deployer is a Structural Fuselage with the QBEsat tucked inside it (attached to a 0.625m decoupler, obviously) and a 1.25m decoupler on top of the Fuselage to get rid of its docking port when it's released. The QBEsat is a QBE with a reaction wheel on top, a stackable battery on the bottom, an RTG offset into the QBE, and an antenna on top.

[JebsDead]

I claim the save.  Station maintenance.

[JebsDead]

Done.

New save: https://www.dropbox.com/s/r27ab0maayp2y4c/KSS.sfs?dl=0

 

I took everything off of the big asteroid and moved it to 250km.


 

[JebsDead]

[Venusgate]

2 hours ago, JebsDead said:

I took everything off of the big asteroid and moved it to 250km.

Looks great!

Will send up more stuff tonight. Thinking it's time to get back to building onto the Jool ship (and actually calculating how much dV it currently has).
 

[Venusgate]

I release the save: KSS.sfs

It looks ugly now, but starting to add two hanger bays to the jool ship (and get rid of the ugly flat face of the engine nacelles). Oh, and current dV of Jool Ship is ~3700m/s.

 

[JebsDead]

I claim the save.  Building a second tug from station parts. 

[JebsDead]

Done.

New save: https://www.dropbox.com/s/m74mhl1ts91odxj/KSS.sfs?dl=0

• I created a second tug by scavenging parts from around the station. 
• I replaced the claw with a sr docking port on the large engine at the bottom of the station and attached it straight.

[Venusgate]

Maint mission to attach first hanger bay to jool ship.

Spent better part of two hours realizing im terrible at building/flying space planes before i just reverted to a TSTO Rocket.

I release the save: KSS.sfs

 

Edited May 20, 2016 by Venusgate