Inverted munlander

[Boris_T_Roach]

Seeing as the EVA stuff is coming, I decided to design a mun lander that placed the capsule close to the surface,

http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/1171184187739975462/04502BF77D34C9EF17EADFF1D527F2950DAED20E/

As you can see, it has 3 fuel tanks/gimbal engines and some lander legs strapped to the return stage/service module

Ok yes it has mechjeb... sadly it cant cope with the inverted landing mode

But I\'ve brought the thing in at <0.1 m/s drift and <1 m/sec decent and every time its broken apart on landing, have the 3 engines/legs pointing down and it lands fine

Any help/ideas/laughter?

Boris

<<fed up with stranding kerbals on the mun

[Nomer]

+1 for using only vanilla(somewhat, you didn\'t go crazy-ass with mods) parts.

[Markus Reese]

The thing I see is that the legs and the engines seem fairly close to the same plane. Flex could cause some collision with the ground. Can you give more detail on how it is breaking apart?

Personally, my favorite are horizontal landers They can be done with stock parts, but mod vernier parts makes them look cooler. This will probably be my standard design for Moon EVA I think as it becomes common, depending on what else comes out as well.

I will try doing similar since that is pretty cool and see how it goes on my end.

I did similar on all stock parts, but with the retracting landing legs instead, got down fine, if you crash, can you post up the final log?

[fowlplaychiken]

I am almost certain that your lander legs just are not long enough. Also, the default lander legs are pretty flimsy and can break under heavy craft I think? I use modified ones with a 250 impact tolerance.

[Nomer]

I have to agree with him on this one, the legs are to close to the ground, and it can cause crittical risk to the command pod even if it\'s off by just 1/10 of a meter ( 3 inches )

[Boris_T_Roach]

The method of breaking is that the lander legs touch down and instantly one of the fuel tanks breaks off and the whole lot just topples over and falls apart

I know the lander legs themselves are well clear of the capsule, but i need to be able to dump off the landing rockets as theres no way of hauling all that weight back to kerbal, a brief lift off boost, stage, rotate the service module and fly home is the plan

But time for another rebuild......

Someone pass me the hammer

[Knyght]

So I\'m fairly sure you could do the same thing with with around a third of the parts.

...but where\'s the fun in that?

[Nomer]

Why do we land on minmus?

Why do we land on the mun?

Why do we set up space stations?

Because we ENJOY it.

Now,

about your lander,

markus reese,

can I have a .craft file, those bases seem legit.

[Markus Reese]

The method of breaking is that the lander legs touch down and instantly one of the fuel tanks breaks off and the whole lot just topples over and falls apart

I know the lander legs themselves are well clear of the capsule, but i need to be able to dump off the landing rockets as theres no way of hauling all that weight back to kerbal, a brief lift off boost, stage, rotate the service module and fly home is the plan

But time for another rebuild......

Someone pass me the hammer

Definitely sounds like the legs just need to be moved then. Shift them to allow more engine clearance.

[Boris_T_Roach]

Dunno whats causing the break up.... just swapped the engines/legs for a more normal landing method, same parts, same rocket and brought it in manually with about 0.2 m/sec drift and <1 m/sec decent and it landed perfectly

Hmmmm maybe the rocket parts are stronger when force is applied from below rather than \'above\' as I\'m trying to do

Boris

oh and I brought these 3 poor foo.. err brave heros back safely

[Markus Reese]

Why do we land on minmus?

Why do we land on the mun?

Why do we set up space stations?

Because we ENJOY it.

Now,

about your lander,

markus reese,

can I have a .craft file, those bases seem legit.

Sure thing, they use a whole pile of mods on my MOD install of kerbal space. Think a combination of novapunch, KW, Zeoxyne, powertech and dynasat. Oh, and the carts. Trying to remember if I had any odd and end ones as well. Satellite relays, some laning legs, and OA Lights. It ends up being very software intensive, I think alot from the ZO, but what you see is the maximum my computer could handle. It was impossible to land any more at the site.

They look odd, but the real cool things is stuff like those foreground ones, and the one far background all fit within 3m shrouding. The others, only the industrious looking fixed legs and capped tanks are exposed. Rover one is really handy. It flies well, and the rover itself is suspended. When it lands, the rover is only a bare little bit off the ground for an easy dismount.

As for the strength, it is possible. I was wondering if the couplers only have strength maybe one way or something. Without a previous failure record, is impossible to know. Any modders who know the code well would be able to give you a more difinitive word. The upside down landings do work, whether it works for eva will depend on how the kerbal mount/dismount works.

[Trekkin]

I tried making a stock-only one. It\'s not strictly inverted, although nothing\'s stopping anyone from flipping over the engine pods. It does, however, have the bottom edge of the pod just above the Munar surface.

The key to this, i think, is the Skycrane configuration. Everything else is kind of semantic, no? All the parts look like they take strain independent of orientation.

Oh! And the eight legs. They\'re critical; the lander\'s too big to reliably land on just four. Might be what\'s wrong with Boris\' lander; multi-engine landers are heavy.

[DomAzaris1996]

If it breaks apart maybe just absolutely cover it in struts like I do? seems to work most of the time