Build-a-Rover "Station Style" (Now open)

[cyberKerb]

My Challenge idea is something that I don't think I've seen on the forum as yet and I feel there should be some people that will get a kick out of trying this out. I found the design challenge section alone was fun in itself, but figured it needed something extra before being published. (Thanks to those that have help flesh this out!)

Background:
The idea came from me never really being comfortable with the idea of using a "brute force rocket" to lift a huge fully-formed rover off Kerbin and have it miraculously land on the Mun with all the leftover thrust from the gigantic thing that initially launched it.

I built a rover that was broken up into its components (like how er.. "most" people would construct a KSP space station) and had its final steps of constructions performed in orbit using little RCS tugbots. I initially was going to have separate rockets from the different packages so it could fit into a somewhat slimmer fairing, but ended up with the single rocket example shown in the imgur album below that I built in career mode. I was pleasantly surprised how good decouplers are at being oh-so-slightly-flexible-shock-absorbers.

Happy to take any additional suggestions/ideas for activities required for the built vehicle.

Design Challenge Section - Launch Rover sections into Orbit and complete assembly in Orbit.

• All parts should be stock (No mod parts)
• Must be a 4 wheel rover with 1 x "Modular Girder Segment" used in each wheel "arm" (can't be a mini rover-in-a-can thing)
• Needs to be partially constructed in orbit (Getting wheel arms / landing tanks on straight is part of the fun)
• Rover has to has landing capabilities independence from vehicle that got it to orbit
• Capable of landing on Mun from a (Rough-maximum) 12k orbit (ideally should only carry what required to get down with a small margin of error)
• Launch with all rover parts within a 2.5m Fairing. (Can be multiple launches if you want to avoid lifting too much in one rocket)
• Requires the following sensors is minimum (Science Jr, Mystery Goo, Accelerometer, Gravioli Detector, Thermometer, Barometer, Surface Scanning Module)

Activity Challenge Section - Land the constructed rover

• Get constructed rover into 9-12km Mun orbit
• Land the rover and drive at least a few hundred kms and jump a crater or two to check the durability of the rover

Checking the submission guide, I figure the above should tick most of the boxes... 

• new? pretty sure this is new from the searching I'd done
• Possible? Yep, did it myself, but the example doesn't count as it uses a 3m fairing. 
• Fun? Trying to stuff a disassembled rover into a rocket, and reassemble in Zero-G... depends on your taste - could be frustrating if you're as bad as RCS contral as I am, but I still found it fun overall
• what are you doing? Partly design challenge with a couple of durability test of the resulting vehicle. 
• Win conditions? 
  • Post pics of craft(s) in VAB, in construction and on glamour shot on Mun
  • Needs to be able to be driven a few hundred Kms on surface
  • Survived crater jump (RCS is optional if your overly Kerbal!)
  • The maker of the entry that scores the highest number of likes is the winner

Separate Bonus Section: Doing all the above and making it a "mining rover"  - must include:

• Drill-O-Matic Junior
• Convert-O-Tron 125
• 2 x Radial Holding Tanks

Here the .CRAFT file for the below rocket as well as a .CRAFT file for the rover in the SPH in case you wanted to test that separately

 

 

 

Edited June 28, 2016 by wile1411
added craft files for reference

[Firemetal]

#Shadowzone did something like this in his "Gargantua" series. This looks like an interesting challenge and I might attempt something like this in the future but right now I'm learning how to build an fly SSTOs.

[Jetski]

Good idea, and original!  I'll give it a shot, but may be a while before I can upload pics as my internet is iffy.  KIS would make this a breeze, but I like the idea of doing this in stock.  A good requirement would be that it has to actually land and drive 200m or something like, also maybe a low mass bonus section, and a prize for more Kerbals aboard!

[cyberKerb]

Thanks for the replies - I'd added the craft files into the OP if it helps with people experimenting after seeing what I've done in the example.

[Cunjo Carl]

This sounds fun! I personally like the design focus, but if you wanted to turn it into a challenge....

Perhaps everything must go up in 1.25m fairings with a given max mass (convenient because it's listed while you make it + provides nice length/width tradeoffs), and the objective is to make an autonomous mobile platform with the maximum continuous Fuel+LOx generation rate through continuous power generation, mining and ISRU conversion, engineers prohibited. All the big equipment just barely fits into those small fairings, so it's a nice excuse for the orbital assembly. (Convert-O-tron 250s, large holding tanks, drills and gigantors are 2.5m, and I think the fairing maxes at 3m.)

Left to my own devices, I'm gonna make a rocket car! Should be fun both ways, I think.

Edited June 25, 2016 by Cunjo Carl

[cyberKerb]

Thanks for that - I like the idea of restricting the fairing. I tried on my example and figure a limit of the 2.5m fairing should be good without being too restrictive. There will have to be 4 wheel arms that have to be included somehow and that fits in a 2.5m fairing fine. I used the 3m one in the example as I use a huge metal plate for a base to mount them on. I should of just mounted those to the fairing directly. OP modified accordingly.