Construction question - To the Mun

[mason]

I've finally finished all the tutorial missions, and I'm progressing along in a campaign, but I'm confused about something - in the "To the Mun" tutorial, we start in a transfer-orbit stage that's got an interesting design - at the back of it there's an FL-T400, with two more FL-T400s somehow merged into it, with a LV-909 Terrier on the tail of each of these. There's also a smooth cap that might be an aerodynamic nose cone flipped around.

I don't see how to build this merged-fueltank assemblage, but I'd like to know how as it looks pretty sleek. Is it possible to build the vehicle that's presented in "To the Mun (part 1)"?

Thanks!

[mason]

And, some friendly folk on the IRC channel told me to try the offset tool, and that worked beautifully. I'll see about reproducing the craft more exactly, but for now after using the offset tool: http://imgur.com/a/41Fsm

[Streetwind]

Yeah, offset and rotation are what unlocks a huge amount of aesthetic design potential. I mean, if you abuse them you can easily get something that looks like it defies all laws of physics, but used with care it can replicate realworld designs or produce body shapes you could never achieve with just sticking stock parts together.

[Clipperride]

When you get onto building planes, the offset tool is very useful indeed.  It enables you to tweak the position of wings and landing gear without having to remove them and reattaching by eye.  That was a real source of frustration when I first started and before I discovered it's usefulness.

Happy landings!

PS I know some will disagree, but I always like to head to Minmus before the Mun. It's only a little more complicated, as you need to adjust the plane of your orbit ("set target" on Minmus will show you the points where your current orbit intersects the Minmus orbit. Set a manoeuvre node on either the ascending or descending node and use the "up" and "down" sliders until they match. 0.1° is plenty close enough) It's also good practice for later, when you are matching your orbit to that of a space station so you can dock.

The low gravity on Minmus makes landings less frantic than the Mun. All of the "flats" are flat (obviously) and at 0m elevation, making it easy to know your altitude above the ground.  The low gravity also means you need very little thrust and propellant (delta V) for the trip home. It is also usually possible to right a toppled vechile on Minmus, should your landing be a little off. Finally you get a good amount of science points for conducting experiments.

The Mun, on the other hand, has a much less forgiving gravity well and flat landing spots are harder to find.