Suicide scientist

[Foxster]

I'm playing with the new Experiment Storage Unit. My idea is around having a manned craft (manned because all the science can be gathered and the experiments reset) farming all the biomes on the Mun until out of fuel and then posting the science home in an ESU; abandoning the crewman to his fate on the Mun. 

To make it practical, the ESU return craft has to be so tiny that it adds little mass to the Mun hopper and it needs to make sense to return it rather the crewed capsule. 

Here's what I have so far with the top half of this craft...

What is the smallest possible stock craft you can make that can get an ESU back from the Mun safely to the surface of Kerbin?

I genuinely want to know if this can be a practical halfway between manned and unmanned exploration i.e. all the science but only having to ferry a crewman one way. 

[TwinKerbal]

If you aren't all about recovering crews, this is a good idea. Plus you can do all the "Plant a Flag on the Mun" contracts for free!

But anyways, my best so far has been spark+flt 2nd smallest+science of course this was before the science container. You *probably* have enough dV to get home. Still, a leveled up scientist is useful especially for science labs and such. 

Good luck with your biome farming!

[Matuchkin]

*Sheds tear*

[Foxster]

10 minutes ago, Matuchkin said:

*Sheds tear*

Meh. He ticked "I agree to the terms and conditions" when he downloaded the application form. I can't help it if he didn't read them first!

Edited October 17, 2016 by Foxster

[Eidahlil]

So, something like this Sepratron powered lunch box?

Arm the chute, aim in the general direction of Mun's retrograde vector and fire the two Sepratrons at full power.

I set the radial-mount drogue to open at 0.2 min pressure and 200m altitude, which seems to work quite well regardless of whether you land in the water or the mountains. However do place the Sepratrons so they protrude below the lunchbox, as the drogue will only slow you down to 16-17 m/s when landing in mountains, but the Sepratrons seem to absorb the blow quite reliably (lunchbox crash resistance is 15m/s). Or you know, you could use a normal expensive parachute. Weighs 285kg and costs 1600 funds (counting the decoupler).

(It can be made 40kg lighter with an Oscar-B and an Ant, but it feels less Kerbal that way. Well, and the launch is more complicated.)

[eddiew]

You... you left a kerbal behind... 

Edited October 19, 2016 by eddiew

[Foxster]

On 18/10/2016 at 3:47 PM, Eidahlil said:

So, something like this Sepratron powered lunch box?

Arm the chute, aim in the general direction of Mun's retrograde vector and fire the two Sepratrons at full power.

I set the radial-mount drogue to open at 0.2 min pressure and 200m altitude, which seems to work quite well regardless of whether you land in the water or the mountains. However do place the Sepratrons so they protrude below the lunchbox, as the drogue will only slow you down to 16-17 m/s when landing in mountains, but the Sepratrons seem to absorb the blow quite reliably (lunchbox crash resistance is 15m/s). Or you know, you could use a normal expensive parachute. Weighs 285kg and costs 1600 funds (counting the decoupler).

(It can be made 40kg lighter with an Oscar-B and an Ant, but it feels less Kerbal that way. Well, and the launch is more complicated.)

That's pretty darned good. Was there nothing but the two sepratrons i.e no probe core?

[foamyesque]

5 minutes ago, Foxster said:

That's pretty darned good. Was there nothing but the two sepratrons i.e no probe core?

You get a pretty clear look at it near the end of the video. It's the box, a pair of sepratrons, and, as mentioned, a drogue chute that gets armed on the Mun with settings that make it open after it's safe to do so.

 

It's pretty spiffy!

[Foxster]

7 hours ago, eddiew said:

You... you left a kerbal behind... 

He once made fun of my haircut. I know, I know, it was all in good humour but it got to me in the end. We needed to volunteer someone and he was the first name I thought of.

I'm sure his wife and seven children are proud of the sacrifice or at least glad of the severance package; that basket of fruit will last them days and they can pay me for it anytime in the next 14 days. 

11 minutes ago, foamyesque said:

It's pretty spiffy!

Certainly is. 

Edited October 20, 2016 by Foxster

[Streetwind]

Wow. That is quite an amazing performance.

When I went for a quick test of this "dead return canister" concept, I used some separatrons to return one from Kerbin orbit. I was genuinely surprised by just how much they managed to slow down the thing - way more than expected or necessary, even - but I never expected that two separatrons would be enough for a return from Mun surface. Nor that the canister would survive a direct Munar reentry without a heatshield. (It went in parachute-first, and not even that burned off! Stock reentry heating really is a joke )

[Eidahlil]

4 hours ago, Foxster said:

That's pretty darned good. Was there nothing but the two sepratrons i.e no probe core?

Yes, it's just the box, the smallest drogue chute and two sepratrons. Btw, I use the offset tool with snap enabled to move the parachute to the center after placing it. If it's not dead center, the thing will spin wildly and will not get anywhere.

Both the box and the chute have fairly high heat resistance, but the engines get very close to exploding. They might do that with some launch vectors, but we don't really care about them. It also helps that the thing is very light compared to drag produced, so it slows down quickly.

Spoiler

A lighter alternative is possible with an almost empty Oscar-B and an engine for ants. It works just as well, but when launching, you have to disable all other engines, throttle up, stage the engine and only then stage the decoupler, otherwise the engine won't fire. It's probably more practical for actual missions, and lower on the tech tree too. Does not have the same marketing appeal though.

Spoiler

However, due to its lower thrust, you can do more fancy stuff (scientific term) with it. For example, use the launching vehicle to impart a tiny amount of rotation to it ("bending the launch" ), and launch it from the worst possible locations that way, like the most prograde point on the Mun, inside a crater. (I did not launch it from within a crater, but the trajectory is high enough that I could have. We live and we learn).

Admittedly, yes, this took me 36 tries, but maybe a real rocket scientist could do it more reliably?

Spoiler

 

 

[greenTurtle1134]

22 hours ago, eddiew said:

You... you left a kerbal behind... 

 

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 5:00 PM, Matuchkin said:

*Sheds tear*

 

On Monday, October 17, 2016 at 5:03 PM, Foxster said:

Meh. He ticked "I agree to the terms and conditions" when he downloaded the application form. I can't help it if he didn't read them first!

 

14 hours ago, Foxster said:

He once made fun of my haircut. I know, I know, it was all in good humour but it got to me in the end. We needed to volunteer someone and he was the first name I thought of.

I'm sure his wife and seven children are proud of the sacrifice or at least glad of the severance package; that basket of fruit will last them days and they can pay me for it anytime in the next 14 days.

On the flip side, this could just show total confidence on the scientist's part that bigger rockets will come eventually.

[Foxster]

9 minutes ago, greenTurtle1134 said:

On the flip side, this could just show total confidence on the scientist's part that bigger rockets will come eventually.

Oh, no. We are never going back there. Nuh uh. That was 100% a one-off. All our resources are now dedicated to Minmus. The Mun turned out to be a blasted cinder of near-zero scientific worth. He is very much alone and will never see another living thing again. Ever. 

[vsully]

1 minute ago, Foxster said:

Oh, no. We are never going back there. Nuh uh. That was 100% a one-off. All our resources are now dedicated to Minmus. The Mun turned out to be a blasted cinder of near-zero scientific worth. He is very much alone and will never see another living thing again. Ever. 

Totally. Mun is boring as heck, nothing but big grey craters that defeat my mightiest rovers. Minmus... Who needs rovers when you can carry a science pod around with a jetpack? You can orbit using the JETPACK! All you need is the brave kerbonaut's jetpack. Better yet, dispense the Kerbal and tape his jetpack to the science pod.... use him for extra propellant.... or plant fertilizer....

Edited October 20, 2016 by vsully

[Foxster]

1 minute ago, vsully said:

Totally. Mun is boring as heck, nothing but big grey craters that defeat my mightiest rovers. Minmus... Who needs rovers when you can carry a science pod around with a jetpack?

Oh, absolutely. Plans for abandoning up to five Kerbals to their fate on Minmus are already in a well advanced stage. 

I can see Minmus as just the beginning of an odyssey that may one lead us to being able to see many, many Kerbals die of misery and loneliness on every planetary body in the system! Ah, a man can dream, a man can dream. 

[greenTurtle1134]

3 hours ago, Foxster said:

Oh, no. We are never going back there. Nuh uh. That was 100% a one-off. All our resources are now dedicated to Minmus. The Mun turned out to be a blasted cinder of near-zero scientific worth. He is very much alone and will never see another living thing again. Ever. 

But... (sputters...) well, just never install Kerbalism in your save...

Hey! Maybe that's why there's rescue contracts all over the place! And why the rescues are so eager to abandon their old program.

3 hours ago, Foxster said:

Oh, absolutely. Plans for abandoning up to five Kerbals to their fate on Minmus are already in a well advanced stage. 

I can see Minmus as just the beginning of an odyssey that may one lead us to being able to see many, many Kerbals die of misery and loneliness on every planetary body in the system! Ah, a man can dream, a man can dream. 

Somewhat disturbing.

[Matuchkin]

This is a very, VERY sad thread.

[Foxster]

8 hours ago, Matuchkin said:

This is a very, VERY sad thread.

Yes, we here at mission control have been feeling a tad down too. We have decided it is our moral duty to do something after all!

So, we have switched ComNet frequencies for all new missions and no one is being upset by the constant whining from the Mun anymore. 

Edited October 21, 2016 by Foxster

[Foxster]

Breaking news...

The Minmus 1 spacecraft has launched from the Kerbal Space Centre four hours earlier than planned. 

The craft did not have the scheduled 3-man crew aboard and it is not yet known who, if anyone, was aboard the craft when it made it's unscheduled launch. There has been no radio contact with the craft so far but it has been confirmed to have entered Kerbin orbit on it's pre-programmed trajectory. 

A photo of the Minmus 1 prior to it's launch:

 

 

[Foxster]

Further news on the dramatic story of the unscheduled launch of the Minmus 1 spacecraft earlier from the Kerbal Space Centre... 

An image taken by the Kubble Space Telescope has been released by KASA. It appears to show the spacecraft making an un-programmed burn of it's main engine. The destination has not been revealed but a press release states that the spacecraft's flight path is not towards the planned destination of the moon Minmus. 

More news on this story as we receive it. 

 

Edited October 21, 2016 by Foxster

[vsully]

Send 'em to Eeloo! Or, if you want to return to their unknown destination and don't want whine-fest, then just send them all to Dres. 

Sometimes I sentence "evil" Kerbs to LIFE IMPRISONMENT in The Crater Of Doom on the Mun. But IF you REALLY wanna get rid of Kerbs, the Mohole can't be beat.

[Foxster]

...over to our science correspondent, Kornelius Kerman...

Anchor: "Kornelius, what do we know so far about the unexplained premature launch of the Minmus 1?"

KK: "Well, Katey, not much. We do know that there has been no radio contact with the craft. So we don't know for sure if anyone is onboard. My understanding is that the spacecraft has made a course correction burn with it's main engine. This seems to suggest that someone on Minmus 1 has control of the spacecraft, though we don't know who."

Anchor: "If the craft is being controlled from onboard then that would have to be one of KASA's astronauts, correct?"

KK: "That seems to be the logical conclusion, Katey. Only an astronaut would have access to the launch site and have the skill to pilot the craft. I suspect that KASA will be trying to locate all their astronauts right now."

Anchor: "If there is a rogue astronaut onboard, what could be their motivation in apparently stealing a spacecraft and what could be their destination?"

KK: "That, Katey, is the big question. I can only speculate that there might be some connection with the recent Mun mission that ended with the tragic but understandable stranding of Robinson Kerman on the Mun."

Anchor: "Well, thank you, Kornelius, for your insights and can I just say that you look fabulous in those polka-dot pants?"

KK: " Thank you, Katey, they were my grandmothers."   

Anchor: "And now today's other news ..."

[Matuchkin]

6 hours ago, Foxster said:

Yes, we here at mission control have been feeling a tad down too. We have decided it is our moral duty to do something after all!

So, we have switched ComNet frequencies for all new missions and no one is being upset by the constant whining from the Mun anymore. 

You are a monster.

[Atlas2342]

3 minutes ago, Matuchkin said:

You are a monster.

Monstrosity is in the eye of the beholder. 

[Foxster]

"...and the kitten was strangled with its own guts." 

"Ah ah ah! A very funny story there from our junior correspondent, Kirsty Kerman.

Now for today's Whatever happened to..? story. You may remember a few weeks ago when KASA lost one of it's spacecraft. The Minmus 1 launched from the Kerbal Space Centre prematurely and was not heard from again. Well, KASA has today released a picture taken from a space telescope of the missing spacecraft...orbiting the Mun!

KASA says they have no idea how the spacecraft came to be orbiting the Mun and to quote their spokesperson, '...we don't much care'. 

So there we have it. KASA lost a spacecraft. Then found it orbiting the Mun. Now they are ignoring it.

Fabulous stuff. 

And now in sports news, we go over to the National Gladiatorial Arena in Kerbville..."

 

 

Edited October 21, 2016 by Foxster