Rendezvous with the ISS

[Stogas]

As promised, the screens of ma shuttle.

Nice! I never though of using the radial engine, that looks fairly realistic and usable.. Also, why do you dump your rcs tanks before re-entry? Don\'t you keep them at least till your Pe hits ~60Km for minimum space debris?

I belive op mentioned some tutorials that helped him.

A few rules of thumb which are invaluable:

- Launch when the target\'s orbital path is directly overhead.

- It is easiest to align your orbital plane with the target at launch.

- If you are in a lower orbit than the target you will catch up to it.

- If you are in a higher orbit that your target it will catch up to you.

Basically this, I did in fact have watched one or two tutorials, but there isnt\' any secret to it - align a bit different orbit and wait. The key is to get a feeling of what big a difference you need to make, since you can easily miss your target.

Also, I have used Mechjeb in the past, but it\'s rendezvous module never worked for me anyways - I always ended up deorbiting.

[Stogas]

Well, after a few modifications to your craft, I had made it to my wishes! Probably the main thing I changed was stacking the first stage stacks on a tri-coupler, and adding a long SRB to even out the thrust - I didn\'t like the stack of rcs fuel, you see.. I also considered adding an emergency parachute (the big one), in case of mentioned stall, but later scratched the idea because of ugliness.

Images:

Releasing the RCS tanks after retroburn (I\'ve actually had just ran out of fuel after it)

Steering for land

You also have to be very light on the engine controls and attitude, since the LFE\'s like to spin out the craft, but with enough management, the flight goes fine.

Edit: Aaaaaand it seems my fuel management is a bit off - I tend to run out of fuel before i hit orbit.. Ah well, I will have to fly the stock Enterprise II..

Edit 2: I run out of fuel with your craft as well.. How did I pull the above posted flight without such problems?

[MaxMurder]

Don\'t use maximum throttle during ascent, as this is very inefficient. Keep the LFEs on very low (just enough to allow some control) until the SRB runs out of fuel. Then throttle up to about 3/4 throttle (maybe a little more). As you gain altitude you slowly throttle down, to conserve fuel. The trick is to be slowly gaining velocity during the ascent, at about 1 - 2ms^2.

The shuttle\'s optimal orbital altitude is 100,000km. Begin the gravity turn once your PE reaches about 60,000km. The LFEs should nearly take you to orbital velocity. I usually end up dropping them with 1/8 fuel left in the bottom tank, so they will not achieve orbit. The final insertion is done with fuel onboard the orbiter. The final few m/s to get to orbit only uses a tiny amount of fuel.

The RCS tanks are dropped just before reentry, once the craft is already suborbital. I usually drop them at the end of my deorbit burn so i back away. Once it hits the atmosphere it the potential to fly back into your face if you do it to late.

For reentry watch your angle of attack, if its too steep the craft will surly flip. Keep your nose pointed a little above pro-grade until you drop below hypersonic velocity. You will probably want to conserve some fuel for landing as it takes considerable skill to land unpowered.

Like the real shuttle it has a fairly constrained flight profile and is tricky to fly. It wont fly you to the mun, but its a real thrill to pilot.

[Stogas]

Like the real shuttle it has a fairly constrained flight profile and is tricky to fly. It wont fly you to the mun, but its a real thrill to pilot.

Exactly. As you can see in the pictures I have almost no problems doing an unpowered landing, but your tips on ascent will surely help. Thanks!

[Ciechosz]

*This does give me an idea though! If two people have identical installs of the game (plain vanilla, or have exactly the same mods) could they share the persistence file and fly with the other participants orbiting craft in place? I\'ll have to post that question where it can get answered by the devs.

It has already been made: http://kerbalspaceprogram.com/forum/index.php?topic=9344.0