Firemetal's RO playthrough

[Firemetal]

Alright, so back in 2015, I got this game and had absolutely no idea what to do whatsoever. I got to the Mun, I landed on the Mun, but never returned. I did pretty well for someone who had a horrible understanding of physics. I went away from it for a few months and came back in fall of 2015 after learning a bit of physics and I was able to get to orbit, go to Minimus and land on Minimus and return. I soon after that went to the Mun though it was very overbuilt and after that went to Duna and back. (although this took several attempts.) I went off again after landing on Duna, Ike and Dres, to learn a bit of coding. I didn't get very far there but I plan to go back and start again and try to get further. But anyway, I came back to Kerbal after that and landed on Gilly, Eeloo, Jool's five moons, Eve and Moho and returned from all of them. I did this over a timespan of a few months since I started doing this a little over a year ago. I then downloaded OPM and landed and returned from both Tekto and Slate in two single manned launches. I then decided that landing on the rest of them would be tedious and take lots and lots of DV so I went back to stock and tried to build some colonies. I got a pretty nice Duna one, but then got so bored, that I took a tiny hiatus before coming back and downloading RSS. I got into orbit of Earth before downloading Galileo's Planet Pack and getting into orbit of Gael. I now was torn between playing in GPP, stock or RSS. I ended up going back to stock yet again, doing a challenge, the low mass Moho challenge to be exact,  and then found out that I could have multiple installations of KSP. I ended up downloading RO on one of them, (the pre-release for 1.2) and then starting a little game there. This thread is the mission report from that save.

Well sorry for boring you with my KSP story. This has been told many times but I just wanted to give you a bit of background to this playthrough.

So here is the modlist since someone is going to ask.

Spoiler

Ok I might update this with the actual links to the downloads which will make it easier to edit but for now I'm lazy and I just want to get this done.

Here are my long-term goals for this playthrough.

• Manned return from the surface of the Moon,
• Manned return from the surface of Mars,
• (Possibly) Manned return from the atmosphere of Venus,
• A Colony on the Moon,
• A colony on Mars
• A LEO space station.

Missions complete:

LEO satellite:

The first ever spacecraft launched into orbit around Earth. Tested the Rex booster.

Outcome: Success. Engine bugged and the thrust came from right in front of the spacecraft instead of from the engine making it go out of control but in the end, I managed to get it into orbit. Rex was unable to get the approximately 1 ton spacecraft to LEO. Future modifications needed.

Screenshots:

Lunar probe 01:

Was meant to be the first spacecraft to orbit the Moon. Tested the Rex heavy.

Outcome: Failure. The Rex Heavy got it into LEO but barely had enough DV to start the Trans-Lunar Injection burn. The probe's engine unfortunately was pressure fed and the fuel wasn't pressurized. The engine never started.

Screenshots:

Lunar probe 02:

The second probe sent to the Moon. Tested the Regina heavy.

Outcome: Success. The new, bigger rocket, Regina got the probe into orbit with more than enough DV for the trans-lunar injection burn. After the burn was complete the spacecraft separated. Thanks to the pressurized fuel tank, the engine started up and although the probe had no signal, it was already pointed in the right direction and was able to start up the engine and get it captured into the Moon's orbit. The probe successfully entered a lunar orbit.

Screenshots:

Next mission: Manned Lunar Landing:

This mission will mimic the Ares mission to the Moon instead of the Saturn V. The lander will be sent up with the transfer stage. Then the crew and orbiter will be sent up with the crew and dock to the lander. The Transfer burn will then complete the trans-lunar injection and then decouple. The orbiter will then use its engine to capture around the Moon. The lander will undock and land using its lower stage. The Kerbals will get out, plant a flag and then get back in. Yup pretty boring but it is always the accomplishment that matters. I plan to bring rovers on the next few missions. The lander's upper stage will then take off and rendezvous with the orbiter, transfer the Kerbals and supplies and then get ditched. The orbiter will then burn back to Kerbin and hopefully return safely to the ground. I do not know how Real Heat or Deadly Re-entry work. I just add a heat shield, a few drogues and regular parachutes since I do have passing out due to G-force enabled, and then just go. I believe I will try a manned mission just to LEO before doing this mission.

Screenshots:

But that's it for now.

Fire

Edited March 4, 2017 by Firemetal

[Firemetal]

First 3 missions: LEO Sat and Lunar probes 01 and 02. Apologies for both lunar probes being night launches. I plan to download planetshine in the future.

Spoiler

Rex configuration 1. This rocket ain't that good to be honest.

Darn bugs!

Rex Heavy. This one managed orbit but had no DV left for Trans-lunar injection.

Launch of Regina Heavy. This is the exact opposite of Rex. Way too much DV. Ended up wasting it.

Trans-lunar injection.

Payload separation.

Lunar Orbital insertion burn.

Mission success!

Here are some pictures of the WIP Lunar lander and Launch vehicle.

Spoiler

Lower stage has about 3k m/s of DV. And according to this, that is way more than enough to land. The upper stage has 4500 m/s so there is no problem there. The problem that does arise is that since I'm using the engine that was used for the Apollo lander descent, there are only 3 ignitions on the lower stage. The upper stage has 10 ignitions so there is no problem there however I will have to be VERY precise with the landing

Launch vehicle. Pretty much a cross between Saturn V and Ares V.

But that's it for now.

Fire

[Firemetal]

Update on Lunar Landing Mission 1! (LLM 1)

Fire

[Firemetal]

More updates on LLM-1. Mission hopefully takes off tomorrow!

 

Fire

[stratochief66]

Keep it up. See you on Mars!