How will you get to one of the planets?

[deadly654321]

asap as docking is added i shall perpare a invasion force send a huge rocket to send up mike docking station with 8 space planes attached with bombs the dock station will be at alow orbit kike 2000 meter above atmosphere of a planet and yseing small soild fuel rocket to get spaceplanes onto orbit attack

ps everyone knows that jebdiah is head plane

[Cykyrios]

So, by reversing course at the Far planet's orbit, you spend an extra 13 km/s of delta-V over if you'd gone the right way. That is a lot of extra fuel you had to bring along.

Also, if you've decided to come into the planet head-on, you'll be moving at more than 15 km/s relative to the planet when you enter the planet's SOI. Kerbin's atmosphere could probably eat that. A hypothetical Far Planet's atmosphere may not be so accommodating.

That, and also the fact that going the same way as the target planet allows you to correct your trajectory in case you were not perfectly lined up, while going the other way means you can't correct anything efficiently and will most probably miss the planet.

[TornadoEvil]

My current far-fetched plan:

1)Launch a large space plane horizontally from Kerbin into a low orbit, jettisoning air-breathing jets and solid boosters along the way

2)Optional: Refuel in low orbit/Fuel Lander in orbit

3)Transfer to target planets orbit

4)Detach Lander from rear of large spaceplane

5)Land on target planet with lander

6)perform orbital rendezvous, discard lander

7)return to Kerbin and land on runway

[KSPYasin]

I've launched my rocket to lower kerbol orbit using mun as gravity slingshot an it worked, well until space kraken took over my controls !

[maltesh]

I've launched my rocket to lower kerbol orbit using mun as gravity slingshot an it worked, well until space kraken took over my controls !

Getting into Kerbol orbit is fairly easy. You only need to be moving about 90 m/s faster in LKO to get into Kerbol orbit than you do to get to the Mun, and only about 10 m's faster than you need to be going to get to Minmus.

The thing with using the Moons as gravitational slingshots is that it is extremely easy to spend more fuel aiming and pointing a slingshot than it would potentially save you, and the game currently doesn't have the flight-planning instrumentation to help you make these decisions without doing the math yourself.

Also, if you're aiming for a gravity slingshot around the moons themselves, you're not taking full advantage of the far more easily predictable Oberth Effect by burning directly into your Kerbol orbit directly LKO.

There's a reason why NASA doesn't slingshot interplanetary probes by the Moon, and NASA's dealing with far tighter fuel constraints and higher velocities than KSP is.

[Viper_607]

How you ask? WITH OVERPOWERING THRUST I SAY!

[Tim_Barrett]

I would probably design a ship that wouldn't involved getting the entire lander back home - instead, more of an apollo style since EVA's were added. It will also cut down on weight.

If the new moons are small enough, I could even just use my EVA suit thrusters to fly into the same orbit as the mothership and then from there go back home.

All I can say is that this will truly be KSP's first real challenge.

[arcanine300]

they should add solar sails for deepspace travel

[The Destroyer]

Shouldnt be too hard, its just farther away= more burn time, so symple!

[sal_vager]

Don't forget guys

Section 3: Spam

A user shall not: Create a Post containing no real content, such as '+1!' or other single word responses.

[_Aramchek_]

How about.: I will build monstrously large rockets that will make those who choose "effeciency" and mehcjeb to quake in despair and fear when their mighty flames are lit, and I will not calculate anything and instead opt for a brute force takeover of all planets in the system. Without mercy or remorse or thinking of the consequences.

Many kerbals will die, and their deaths may be in vain, and no one will ever mourn for them.

But I WILL become the supreme overlord of ALL planets.

[Viper_607]

How about.: I will build monstrously large rockets that will make those who choose "effeciency" and mehcjeb to quake in despair and fear when their mighty flames are lit, and I will not calculate anything and instead opt for a brute force takeover of all planets in the system. Without mercy or remorse or thinking of the consequences.

Many kerbals will die, and their deaths may be in vain, and no one will ever mourn for them.

But I WILL become the supreme overlord of ALL planets.

Wouldn't that make their deaths meaningful if you eventually achieve your objective?

[Tim_Barrett]

Well, first I would get there with simply a really big rocket, but landing will be different.

I will station myself in orbit with two 1-kerb capsules. He will get out and get into the landing capsule, and then detach from there in his own lander, leaving the mothership behind. He will land, and then come back up and rendezvous with the mothership again, switching capsules for the final time, and ditch the landing craft in orbit as he goes home.

I will use that empty command module mod for the job.

[_Aramchek_]

No, I resist learning lessons from their deaths. And I will actively find ways to make their deaths meaningless if I have to.

[Sbowyer28]

I Honestly dont Know Im taking Voyager Labs by steps, I dont even have a Munar Rocket, Have a Lander, Just not a rocket. Im just going to see what new parts they add on the new update.

[Mikeboy]

Quite simply, using this:

I a test flight which went amazingly well by my standards in that it actually worked as I wanted it to first try, it was capable of achieving orbit, doing a burn powerful enough to inject it to another planet and insert and decelerate, land on Kerbin, take off from Kerbin and returning. So now I just need to wait until they add the new planets to see if it will go as successfully in the actual thing as it did in tests.

I also did some testing to see how I could use gravity to assist with my return:

I'd spoiler the images but the

commands didn't seem to work.

Edited August 10, 2012 by softweir
Fixing Spoilers

[softweir]

You have to use ["spoiler=some title of some sort] stuff ["/spoiler] only without the quotes I used so you can see them!

Alternatively, you can now edit your post to see what I did.

I hope this helps!

Richard.

[Mikeboy]

Ah, many thanks.

[softweir]

You're welcome!

[Lordherrmann]

Quite simply, using this:

I a test flight which went amazingly well by my standards in that it actually worked as I wanted it to first try, it was capable of achieving orbit, doing a burn powerful enough to inject it to another planet and insert and decelerate, land on Kerbin, take off from Kerbin and returning. So now I just need to wait until they add the new planets to see if it will go as successfully in the actual thing as it did in tests.

I also did some testing to see how I could use gravity to assist with my return:

I'd spoiler the images but the

commands didn't seem to work.

Seems to be a efficent way for one-kerb-missions, but to truly archieve a scientific meaning with missions you need ships able to transport more kerbals. My approach will be a orbital rendezvouz with another ship after launching from the planet I visited. I'll have to do the maths anytime soon (atleast learn the equatations necessary), in order to get the launch-window right and to perfectly time my ascent. I also need to design better landers.

[100cottage]

So far I think, counting Kerbin, there are 5 objects with atmospheres.

Oh man, do I ever want to try to get to these planets. (Keyword there try)

[Mikeboy]

Seems to be a efficent way for one-kerb-missions, but to truly archieve a scientific meaning with missions you need ships able to transport more kerbals. My approach will be a orbital rendezvouz with another ship after launching from the planet I visited. I'll have to do the maths anytime soon (atleast learn the equatations necessary), in order to get the launch-window right and to perfectly time my ascent. I also need to design better landers.

Yeah, once I've managed to get that to do a successful mission I'm hoping to do a 3 man mission, along with a rover from the cart mod.

[matthewpepperl]

well with docking you could setup a base on minmus and launch from there because they are very little gravity on minmus you could use very little fuel on minmus (not much difference between going to minmus or going to mun fuel wise) getting back now thats a different story we will have to see what new parts they add

[what-the]

Just created a nice rocket which can achieve escape velocity in 2 minutes pulling a fairly constant 5g's up to a maximum of 7g's. I will be using a very similar one when 0.17 is released. Also it's not that big for what it can do.

[SargeRho]

I'll use this ship: The fuel should suffice for a roundtrip.