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Roads to Duna: No Moar Boosters (UPDATES!)


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  On 9/15/2017 at 3:27 PM, icantmakemodels said:

@sevenperforce, for Loop The Loop, is it okay if I leave some drop tanks in an elliptical Kerbin orbit? I've designed them with probe cores and solars, so I can recover them and reattach later.

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Yes, it is. It's fine to discard the drop tanks entirely if you want. Loop The Loop merely requires that some portion of your transfer vehicle remain in Duna orbit during your landing mission, and that same portion ends up in Kerbin orbit. It is intended to encourage the creation of a transfer hab (Stayin' Alive) like an Aldrin Cycler or the Hermes from The Martian while rewarding Apollo-style Orbit Rendezvous missions. You could use a completely expendable transfer injection stage as long as you still bring the Duna Orbiter back to LKO, ready for another mission.

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Update on my ITS Mission.

The spacecraft was optimized (it's sort of stable on reentry now and can do oxidizer mining on Duna) and I managed to fly and land the Booster.

fgSS3FF.png

Full album with here: https://imgur.com/a/DYh2l

 

14% of the booster's fuel was locked and I used only that to boost back and land. 

Unfortunately, the radiator panels I used as engine shroud blew up on touchdown, but everything else remained intact.

 

Will this still count as reusable? (I could do it again and simply take the radiator panels off, but I'd rather not)

Is it ok, If I simply keep the same amount of fuel locked for future launches and just pretend to land it?

 

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  On 9/19/2017 at 12:34 PM, Physics Student said:

Update on my ITS Mission.

The spacecraft was optimized (it's sort of stable on reentry now and can do oxidizer mining on Duna) and I managed to fly and land the Booster.

fgSS3FF.png

Full album with here: https://imgur.com/a/DYh2l

14% of the booster's fuel was locked and I used only that to boost back and land. 

Unfortunately, the radiator panels I used as engine shroud blew up on touchdown, but everything else remained intact.

Will this still count as reusable? (I could do it again and simply take the radiator panels off, but I'd rather not)

Is it ok, If I simply keep the same amount of fuel locked for future launches and just pretend to land it?

 

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Spectacular! I love your use of the Mk2 parts. This definitely counts as reusable and there's no need to go through the individual landings of every other booster.

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  On 9/20/2017 at 4:21 PM, purpleivan said:

Quick question about "Stayin' Alive"... the rule says that living space is for the "transfer to and from Duna". Is this the transfer to and from Duna orbit, or does the extra accommodation have to go down to the Duna surface as well?

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Transfer only. Think of an Aldrin Cycler or something like the Hermes, where the crew uses a cramped capsule to get down to Mars and back up again, but can enjoy larger accommodations for the lengthy trips back and forth.

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After a great deal of effort, I've managed to pull off what I think is the highest possible set of multipliers: On Tongues of Fire, Old School, Slow Climb, Stayin' Alive, Loop The Loop, Consistency, Justin Case, A Solid Plan, and Rollin'.

screenshot92.png

Orbital Assembly

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Mission to Duna

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Second segment of the mission will post next!

Edited by sevenperforce
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Cool challenge!  A couple questions on the bonus points:

-To get Elon Style, I assume the ship does not literally need to be able to go back to orbit after they've landed at Kerbin, right?   I think I have a design that can get from LKO to Duna and back to Kerbin surface with no staging, but no way in heck it can make it back to orbit with its little Terrier and no fuel left in the tank.

-Also, Elon Style is compatible with Brute Force, right?  So that if I assemble a completely reusable craft that does everything from LKO on, and send up each component fully fueled, I can get both?  

-To get Consistency, Good Sir, you do have to use literally the same design of launch vehicle, or does it have to be literally the same craft?  I.e., if I use the same model of expendable rocket to launch each part, does that work?  Or do I need some kind of completely resuable launch vehicle that can carry each part up, land, and then repeat?  

 

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  On 9/29/2017 at 4:56 AM, Aegolius13 said:

Cool challenge!  A couple questions on the bonus points:

-To get Elon Style, I assume the ship does not literally need to be able to go back to orbit after they've landed at Kerbin, right?   I think I have a design that can get from LKO to Duna and back to Kerbin surface with no staging, but no way in heck it can make it back to orbit with its little Terrier and no fuel left in the tank.

-Also, Elon Style is compatible with Brute Force, right?  So that if I assemble a completely reusable craft that does everything from LKO on, and send up each component fully fueled, I can get both?  

-To get Consistency, Good Sir, you do have to use literally the same design of launch vehicle, or does it have to be literally the same craft?  I.e., if I use the same model of expendable rocket to launch each part, does that work?  Or do I need some kind of completely resuable launch vehicle that can carry each part up, land, and then repeat?  

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To get Elon Style, you just have to get the ship back to Kerbin's surface. Don't have to go back to orbit again.

Elon Style is definitely compatible with Brute Force, even though I didn't originally expect anyone to pull that off. @Kergarin managed it.

Consistency requires the same LV design, not the same physical vehicle.

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sillyduna321.jpg

My latest assembly kit: Silly Duna. Because if you want to do ISRU, you have to overdo it.

In a nutshell, the Silly Duna has excessive fuel capacity, both overall and Liquid Fuel in particular (because as per the challenge rules, more oxidizer can be made easily at any time). One round of ISRU allows it to make two launches and fully refuel the transfer vehicle.

Terse mission report and gallery here. I notice that I don't have a single good view of the cargo bay with contents. The above picture is the best I have for the time being.

              dry  +fuel total(kg)
SD core       2925 +1060 3985
SD 2 boosters 2260 +1700 3960
SD ISRU       2431 +1500 3951
crew transfer 3690  +300 3990
crew recov    2560 +1400 3957

Propulsive landing, no nukes, ladders, double crew quarters, fully reusable everything, consistent LVs, rover. Heaviest launch was the crew tansfer vehicle at 3990kg.

Edited by Laie
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I'm pleased to present the following, mostly successful Duna mission.  My design philosophy was pretty simple: build a fully reusuable rocket-based ship that handles the entire trip, with five equalish-mass components and no refueling.  I also tried to avoid the need for precision alignment of parts, since I'm just too lazy for that sort of thing.  

But as often happens, a simple idea can get difficult in the execution. In particular, those legs ended up very draggy and had low impact tolerance.  Delta-v was also at a premium with no staging.  But thanks to Duna's forgiving atmosphere, I was able stretch my limited delta-v budget just far enough.  

(Oh, and I swear by the Kraken's tentacles, I came up with this thing before I saw @Laie's excellent design).  

Pic of ship on Duna's surface:

bin2aGz.png

Full album:

https://imgur.com/a/zviKZ

The mass specs are:

  • Cabin: 2.165 tons
  • Hub: 2.205 tons
  • Legs (all three identical): 2.232 tons.  

I believe I met the following bonuses: Old School (3%), Brute Force (12%), Slow Climb (4%), Elon Style (25%), Consistency, Good Sir (6%).  

Thanks again for a fun and refreshingly-different challenge idea, @sevenperforce!

 

Edited by Aegolius13
Added sample pic since album not embedding.
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  On 10/5/2017 at 5:56 PM, Laie said:

I like the legs. The lifesavers do act as a kind of supension, don't they?

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I didn't notice that kind of effect... the legs tended to explode if I landed at even a hair above the list collision limit of 6 m/s.  I used the toroidal tanks mostly to dial in the exact amount of fuel I needed.  

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  • 2 weeks later...
  On 10/5/2017 at 3:32 AM, Aegolius13 said:

I'm pleased to present the following, mostly successful Duna mission.  My design philosophy was pretty simple: build a fully reusuable rocket-based ship that handles the entire trip, with five equalish-mass components and no refueling.  I also tried to avoid the need for precision alignment of parts, since I'm just too lazy for that sort of thing.  

But as often happens, a simple idea can get difficult in the execution. In particular, those legs ended up very draggy and had low impact tolerance.  Delta-v was also at a premium with no staging.  But thanks to Duna's forgiving atmosphere, I was able stretch my limited delta-v budget just far enough.  

(Oh, and I swear by the Kraken's tentacles, I came up with this thing before I saw @Laie's excellent design).  

Pic of ship on Duna's surface:

bin2aGz.png

Full album:

https://imgur.com/a/zviKZ

The mass specs are:

  • Cabin: 2.165 tons
  • Hub: 2.205 tons
  • Legs (all three identical): 2.232 tons.  

I believe I met the following bonuses: Old School (3%), Brute Force (12%), Slow Climb (4%), Elon Style (25%), Consistency, Good Sir (6%).  

Thanks again for a fun and refreshingly-different challenge idea, @sevenperforce!

 

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Argh, I belately realized I probably did NOT do Elon Style right, since my launch craft were not resuable.  I can't leave Elon hanging like that, so I re-did the challenge with the same ship (thus same mass stats).  But this time I used my beloved Caravel-class SSTO rocket to deliver the components to orbit in a fully reusable fashion.  Everything after ship assembly was basically the same. 

New and improved album at:

https://imgur.com/a/xFcH1

 

Cs4EG9J.png

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I've wanted to do this challenge since it was introduced. I was in the middle of a Jool 5 and an Eve mission though, so I couldn't get to it right away. Not sure why this one appealed to me so much, cuz it's way outside my comfort zone.  If you put my five modules together, it would easily be the smallest ship I've built since my first few weeks in the game (not counting satellites). I never try the "low cost" or "low mass" challenges, because it's just not my style of play. After all this time, I still enjoy the Duna/Ike system though, so I figured I'd give it a shot. Haven't looked at the other entries, cuz I didn't wanna be influenced by them, but I did look at the leaderboard. Then I realized I needn't have worried. Those entries are all ridiculously small. I won't be able to top 'em, but I think I had a pretty good mission. My largest module is 7.1 tons. Pretty sure I'm eligible for "Consistency, Good Sir", "Old School", "Slow Climb", "Justin Case", "They See Me Rollin", and "A Solid Plan". Kudos to @sevenperforce for an awesome challenge. After coming up with the idea itself, I think figuring out a way to score it is often the toughest part of coming up with a challenge. Not sure how you came up with all the different bonuses, but I definitely like 'em. It gives you a lot of different options to plan your mission (I'm gonna go back and see what everybody else did; I'm betting some of them are gonna be wildly different). One question I had was whether you had considered a bonus for sending the Duna Ascent Vehicle on a separate transfer from the crew and lander modules. Just curious. Anyway, here is my mission. Hope it measures up to the other entries.

 

Here is the Duna Ascent Vehicle, at 6.3 tons.

screenshot745.png

 

The separate transfer stage for the Duna Ascent Vehicle, at 7.116 tons. This is my heaviest module.

 

screenshot748.png

 

Main transfer stage for the crew and lander modules, at 6.97.

 

screenshot746.png

 

The lander module and rover, at 7.097 tons.

 

screenshot743.png

 

The return stage, at 6.877 tons. Could've certainly made it lighter. It's a bit unorthodox with the 3 Mk1 Command Modules, but I kinda like the way it turned out. And I didn't need to worry about the lower heat tolerances of the Mk1 Lander Can and crew cabin during the return. Seemed like a good trade off.

 

screenshot747.png

 

Full album below. Hope you guys dig it.

https://imgur.com/a/u5iBA

 

Edited by Cpt Kerbalkrunch
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I just wasted my entire evening. :(

The rules say no command seats for the transfer ship or the lander. However, I saw the part about being allowed to have command seats on a separately landed ascent vehicle. Except I didn't read the "separately landed" part. Thus, because of my ignorance, my submission is invalid. Which is a shame because I had a mass per launch of <2t.

KIXXD73.png

Oh, whatever, I'll sum it up anyway, if nobody minds, even if it doesn't count.

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If those sort of landers were legal, my score would be:

1.92t - highest mass.

Old school - no nukes/ions - 3%.

The point behind slow climb is that you don't need a jetpack. However, I didn't need a jetpack or ladders... I'm not going to count it.

Consistency, good sir - use the exact same launch vehicle - 6% (I changed the fairing shape, but I'm pretty sure that's allowed, but if it's not, well, it doesn't matter anyways because my entry doesn't count).

0.91*1.92 = 1.7472.

 

Except I'm ignorant and unobservant, so it doesn't count. Thank you for teaching me two lessons - both how to make tiny crafts, and to ALWAYS read the rules 5 times before even considering completing a challenge.

Have a nice day.

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