Have you had to push your ship yet?

[Guest]

I've tried but since the vessel had a single crew member and no automated control it spun around constantly and I couldn't really do anything with it. It's easier and feels better to send actual rescue crafts. It feels even better if you have an escape vehicle you can use; I've found designing tiny jetpack type things to be quite fun, and they're surprisingly capable.

[Skorpychan]

On 10/31/2017 at 4:57 AM, dvp said:

Man. What I wouldn't give for a Halo-style "Flip Vehicle" button. But I guess this isn't that kind of game.

Spoken like a man who's never fiddled with landing gear and reaction wheels to right something. Or tried to do that, given up halfway, and just decided to roll it around, point it downhill, and take off actually pointing DOWNWARDS before thrust-vectoring back upright and taking off properly.

On-topic? Yes. I've even designed ships around possibly needing to, with arrangements of fuel tanks to keep the kerbal in place. I've also had to weight down the W key and go do something else while Jeb waddles back to the ship after running out of jetpack fuel, smashed landers while trying to move them, dropped rovers from high altitude by accident, and chosen parts for impact resistance rather than mass efficiency, thus leading to NEEDING the impact resistance.

[roboslacker]

Yup

[Fearless Son]

Frequently happens to me in early career games, where part count and weight considerations mean I sometimes have just less delta-V than it turns out I needed.  

Mostly I only need to do it enough to begin aerobreaking, as it is usually on the return trip when I run out (if it is more obvious before then I usually abort the mission.)

[Merinsan]

I did it yesterday, for maybe the 2nd time ever. And it wasn't because I underestimated my delta-v either.

I was returning from Minmus, got myself a nice return trajectory, where I'd hit atmosphere and be slowed sufficiently to land. I decided to stage, and let the engine/fuel burn up....however, the force of the separation caused the capsule to have a periapsis of 64km...it would have worked eventually, although more likely than not, I would have encountered the Mun and been in all sorts of trouble, so I got out and pushed.

[ThatGuyWithALongUsername]

Happened to me before 

 

This isn't exactly the same, but- Once I also deorbited by decoupling the capsule while spinning the ship and hoping for the best. It worked, somehow.

[FrostedShoe]

Once I ended up with all my solar panels facing away from the Sun so I had to EVA and turn the whole SSTO. It was big and heavy but it got there in the end.

[Agustin]

yeah!

I had to come back to kerbin and for so little (ran out of fuel) had no reentry on atmosphere. But with some push i had and slowly I reentered and survived!

[pandaman]

I tried it once.

Small Duna lander with 2 crew in command seats.  I stuffed up my ascent and didn't quite have enough fuel to circularise, so one kerbal got out and stuck his head in the engine bell to push.  I failed, and had to abandon the idea before the lander re-entered the atmosphere, leaving it to re-land on the parachutes that I re-packed before ascent (for just such an emergency) with the other crew in his seat.  The pusher had JUST enough juice to get into a safe, but very eccentric (and lonely) orbit.  

As it was a multi ship expedition, with ectra ships as back up, i was able to rescue both crew and return home safely.

 

[Confused Scientist]

Once I had a space station module break loose from the shuttle that was delivering it, so I had to use the kerbal EVA suit to act like a translational RCS port to guide the module in. It was like docking something with no reaction wheels and only four RCS ports for translation, which can't fire within five seconds of each other.

[mistergoblin]

Yes, but not to push a manoeuvre. Instead my craft had gone dead on an interplanetary trip when the panels had drifted out of alignment with the sun. I sent my kerbal out to push the ship and change its attitude, the hop back in and use the SAS to stop the rotation once I had power.

I've done similar operations IRL on the highway...