The KSP Caveman Challenge 1.3.x - 1.10.x [re-booted]

[Rakaydos]

So, simply as a matter of ridiculusness, lets say 9000 HG5s will allow comunication to Jool.

A reasonable low- part launcher might have 6 components, with a hard- attached payload. (Reliant, 2 large tanks, decoupler, Terrier, 1 large tank) It is possible, then, to send up 20 antennas, a pair of docking ports, a probe core and a solar panel.

You would need to grind 450 launches and rendevuses to assemble that relay... but it COuld be done.

[JAFO]

I was curious about the 1-8 antennas range, so I did some more checking, and found I'd made a mistake with the single antenna data (I missed seeing an antenna hiding in the shade, so what I quoted for 1 antenna actually turned out to be the data for 2 antennas). The table has been corrected.

I've expanded on the information by adding results for using 2-7 antennas to the original table as well.

 

16 hours ago, Rakaydos said:

So, simply as a matter of ridiculusness, lets say 9000 HG5s will allow comunication to Jool.

A reasonable low- part launcher might have 6 components, with a hard- attached payload. (Reliant, 2 large tanks, decoupler, Terrier, 1 large tank) It is possible, then, to send up 20 antennas, a pair of docking ports, a probe core and a solar panel.

You would need to grind 450 launches and rendevuses to assemble that relay... but it COuld be done.

In theory yes.. but I suspect only a real masochist could cope with that kind of grind. 

(And don't forget.. there would also be the grind needed to raise the necessary funds!)

Edited June 14, 2018 by JAFO
edited for clarity and to include link to table

[dvader]

Againt my better judgement, I have started a NCD Caveman attempt. After @IncongruousGoat finished, I just wanted to try it a bit and now I can't stop. I have no idea how long it will take, if I'll loose interest half-way or if the other life will require too much of my attention but here we go:

 

[Rakaydos]

I've just about got my earth orbit->tylo planned out, DV wise, and I'm going to need to "simulate" it to make sure, before starting the actual orbital assembily.

However, other things have picked up, and this project is on the back burner recently.

[Mr. Peabody]

On ‎6‎/‎10‎/‎2018 at 6:34 PM, IncongruousGoat said:

It's finally done. Ladies and gentlemen, Nanocrystalline Diamond has officially been completed.

Epic! Congratulations! I would award you your badges but I see you already have.  Apologies for being gone for a while.

I can, however, award you the "Order of the Trilobite" for completing Nano-Diamond! You may claim you badge.

[IncongruousGoat]

6 hours ago, The Dunatian said:

Epic! Congratulations! I would award you your badges but I see you already have.  Apologies for being gone for a while.

I can, however, award you the "Order of the Trilobite" for completing Nano-Diamond! You may claim you badge.

It's okay. Real life happens to all of us from time to time.

As a point of book-keeping, though, you may want to update the Order of the Trilobite section of the cave wall. Also, you *may* have misspelled my username.

[Rakaydos]

damit, I add 8 moduels to my prototype to give it the DV it needs, and now it consistantly krakens when cheat menued to orbit.

[Rakaydos]

Redesigned a tylo lander stage that can carry the tylo lifter, but now I need a kerbin lifter that can manage 7.5 tons to kerbin orbit.

Looks like I need some horizontal assembily.

[Rakaydos]

Redesigned the Tylo lander again. The tylo lifter is still a single assembly that has to go up on a build-a-rocket, but the lander has been broken into 3 parts that should be assemble-able without cosign losses.

Taking the Jool 5 Infinity video as inspiriation, I would also need an additional 1250 DV  to go from a highly eliptical mothership parking orbit to low Tylo, with enough residuals to give the returning can 1250 DV back to the mothership and redevous. And Cavemen cant do bump-rendevus.

That's managable. So I've started to look at what's needed to take the empty landercan to other jool moons and back. (using kerbal engineer for ship design) Turns out 2 of my "fuel pods" can get me Val and back with good flying. 1 pod each for Bop and Pol, with something like 300 m/s reserve for intercept, docking, and poor mission planning. Laythe will probably take an independant lander, and of course Kerbin requires at least 1 2.5m heat shield to protect the lander can from jool intercept velocity at kerbin, though I only need 1 more fuel pod if Ionly have 1 heat shield. A heatshield, probecore, battery, parachutes, 2 baguete tanks and solar panels gives a healthy margin and should have enough utility to return to kerbin.

Masses: 2.25 tons for heat shield/parachute assembly, 2.176 tons per fuel pod (5 for Val, Bop, Pol and Kerbin), whatever the Layth lander ends up looking like, the Tylo lifter (2.753 tons), the 3 parts of the tylo lander(2.356 tons each), and the tylo orbit tanks (4 more fuel tanks). That's what a mothership needs to bring to Tylo eliptical orbit.

Edited June 23, 2018 by Rakaydos

[JAFO]

2 hours ago, Rakaydos said:

(using kerbal engineer for ship design)

Quite a few times in the past, doing this (even though it is in a separate gamesave) has been regarded as violating the spirit/intent of the rules...

just sayin'

Edited June 23, 2018 by JAFO

[Rakaydos]

It's nothing that couldnt be done with lots of pencil and paper (Or more cheat menu orbit testing) but Jool mission grind is already bad enough. Since my tech tree is full already, this isnt even the challange proper anymore, "just" an Order of the Trilobite.

If it's still a problem, I can uninstall it and go back to orbital tests.

[JAFO]

1 hour ago, Rakaydos said:

Since my tech tree is full already, this isnt even the challange proper anymore, "just" an Order of the Trilobite.

That's beside the point.. the whole point of the OotT is that it's still done with the same ruleset as the Challenge. And incidentally, there's nothing "just" about becoming a Trilobite.. that's caveman on steroids material. So the same high standards ought to apply. Manually calculating dV is fine.. empirical testing is fine.. but mods that act as design aids.. not fine.

 

1 hour ago, Rakaydos said:

If it's still a problem, I can uninstall it and go back to orbital tests.

It's not my call... that's up to @The Dunatian.  But If it were up to me, well... let's just say that I'm in full agreement with decisions that rejected other attempts that did the same thing.

Edited June 23, 2018 by JAFO

[Mr. Peabody]

On ‎6‎/‎23‎/‎2018 at 10:01 AM, Rakaydos said:

It's nothing that couldnt be done with lots of pencil and paper (Or more cheat menu orbit testing) but Jool mission grind is already bad enough. Since my tech tree is full already, this isnt even the challange proper anymore, "just" an Order of the Trilobite.

If it's still a problem, I can uninstall it and go back to orbital tests.

I'm not trying to cause you extra work for no reason, but challenge rules do explicitly state that KER is not permitted.

Trying to build a Caveman Tylo lander boggles my mind. I'll be looking forward to seeing what you come up with.

[GoSlash27]

On 6/23/2018 at 2:18 AM, JAFO said:

Quite a few times in the past, doing this (even though it is in a separate gamesave) has been regarded as violating the spirit/intent of the rules...

Agreed. Using KER in a separate career for design purposes is expressly forbidden in Caveman runs. 

 

Quote

-*EDIT* New rule: No using mods in another session to assist you in completing your "caveman" attempt. This includes designing using KER and then using the design, testing with MechJeb, and everything else. What happens in the cave stays in the cave!

In fact, the use of KER is forbidden in any role whatsoever in a caveman attempt, and is grounds for disqualification.

On 6/23/2018 at 8:01 AM, Rakaydos said:

(Or more cheat menu orbit testing)

Also, "cheat menu" is forbidden in caveman attempts, including for testing purposes even when done in another session.

Best,
-Slashy (the O.G. caveman)

Edited June 25, 2018 by GoSlash27

[Rakaydos]

Yea, I threw everything out after that.

This is what I've rebuilt so far:

https://imgur.com/a/FEQf0xi

I need to figure out what to DO with those wet/dry masses, but I have them.

Currently writing up the lifter.

[Rakaydos]

Whats the "Effective exaust velocity" of a Spark engine?

Edit: Found a calculator that accepts ISP.

Edited June 25, 2018 by Rakaydos

[GoSlash27]

All exhaust velocities are simply Isp x g0.

Best,
-Slashy

[Rakaydos]

Lightweight Caveman Tylo Lifter- Wet mass 2.833 tons

https://imgur.com/a/JUSmsk9

Has a bit over 3200 m/s- a hefty reserve for rendevus and docking, and the possibility of having to manage the tylo landing approach on it's own, though the TWR is a bit low with the legs still on to be comfortable with that.

[Rakaydos]

The fuel pods are 2.256 tons wet, .366 tons dry. A single Spark (2.548 tons of thrust on tylo) gives a positive TWR for a single tank. The lander is dead mass, so lets look at 3 tanks, docked parallel, no staging, with 2 additional sparks. (all lifter tanks locked down)

2.256+2.256+2.833(lander)+.2(two sparks)=7.545 wet,
.366+.366+2.833(lander)+.2(two sparks)= 3.665 dry
At 320 ISP (all sparks, leave the ants offline) thats... 2265.91 m/s. Not quite enough,but pretty close- in theory I could get away with using the lifter to go the rest of the way, but I'd have to ditch the landing shocks, which is a no-go.

A 4th fuel pod, mounted on top on the tank's integrated decoupler as a separate stage...

7.545+2.256= 9.801 tons wet
7.545+.366= 7.911 tons dry
=672.28 m/s (+2265.91 m/s = 2938.19 m/s)

...Should be good with a good approach.

 

[JAFO]

14 minutes ago, Rakaydos said:

 

Lightweight Caveman Tylo Lifter- Wet mass 2.833 tons

 

Lookin' good! 

Best wishes for the lawn build.. I haven't tried that myself yet.. it looks painful.

[Rakaydos]

21 minutes ago, JAFO said:

Lookin' good! 

Best wishes for the lawn build.. I haven't tried that myself yet.. it looks painful.

Worst part is, I had a pretty well debugged lawn rocket, but I was overenthusiasic about deleting everything, and now need to rebuild it from scratch.

[JAFO]

26 minutes ago, Rakaydos said:

Worst part is, I had a pretty well debugged lawn rocket, but I was overenthusiasic about deleting everything, and now need to rebuild it from scratch.

Ouch.. I feel your pain.

[GoSlash27]

1 hour ago, Rakaydos said:

Worst part is, I had a pretty well debugged lawn rocket, but I was overenthusiasic about deleting everything, and now need to rebuild it from scratch.

Raykados,
 Best of luck. I was never as ambitious as you are when it comes to this challenge. Cavemanning is hard

Best,
-Slashy

[Rakaydos]

THE FIRST COMPONENT IS IN ORBIT. (barring redesign)

https://imgur.com/a/Ybrr4ni

[JAFO]

8 hours ago, Rakaydos said:

THE FIRST COMPONENT IS IN ORBIT. (barring redesign)

https://imgur.com/a/Ybrr4ni

Well done!

A pity you didn't have more pics of the assembly process though.. I'd love to have seen that.