Science for a flyby

[MSA]

Hello! I am planning an SSTO mission to dres and wanted to beat a Duna assist. I want to get as much science as possible so I would collect some at PE while burning. The only problem is that I don’t know what experiment would be the best for that kind of thing.

[Noobton]

Hi MSA, welcome to the forum, I moved your thread to gameplay questions for better visibility.

[Aegolius13]

I'd advise bringing all available science instruments,  since they're not that heavy or expensive compared to the mission as a whole.   Note the accelerometer only works when landed, and the atmosphere analyzer only works in atmospheric (which may or may not work at Duna with your flight plan).

[HvP]

My suggestion would be to make sure you have a Negative Gravioli Detector on board.

It has a high science output for each report and can generate biome specific reports from low in space and from high in space. Use it with an Experiment Storage Unit and assign the storage unit to collect all science with an action group and you can clean up a huge amount of science very quickly.

Just make sure you have a lot of battery power on board because the gravioli detector generates a large amount of data that will drain small batteries very quickly when trying to transmit.

Edited January 14, 2019 by HvP

[MSA]

Thanks!

[eddiew]

As above, really. Science instruments are so tiny that you should be carrying all of them all the time. An exception can occasionally be made for the materials lab due to its bulk, but even that is only 0.1t and really should be viable on anything.

Since Duna's atmo is so thin, you could be brave and scrape the top kilometre without actually losing any speed. Wire up an action button to fire every experiment at once for speed.

Unless you want to RP it and send different missions for difference science packages, which is an excuse to design more vessels and if you're enjoying doing that and don't need to save funds, then by all means do so. And indeed the gravioli detector is a great package since you'll get biome science at all altitudes and will likely get a good couple of hundred points out of it 

(Why are you going to Dres before Duna? Duna is notably easier...) 

[Superfluous J]

If you're going modless, right click each experiment well before the flyby and pin them open with the button in the upper right hand corner. Then you can just click-click-click to gather the science.

If you like mods I'd suggest All Y'All or ForScience for... well... science collection that is easier and allows you to actually watch the flyby you are partaking in.

[Aegolius13]

1 hour ago, 5thHorseman said:

If you're going modless, right click each experiment well before the flyby and pin them open with the button in the upper right hand corner. Then you can just click-click-click to gather the science.

If you like mods I'd suggest All Y'All or ForScience for... well... science collection that is easier and allows you to actually watch the flyby you are partaking in.

I think you can also set the "record data" actions for all your modules to an action group.   Pairs nicely with the science container or probe core command to collect all data,  which can go to a different action group.   

[Superfluous J]

3 minutes ago, Aegolius13 said:

I think you can also set the "record data" actions for all your modules to an action group.   Pairs nicely with the science container or probe core command to collect all data,  which can go to a different action group.   

Yes this is true, though in almost 6 years of play I've thought about setting action groups in the VAB about 3 times, and as I'm approaching my target ... well a lot more than 3 times.

It's easily the biggest disconnect in my brain for this game.

[Starman4308]

The lightweight experiments are just about a given. For a cheap no-return flyby, goo and materials bay are marginal: they are heavy and do not transmit 100%.

One mod I like is DMagic's science parts (may not be updated); a lot of them have some mass, forcing actual choices in some cases. If you play with extra science parts, I recommend reducing the science multiplier.

[MSA]

17 hours ago, eddiew said:

 

(Why are you going to Dres before Duna? Duna is notably easier...) 

I go to Duna all the time and want a challenge 

[Geonovast]

19 hours ago, 5thHorseman said:

Yes this is true, though in almost 6 years of play I've thought about setting action groups in the VAB about 3 times, and as I'm approaching my target ... well a lot more than 3 times.

It's easily the biggest disconnect in my brain for this game.

Which is why you need something like AGEX, which lets you name them and edit them in flight.

[eddiew]

6 hours ago, MSA said:

I go to Duna all the time and want a challenge 

Ah. I'll assume you mean in other careers

[MSA]

Correct

[Fearless Son]

Two recommendations:

• The Negative Gravioli Detector - Works over different biomes and different altitudes, so it should give give you plenty of new readings to store and take back home with you.
• Your own crew.  Seriously, having a crew member get out of the craft and take an EVA report.  EVA reports also have different responses at different altitudes and over different biomes, so again you get plenty of different reports.  As a bonus, you can transmit them when you get back in the craft and because they are only crew recordings you can transmit them back to Kerbin with no loss in science value.  You would need to leave the ship anyway to nab the data from the Negative Gravioli Detector anyway, so you might as well take an EVA report while you are at it.

Though, uh, for obvious reasons you shouldn't send your crew out during the actual burn itself.  But there will be plenty of unpowered flyby time near the planet before and after your burn.

[Superfluous J]

2 hours ago, Geonovast said:

Which is why you need something like AGEX, which lets you name them and edit them in flight.

Granted it's been 2-3 years since I tried any action group mods, but I never found any of them palatable. They seemed to have about 100 features and the one I wanted (set action groups in flight) was buried in so many clunky menus that it was easier to just right click the parts and open the solar panels myself.

Then I wrote All Y'All and never looked back