Launch a kerbal into orbit with rocket exhaust

[Amodii]

thought you were good?

try this.

launch a kerbal on eva into orbit round kerbin using engine exhaust and jetpack fuel, collisions are ok as well.

the launch has to take place from the runway or the launch pad.

you are allowed to use solid rocket boosters and rcs, but im not so sure rcs affects kerbals.

you can use any mods.

also try getting the kerbal to go round the sun from orbit.

like in this video at 2:24

i just thought it up so i have no idea how to do this.

Good Luck!

Edited September 12, 2012 by Amodii

[TheProdigy]

...no fuel tanks? Lol

[Amodii]

you can use fuel tanks.and anything else, but make sure the only thing affecting the kerbal is engine exhaust, his jetpack and collisions.

And yes you can use solid rocket booster exhaust, but im not so sure that rcs affects kerbals.

[Bluejayek]

This isn't possible. First, you cant get something in orbit by shooting it from the surface, you need a burn once your at altitude to get the horizontal velocity needed (The lowest point of your orbit will be where you started your burn, so here ground level.. That doesn't work so well.

Second, if you have ever tried it, jumping a kerbal into an SRB exhaust, you can get about 1km altitude and 3km distance, and not much more. Far short of reaching orbit. The problem here is mainly air resistance, not thrust; if you were to do the same where the SRB was sitting in orbit, you would have a very large velocity imparted to the unfortunate kerbal.

I suppose in principle you could build a 70km high tower off the launch pad with your SRB on top...

Edited September 12, 2012 by Bluejayek

[Fendleton]

Actually, in theory....IF you could get a kerbal up to a 70km height.....and then have a perfectly timed rendezvous with a second spacecraft...then used THAT craft to supply the horizontal velocity by blasting them a second time.....then it could in theory work if you had insanely powerful engines IE: CFG edit engines to the point where they fly through the spacecraft they're fitted to on 1% thrust.

[a7i20ci7y]

Scott Manly managed to do this on the Mun. Kerbal orbit... not so much.

[Amodii]

ok i thought of something else. what about getting a kerbal going round the sun, with engine exhaust from orbit like in this video.

skip to 2:224

[Bluejayek]

I suppose in principle you could build a 70km high tower off the launch pad with your SRB on top...

Like so... Unfortunately my SRB exploded this time. Will post back when I get it. Note that this definately needed CFG edits, for strength.

EDIT:

Even from 70km I can only get a few 100m/s off the SRB, nowhere near enough for orbit.

Edited September 12, 2012 by Bluejayek

[a7i20ci7y]

Like so... Unfortunately my SRB exploded this time. Will post back when I get it. Note that this definately needed CFG edits, for strength.

EDIT:

Even from 70km I can only get a few 100m/s off the SRB, nowhere near enough for orbit.

Now you just need to get him to land in an ordinary glass of water.

[Amodii]

You can use the eva pack thrust.

[purple100]

Does the EVA pack have enough delta-V to do that, though? Won't you just run out of fuel before you get going fast enough?

[Bluejayek]

Yes. It will purple. Now, I could go to the extreme in abusing the lack of rules in this challenge, set a launch clamp tower at geosynchronous height, and then jump into a SRB plume and attain orbit that way, but it seems a bit like cheating.

[superecnate]

Like so... Unfortunately my SRB exploded this time. Will post back when I get it. Note that this definately needed CFG edits, for strength.

EDIT:

Even from 70km I can only get a few 100m/s off the SRB, nowhere near enough for orbit.

Nice Space Elevator.

[Soralin]

This isn't possible. First, you cant get something in orbit by shooting it from the surface, you need a burn once your at altitude to get the horizontal velocity needed (The lowest point of your orbit will be where you started your burn, so here ground level.. That doesn't work so well.

You don't need a burn, you just need some form of horizontal change in velocity. If you could get the height needed, with the right timing, you could get into orbit by a gravity assist from the Mun.

[anaximander]

This isn't possible. First, you cant get something in orbit by shooting it from the surface, you need a burn once your at altitude to get the horizontal velocity needed (The lowest point of your orbit will be where you started your burn, so here ground level.. That doesn't work so well.

Theoretically, if you could throw the Kerbal horizontally, rather than vertically, at a high enough speed, it would act the same as an apoapsis-raising burn, so they'd orbit around and land back at the pad. Of course, they'd have to overcome air resistance, and the orbital velocity required at that level is enormous, but in theory it's possible.

[maltesh]

For an unpowered orbit, velocity and altitude are inextricably linked. If you have a certain speed when passing a particular altitude going up, you'll have that same speed when passing that altitude going down.

The orbital velocity required to punch through Kerbin's atmosphere at that shallow an angle and return to KSC is far in excess of Kerbin escape velocity at the surface. In fact, it's far in excess of Kerbol escape velocity at Kerbin's orbital radius.

If you leave Kerbin's atmosphere with the required speed, you're not coming back to Kerbin.

[-Gamah]

You said collisions were allowerd, my colissions were powered by liquid fuel rockets... While I did it form the launch pad, I could have done it on the runway too...

I kind of cheated, sure... but can I have a "pioneer" award or something for getting it done instead of saying it's impossible?

http://imgur.com/a/oA5kX

Edit:

Through some tweaking/gravity slingshots I could definitely add a delta-v budget to get him to escape kerbin and independently orbit kerbol via rocket pack fuel... but as for now I'm off to bed.

Edited September 14, 2012 by -Gamah

[Bluejayek]

You don't need a burn, you just need some form of horizontal change in velocity. If you could get the height needed, with the right timing, you could get into orbit by a gravity assist from the Mun.

I thought about this. However, as far as I can figure, if you gravity assisted by the Mun once, you will eventually pass by it a second time later on, which will probably kick you into kerbol orbit. Hence this isnt really stable.

[eppiox]

OH well.. I tried to double up the force but it does not seem to work.

Seems the initial boost from one exhaust is too great to count the others.

http://imgur.com/a/axEbn

[VincentLaw]

I believe you are moving so quickly from the first blast that you essentially teleport through the others. I also tried a number of techniques similar to this. Even exploiting the VAB to mount engine parts inside of each other at the exact same position does not provide any additional launch speed.

[Joe Pinball]

I also had a stab at this:

My first effort focussed on getting a Kerb to jump onto one of the big engines, that got me to around 4.5km going straight up.

I then decided to add some linear accelerator-style boosters by sticking some upside-down radial boosters onto tanks that were attached to the sides of the main tank, kind of like a rifle bore.... STILL got only 4.5km.

someone suggested my Kerbonaut may well have been going too fast to even notice the booster effect, so this time I made it three rows of radial boosters, and increased the gap between them and the starting 'pusher' engine

and even with THIS Kerbal Linear accelerator, they STILL peak at 4,538m altitude!

I suspect the only way to get higher would be with cfg edits on custom engines to get lolstupid amounts of thrust.

Joeeee

[-Gamah]

So did my post not count?

[superecnate]

Well, Scott did only manage to get into Mun orbit with 0.9% thrust left.....

[iplop]

My best attempt:

[kahlzun]

that looks so cool!