Deployable Seismic Sensor - Forcing the issue

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

I've got a contract to return science from my deployable seismic sensor. 

Despite the best efforts of One Star Scientist Bob, and his Two Star Engineer Alny Kerman in setting up a remote station to the best of their abilities, we're not seeing much progress.  Val had the crazy idea to force the issue by taking an almost empty of fuel lander up to 500m and then launching it at Minmus (while she gently EVAd back to the surface with full monopropellant braking).  Having survived, she ran over to see the results of her 'experiment'...

Only to discover we're not moving the needle on the contract.  While we got three messages (from the initial impact and two debris impacts) showing 0.34, 0.43, and 0.31 (which should in most gravity environments add up to about 1) science points transmitted back to Kerbin… we're not even 1% complete.

… and so the question: is this one of those contracts that's just gonna need to be background noise?  i.e. it's not gonna get completed any time soon?  Also - if I level up my Kerbals and then come back to pick up and then re-deploy the science, will I end up setting my completion back as well?

Edited May 24, 2020 by JoeSchmuckatelli

[Cavscout74]

For you second question - yes, if you use a higher level engineer/scientist & pick up then re-deploy a part, it will function at the higher level.

For the original question - It needs a combination of mass & velocity, combined with distance.  Another factor is the body its on - lower mass bodies need smaller impacts.  Minmus is usually fairly easy, but it does still take a pretty significant impact.  What kind of mass & velocity did that fuel lander have?  Typically I can max out Minmus on a single impact if I use a dedicated impactor coming in a high velocity.  I usually enter a retrograde orbit at Minmus & try to impact a hill near the sensor - that way the hill shields my base from any flying debris.  Once set up on a good approach, I try to build up as much speed as I can, plus I build my impactors to have a fair amount of non-fuel mass (either dedicated ballast parts or ore tanks for stock)

[jimmymcgoochie]

These contracts seem like a lot of work, but they're actually pretty easy to do- you don't need to leave your crew there either and I;d advise you to get them out of the potential blast radius.

Just launch a small, cheap rocket with high delta-V straight at Minmus, and as soon as you get inside its SOI aim straight at the ground and burn for maximum speed. If you can aim for somewhere near the seismometer then great, but if not it shouldn't make too much difference as long as you get up to maximum speed. A QBE, two oscar-Bs and a spark will probably be enough (add a solar panel to keep the power on and a reaction wheel to make it point the right way) and then launch one or even a whole cluster of them at Minmus- I've seen 40,000% readings on seismic detectors by doing that.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

Ah - so what you're saying is that Val had a good idea, but we need to Jeb this thing up with MORE POWER!

Sounds good!

[AHHans]

For all bodies without atmosphere (that I tried up to now, i.e. Mun, Minmus, Ike, and Gilly) I got the seismic science by dropping spent stages or other obsolete craft on it. Preferably having them impact from the transfer, but dropping old landers from orbit or drop-tanks during landing also works.

Duna required a dedicated impactor that was designed to be reasonably streamlined, and that I "rode down" i.e. had as active vessel during the atmospheric entry and all the way down until the crash. And Eve?!? Well, Eve is Eve. I finally build massive robotic planes, that mined up a few hundred tons of ore in Eve, then flew to the experiment site and still only got the 50% done when crashing at 4x physics warp...

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

Heh. 

[N_Danger]

I used a large number of imactors for a Munmus contract. 25 including the bus. Drop them within 4-5 KM of the sensing unit you can 2-3 pts of science each. in retrospect I didn't need the probe cores and I'm pretty flush with cash so it was expensive.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

2 hours ago, N_Danger said:

I used a large number of imactors for a Munmus contract. 25 including the bus. Drop them within 4-5 KM of the sensing unit you can 2-3 pts of science each. in retrospect I didn't need the probe cores and I'm pretty flush with cash so it was expensive.

Took me a minute to figure out what I am seeing: those are all guided bombs with fuel clipped into OKTOs... Never would have thought of that!  (Of course, I only learned you can clip parts recently).

I'm guessing you could have done the same with dumb bombs and a slow fly-over / hover?  Bunch of fuel tanks or something - well then you wouldn't have had the thrust... small SRBs?  

[N_Danger]

12 hours ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Took me a minute to figure out what I am seeing: those are all guided bombs with fuel clipped into OKTOs... Never would have thought of that!  (Of course, I only learned you can clip parts recently).

I'm guessing you could have done the same with dumb bombs and a slow fly-over / hover?  Bunch of fuel tanks or something - well then you wouldn't have had the thrust... small SRBs?  

Yes to the using dumb bombs, the first time I used this on a contract it was at the Mun and I released and guided everyone of the impactors. That was time consuming.

When I used it on a contact at Minmus I just de-orbited the bus from a a 50 KM altitude to hit near the sensor and then hit the space bar to stage everything. Basically a giant shotgun shell of unguided imactors and the bus.

Like you the scientist placing the sensor the was a level one and I found that hitting within 3-4 KM with most of the impactors got more than enough science to fulfill the contract.