THE 3,333 METERS OF DELTA V CHALLENGE

[Dr. Kerbal]

THE 3,333 Meters of Delta V Challenge

   

  Welcome to the 3,333 meters of Delta V challenge. Im Dr. Kerbal and this is my third challenge I have submitted to the KSP community. In this challenge you are directed to build a craft in the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) or the Space Plane Hanger (SPH) with 3,333 meters of delta v or less. How far can you go? To the Mun? Duna? Eve? There are no weight limits on the craft or any size constraints. However you may not use any modded parts. Please use stock Kerbal Space Program parts (any parts from DLCs such as Making History and Breaking Ground are allowed). In the following paragraphs I will state and clarify more rules to make this challenge easier to participate in.

  You may ask, how do we calculate the Delta V. The delta v for each craft varies depending on each plant and space above a certain celestial body. Well, if you are reading this paragraph thank you. I will now list all the requirements and calculation of delta v. As I stated in the first paragraph your craft has to have 3,333 meters of delta v or less. However it needs to have 3,333 meters of delta v or less on Kerbin sea level. So on the launch pad or runway the Delta V readout must be 3,333 meters of delta V or less. Even if your craft has 4,567 meter of delta v in orbit above Kerbin but has 3,333 meters of delta v or less on the ground (Kerbin Sea Level) you are not breaking the rules. To sum it all up as long as your craft has 3,333 meters of delta v or less on sea level your craft is not breaking the rules.

   Propellers are very useful for flying in Kerbal Space Program. Please use stock propellers on your craft though. You may use a propeller whether electric or powered by fuel. However I would like to put some restraints on the electrical propellers. Since electric propellers can rechange using electricity this breaks the 3,333 meters of delta v challenge and purpose. I will allow propellers in the challenge however they can only be used 1,200 meters over sea level. This means you can use propellers under the altitude of 1,200 meters of delta v above sea level on any planet or moon. Once crossing the 1,200 meter line you have to drop and terminate your propellers. Weather decoupling them or destroying them. 

  Since some people may ask about Ion engines and that they have unlimited fuel they don't. They need electricity and XENON GAS which is limited. So I will allow Ion Engines.

  Since you could propel yourself with tires, magneto boom, or robotic parts and create trust you could theoretically go up or create thrust. I will not allow these items to be used as trust to reach your destination. You may use these parts for experiments or rovers to explore your destination.

  Yes, you may bring science experiments on the challenge. May sure they don't serve any use for trust for your craft.

   You may not use Kraken Drives. Because Kraken Drives can give almost infinite range it goes against the 3,333 meters of Delta V challenge. So please no Kraken Drives or exploiting glitches. 

   No use of the cheat menu. Accessing the chat menu could give you infinite fuel or hacking the gravity. Please don't use these things. No cheat menu. 

  Like though you may use colliding into terrain to get rid of excessive waste. Like in Stratzenblitz75’s submission by gaining more delta v by getting excess mass. But for those who don't want to do that you have decouplers used to stage your rocket.

  You may use gravity assist off of any planet or moon. I will allow this and you can make unlimited gravity assists if you want.

  When it comes to mods there are some that enhance a ship and some that add planets and some that are shaders. I will only allow mods that enhance gameplay, shaders, Kerbal engineer, and the Outer Planets Mod.  No Hyper Edit or anything related.

  You may not bring any way for refueling a ship. This means no ore tanks, drills (unless for science), and converter-trons.  And also no cargo. 1.11 has allowed players to attach small fuel tanks to crafts. So you may not be building in space.

  You may not dock with space stations or other ships to refuel. Actually no docking at all. No orbital assembly either. You may only submit on craft. However if you are attempting an Apollo style landing you may dock with the lander and ship only. Nothing else.

  You may not spouse RCS trusters because people might use it to cheat DV read outs.

 You can use Kerbals or Probes.

  Those are the rules listed above in the 13 paragraphs. Now I will list the 5 rankings. 

 

• Awesome! You made it to the Kerbin orbit, Mun, or Minmus and returned safely. 

• The Kerbal Award of Cheapness! You made it to Duna, Eve, Ike, or Gilly and made it back safely.

• The Von Kerman Award! You made it to Moho or Dres and made it back safely.

• In The Name of the Kraken! You made it to Jool or beyond and returned the crew/probe safely!

• Impress Me! Impress me with a crazy mission by following this challenge. 

• In Space of 3333: Launch a vessel with 3,333m/dv or less mesuered in a vacuum 

 

List of participants, crafts names, and rankings:

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Edited May 24, 2021 by Dr. Kerbal
More rules, more clarification, better challenge. For all of Kerbal kind!

[paul_c]

This challenge becomes trivial if you (or if the editor.....) deliberately messes up the staging sequence as built; but then you correct it or manually decouple and/or activate engines on the flight.

[paul_c]

.......Or if you (need to) have an engine start out with 0% thrust. Its basically, that the editor/KSP doesn't know what flying controls/decisions are going to be made in the future, so its indication of deltaV at the launch site or in the editor is at best, approximate!

To illustrate:

Don't let me put you (or others) off though, its a great idea for a challenge.....its just that the way KSP determines delta V once the rocket (staging or engines) become a bit more involved, is flawed. So its difficult to make a level playing field there.

[Dr. Kerbal]

1 hour ago, paul_c said:

.......Or if you (need to) have an engine start out with 0% thrust. Its basically, that the editor/KSP doesn't know what flying controls/decisions are going to be made in the future, so its indication of deltaV at the launch site or in the editor is at best, approximate!

To illustrate:

Don't let me put you (or others) off though, its a great idea for a challenge.....its just that the way KSP determines delta V once the rocket (staging or engines) become a bit more involved, is flawed. So its difficult to make a level playing field there.

Thanks. I know this because I play the console version and it really flawed or even worse sometimes with the DV measurements. That I why said that in the launchpad the craft has to have 3,333 DV or less. Because of the DV miscalculation.  There isn’t much I can do about this. I could suggest this to the developers for better calculations.

[paul_c]

I was thinking about how it could be worked-around to keep the challenge on. The best I can do, is to suggest that if eg a staging is unusual and manually controlled, its set up as best it can be in the VAB (so it reports the as-near-best figure). Similarly with engines, if they are activated or thrust altered manually, a "measurement" calculation is made where its staged/activated/thrust 100%. That way, although not 100% accurate, the deltaV figure on the launchpad is more representative.

Also, there can be a difference between the VAB figure ASL and the launchpad figure (because the launchpad is +68m)

[The Blazer]

I got a question: for the Von Braun award, is it ‘Moho and Dres’ or ‘Moho or Dres’?

[Souptime]

Alright, imma get to designing!

[Souptime]

17 hours ago, Dr. Kerbal said:

In The Name of the Kraken! You made it to Jool and beyond and returned the crew safely!

Does it specifically need crew for this tier?

[Dr. Kerbal]

2 hours ago, Souptime said:

Does it specifically need crew for this tier?

No to does not, I should probably clarify that more.

7 hours ago, The Blazer said:

I got a question: for the Von Braun award, is it ‘Moho and Dres’ or ‘Moho or Dres’?

Or. Sorry. I’m going through for clarification.

[Superfluous J]

5 hours ago, Souptime said:

Does it specifically need crew

A huge ship with crew and living quarters with 3,000m/s dV will get exactly as far as a tiny little optimized probe with 3,000m/s dV.

[The Blazer]

1 hour ago, Superfluous J said:

A huge ship with crew and living quarters with 3,000m/s dV will get exactly as far as a tiny little optimized probe with 3,000m/s dV.

Yes, 3000 is almost the minimum limit to reach LKO, true. But the challenge demands 3333 ms deltaV on the launchpad, at sea level. And remember that many engines increase their ISP at high altitude/vacuum. The Nerv and the Ion, for example, they suuuuuuck at sea level and look at how good they are in space.

[Dr. Kerbal]

32 minutes ago, The Blazer said:

Yes, 3000 is almost the minimum limit to reach LKO, true. But the challenge demands 3333 ms deltaV on the launchpad, at sea level. And remember that many engines increase their ISP at high altitude/vacuum. The Nerv and the Ion, for example, they suuuuuuck at sea level and look at how good they are in space.

Yes! This was the point of the challenge to think and go around seem to be high obstacles but really it isn't all that hard.

[Superfluous J]

1 hour ago, The Blazer said:

The Nerv and the Ion, for example, they suuuuuuck at sea level and look at how good they are in space.

And 100 NERVAs pushing your luxury space yacht with 3333 m/s on the pad will go as far as a small 3333 m/s probe with 1 NERVA.

Granted the probe is easier to build...

[The Blazer]

7 hours ago, Superfluous J said:

And 100 NERVAs pushing your luxury space yacht with 3333 m/s on the pad will go as far as a small 3333 m/s probe with 1 NERVA.

Granted the probe is easier to build...

A. I never said I was going to build a “luxury space yacht”.

B. That depends. Yes, if you use 1000 nervs on the space yacht, it is true. However, the yacht is probably heavier than the little probe, so you might want to use more powerful engines to lift it off the pad, once again because the Nerv sucks at sea level, let’s say Aerospikes for example, those engines will give you far less deltaV in Orbit, than the Nerv only probe.

[Souptime]

oh boy this is gonna take a while with what im doing...

[Dr. Kerbal]

On 2/1/2021 at 11:58 PM, The Blazer said:

I got a question: for the Von Braun award, is it ‘Moho and Dres’ or ‘Moho or Dres’?

the or

[camacju]

Will I get extra points if I use 3333 vacuum delta-v instead of sea level delta-v?

[Dr. Kerbal]

Just now, camacju said:

Will I get extra points if I use 3333 vacuum delta-v instead of sea level delta-v?

Yes. I should of clarified that. 

[camacju]

Do you have to land at the destination or is a flyby okay?

[Dr. Kerbal]

1 hour ago, camacju said:

Do you have to land at the destination or is a flyby okay?

Landing on the destination is preferred.