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The Elcano Challenge: Ground-Based Circumnavigation (4th)


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10 hours ago, king of nowhere said:

I propose, since adding a new leaderboard for all modded planets would be highly impractical, to simply add another category, like "modded planet circumnavigators", or maybe "hexoplanet circumnavigators".

I have given some thought to this, and haven’t decided exactly how to handle it.  In addition to planets from mods, I suspect KSP2 may also have additional planets and moons.

Right now, I do think that adding a single leaderboard for all planets or moons com mods is probably the most practical way to go.   The reason this challenge has never had leaderboards for mod planets is because it would be difficult to keep track of them all.  I can tell that you understand that issue.

Anyway, I do like your suggestion, and have been thinking along the same lines myself.  I will try to ping you when I get something implemented.

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Video's out. The commentary and mic quality are pretty terrible, as it's my first serious attempt at making a video, but I think it turned out somewhat decent. I did find a few ways to improve things that I'll definitely utilize in future uploads.

 

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1 hour ago, Jack Joseph Kerman said:

Video's out.

OMG!!!  That was truly awesome!!!  Yes, I’m a little biased.  But wow!   Fantastic video!  Just wow!!!

As they say, I laughed.  I cried.  And then I saw the movie.   Just kidding.  I’ve never done video.  That was awesome!  In case you’re not sure if I liked it or not, THAT WAS AWESOME!!!

Thank you @Jack Joseph Kerman!

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42 minutes ago, 18Watt said:

OMG!!!  That was truly awesome!!!  Yes, I’m a little biased.  But wow!   Fantastic video!  Just wow!!!

Thanks for the feedback! I’m still pretty new to video editing, so putting it together took about a week or so once I got going on it. Hopefully I’ll get a little better at it as time goes on, especially in the commentary aspect; I thought my commentary was kind of monotone if I’m honest.

I’m also thinking of making shorter videos explaining obscure astronomy/ space exploration topics in the future.

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10 hours ago, Jack Joseph Kerman said:

Video's out. The commentary and mic quality are pretty terrible, as it's my first serious attempt at making a video, but I think it turned out somewhat decent. I did find a few ways to improve things that I'll definitely utilize in future uploads.

 

really nice technical achievement

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7 hours ago, Jack Joseph Kerman said:

it's my first serious attempt at making a video

For a first serious attempt it's a great success! I watched it twice from start to finish with a big smile :cool:

4 hours ago, Jack Joseph Kerman said:

putting it together took about a week or so

Yep, editing videos is very time consuming... I never managed to find a proper rhythm and am never satisfied with the result. But it's definitely better than screenshots!

I never tire of rereading/reviewing our adventures "together" and I hope they will continue for a long time! You've given me a new taste for life with all this. I'm serious, you are great people ! TY! @18Watt @Jack Joseph Kerman @damerell ;)

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We had to find a way! :D

We couldn't stay there forever without being able to drive at night! (Stock)
So, once again, here is an "unexpected" rover:
Aka "Eyestalk"

?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Lett

I love my rovers for this challenge : they are so ugly ;)

It had to be tested in the most beautiful way, on my favourite CB : Mun ! oh Yeah !

Spoiler

(After providing a satisfactory network of 6 relays for a good Kerbnet access in this new game) Let's go

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Don't ask why but i had better rocket control without fairing...

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Landed on the night side to split my night driving into 2 phases.

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Circumnavigation :

Spoiler

Starting Day 6, 5h 44 at 0°43 N ; 82°43 W

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Forgot to plant a flag... the target will be the empty tank that I leave on the ground

Video of the night session n°1 (Bad routing...)

Sun rising, canyon

Day session, jumps, fails

All markers at 30 minutes interval (kal 1800s looped) / So here is 2hours :

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My daytime driving was really fast, I just lost time fixing some wheels and over-braking  for a couple of craters.

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4h, more than halfway, but a big night session is coming

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New PB for the Mun: 75,5m/s no damage

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5h30, already at night, no more direct routing, only kerbnet help a bit. I was 90% of the time between 0.5°N and 0.5°S but sometimes I made detours up to 3° from the equator

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This 2nd night session is endless, I lose a bit of rhythm at the end... 7h :

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Finally we are getting closer!

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8h, only some km left

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only 12 kits left! I have repaired 10 wheels :)  I really had no luck with the terrain elements (rocks and craters Breaking Ground) --> I crashed at least six times, with systematically broken wheels.

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Crossed 82°43W Day 8 ; 1h 59

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Circumnavigation done in 8h15min IGT, 42.3 m/s raw average speed (1257km) !

That was a really decent run, this one should be much much harder to bring down. No major technical improvement seems possible, it's all about routing, piloting and knowing your rover. :cool: You will need to attack attack attack !! :D

PS : I love the Mun ! :heart_eyes:

Edited by Pouicpouic
ad PB ^^
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On 8/19/2022 at 11:11 PM, Jack Joseph Kerman said:

Average speed: 170.8 m/s

On 8/26/2022 at 12:23 PM, Pouicpouic said:

Raw average 3770km : 174.5m/s

My apologies for these errors... You have to tell me when I am wrong!

There was a conversion error in my spreadsheet: division by 84600 instead of 86400... I am so stupid, sorry.

So here is the updated version for Kerbin :

fal6iLn.png

*Estimated times from your screenshots --> if you can get a more accurate value I will update.

A recap for the Mun? Yaya :

VHVomNF.png

(Sorted here by time and not by date)

@18Watt : I know that these "speedruns" are against the spirit of the main challenge, so, if you want I can create a new topic instead of posting here?  I don't want it to bother you, and I don't want it to repel newcomers. Just tell me.

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Two more leaderboard additions!  Congratulations to @damerell and @king of nowhere, for completing circumnavigations of Duna and Hale!  I struggled to deal with Gilly's low gravity, but at least I only had to do it once- A few of the OPM bodies @king of nowhere has navigated are every bit as challenging as Gilly, and harder to reach!

If anyone is curious about the speeds required to stay in daylight around each CB, check out @damerell's post- in one of his Duna entries he has a table which should give you a good idea what speed that would require.

On 9/11/2022 at 7:23 PM, damerell said:

It's late here so I literally braked to a stop and quit; Ike will have to wait.

I've said that myself after almost every Elcano I did!

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Our weary travellers. They even got tired of Mint Ice-cream after a while (they will have a discussion with Jeb about the proper selection of supplies for a Minmus mission when they return. Luckily for Jeb, he has scheduled their pickup by the Mun / Minmus / Kerbol XP gaining mission and it will take them some time to get back)

PN6Kmae.jpg

Hopefully, I've done enough to qualify for completing the challenge (Modded) on Minmus. I even managed to visit every biome to record science for a future Mobile Processing Lab to analysis, which is why I initially landed at the South Pole (and saw the strangeness that lies there). I recorded most of it on video, there's about 3 degrees of longitude that I lost, but it was a very boring zigzag up a hill to reach the Highland biome and I cut out most of the times I crashed and reverted (there weren't that many times). Hopefully this is judged as acceptable.

This is a Modded attempt as I used the KER, Scansat and NavHud Renewed for helping me navigate and I have Restock and Restock Plus of which I believe I only used one part (a longer 0.625m fuel tank than the Oscar B) and the KER chip part, but as I was testing the rover for use on a future Duna / Ike mission in my current career mode game, I wasn't going to change it (which is why it has parachutes and an atmospheric analyser if anybody was wondering).

I added waypoints after the fact to make the route clearer on the map view as the flags where a bit difficult to see.

Spoiler

From the South pole, up to the equator on the left then Eastward across the Greater Flats and to the Highlands.

s0DIXuf.jpg

From the Highlands to the Lesser flats stopping off at the debris of an old mission (and finding a couple of repair kits)

b4wfOWp.jpg

Across the South of the Great Flats, to join up with the journey from the South pole and back to the equator.

kUSQhzA.jpg

Things I learnt:

  • The poles are to be avoided
  • Minmus's lowlands aren't (low that is, in fact they're quite high)
  • KSP wheels have no traction on low gravity worlds.
  • Parallax 2 scatter colliders are not a good idea when using a rover for long distances, or medium distances, or even short distances.
  • As I found from my long drive on the Mun, the Scansat, KER and NavHud Renewed mods are really helpful for navigation and not ending up tumbling down a hill at break neck (and break rover) speeds.
  • I might just have forgotten how time consuming this is by the time that the Duna transfer window opens and I get the rover there.
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On 9/18/2022 at 11:03 PM, Robin Patenall said:

KSP wheels have no traction on low gravity worlds.

Nor do KSPWheel (Kerbal Foundries) wheels - and, to be fair, this is one of the few respects in which the stock wheels behave as one might realistically expect. :-)

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  • 2 weeks later...

Congratulations to @Robin Patenall, who recently completed a Minmus Elcano run!  Sorry it took so long to get you on the leaderboard Robin, I got behind in checking this challenge.  And nice run!

On 9/18/2022 at 5:03 PM, Robin Patenall said:

The poles are to be avoided

Yes.

 

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On 9/1/2022 at 8:53 PM, Pouicpouic said:

?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Lett

I've lost my mind.

screenshot80.png

Spoiler

This beauty can go up to 53 m/s, draining a lot of EC (which the RTGs sadly can't produce fast enough).

 

EDIT: removing two-thirds of the wheels and doubling the amount of RTGs "fixed" the issue. But it's not fast enough.

Now I have multiplied the number of wheels by 1.5: works just fine.

EDIT 2: without drag, max speed of about 56 m/s.

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Tested the new version on Kerbin and Minmus. After lowering the CoM it handles very well, and can reach 55 m/s and turn *nicely* on Minmus (turning is a bit weird though.)

But the R.A.P.I.E.R I used to lower the CoM exploded, by colliding a "collider" (according to the F3 menu). So I reused my old idea of bumper plates to shield the R.A.P.I.E.R (and the RTGs as well) from collisions.

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Started Minmus Elkano today, currently on the great flats at 57.2 m/s
Kerbin rises over the horizon
And all around the rover, are only the minty flats of Minmus

I'm recording the whole thing, but stupidely deleted the launch and the journey to Minmus, as well as the landing :(

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