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

[Ianwubby]

Okay so I was closer to the end than I realized, just took another 5 and a half hours of driving, and I've finished my first Elcano! Completed in 68 hours and 40 minutes.

Now to make the timelapse-

[damerell]

Well done. I suspect next month I'll be scoring this one.

[Alex Verb]

On 9/28/2023 at 3:05 AM, Ianwubby said:

Now to make the timelapse-

Record whole video than scale in video editor. It takes much space. Good luck!

[damerell]

Well, I said I should probably start Elcano (5th) if 18Watt remains vanished. Thoughts on the rules - which I strongly welcome input on.

"Mark your start location.  Flags, KerbNet markers, or screenshots work.  Some mods allow you to track your path as well." "Document your journey via images or video, or as those of us who have managed to complete this challenge have done, accompanied by a description of the journey." could be merged into one rule - "Document your start location and journey - flags, Kerbnet markers, screenshots, and mod parts like the ScanSAT Been There Done That all work well - and post images, video, and perhaps written descriptions to the thread".

Add "The start location does not need to be on or near the Equator."

"Brief jumps" has been in there since Elcano 1. How brief is "brief"? (It's pretty hard to make a brief jump on Gilly...)

"Thrust devices (rockets, jets, props, RCS) are acceptable, as long as they are only used while in contact with the surface". This is 18Watt's new rule, although in practice 18Watt allowed upward-firing engines to control trajectory. We could:

• retain 18Watt's rule
• allow RCS (etc) rotation, but not intentional translation (of course, this is on the honour system, but what isn't about Elcano?)
• allow thrust to slow down or provide downforce when not touching the ground, but not to speed up or provide lift. (I would prefer this option).
• additionally, stipulate that on atmospheric worlds, the rover must not have significant aerodynamic lift - no gliders.

"Using an autopilot goes against the spirit of this challenge." I personally would allow, at sea, the use of a tool like Mechjeb to hold a course. (Not to steer towards a specific point - just to "steer 275 degrees"). RSS Earth was interminable (and Laythe pretty dull) and with KSP's dead-flat oceans I don't really see much benefit to requiring someone to sit at the keyboard and press A every twenty minutes.

Finally, unawarded circumnavigations I'm aware of (which I have not yet checked for rules compliance [1]):

Me (RSS Earth). King of Nowhere (OPM Tal, Whirligig 2-Wolda and Jifgif). RoninFrog (Kerbin, Minmus, Gilly). AlexVerb (Kerbin). Ianwubby (Kerbin, underwater).

[1] if anything does change from Elcano 4, I'd approve anything that meets the old or new rules.

[king of nowhere]

On 10/22/2023 at 9:41 PM, damerell said:

"Brief jumps" has been in there since Elcano 1. How brief is "brief"? (It's pretty hard to make a brief jump on Gilly...)

 

I would say, as long as your propulsion is entirely based on wheels, every jump is ok.

Quote

 

"Thrust devices (rockets, jets, props, RCS) are acceptable, as long as they are only used while in contact with the surface". This is 18Watt's new rule, although in practice 18Watt allowed upward-firing engines to control trajectory. We could:

• retain 18Watt's rule
• allow RCS (etc) rotation, but not intentional translation (of course, this is on the honour system, but what isn't about Elcano?)
• allow thrust to slow down or provide downforce when not touching the ground, but not to speed up or provide lift. (I would prefer this option).
• additionally, stipulate that on atmospheric worlds, the rover must not have significant aerodynamic lift - no gliders.

Here it comes to the challenge-holder discretion. Too many individual cases to cover all with hard rules.

I would sum it up with  "rockets are allowed to help wheel propulsion, but their use must be limited in scope". That is, want to have backwards-pointing rockets to help climb steep slopes? acceptable. downward-pointing rockets to cushion the fall when you fall down a crater? fine. downward-pointing rockets to keep you glued to the ground in low gravity world? ok. Because in all those cases your method of locomotion are the wheels, and the rockets are only providing some minor extra utility. I think we can all understand the difference between that, and taking a suborbital jump. but there will always be edge cases, that will have to be evaluated individually.

this is more or less consistent with your preferred option, except your preferred option would disqualify using of rockets to go uphill. 

would doing this be so bad? (notice the inclination of the slope on the navball, and compare the speed with the orbital speed for vall)

 

 

regarding propellers, a second rule could be "on atmospheric worlds, propellers can be used to provide the main thrust, provided the vehicle stays on the ground". atmispheric worlds have too much gravity for that to create issues with suborbital jumps anyway.

[damerell]

Well, I just posted Elcano (5th), but I think what I've written - "Any use of thrust devices (rockets, jets, props, RCS) is acceptable while in contact with the surface. When you are in the air, you may use thrust devices to slow down or to apply downforce, but not to speed up or apply lift" - permits rocket thrust up slopes as long as you're touching the ground. Of course, that's not to be applied with ironbound rigour - if you bounce over the top of the slope with the rockets on, or whatever, you're not disqualified. Likewise, I think it's completely fine to use propellers as long as you're on the ground.

[RoninFrog]

On 10/22/2023 at 12:41 PM, damerell said:

I personally would allow, at sea, the use of a tool like Mechjeb to hold a course.

I feel like part of the challenge is designing a rover to be stable enough on water to hold a course through SAS without needing MechJeb.  I'm fairly certain even an unwieldly rover such as the one I used in my Kerbin navigation can be configured through clever use of control points and SAS holdings to be stable without MechJeb.

The main reason I dislike adding MechJeb is there may not be a theoretical limit to the speed of the rover.  The only reason my Kerbin rover was not able to exceed sustained speeds of above 150m/s was the limitations of SAS.  If MechJeb can make full use of the reaction wheels and control surfaces, especially if it can control robotic hinge angles, I fully expect rovers to be able to easily clear 300+m/s which really detracts from the scale of a circumnavigation.

[damerell]

On 10/31/2023 at 11:52 PM, RoninFrog said:

The main reason I dislike adding MechJeb is there may not be a theoretical limit to the speed of the rover.  The only reason my Kerbin rover was not able to exceed sustained speeds of above 150m/s was the limitations of SAS.  If MechJeb can make full use of the reaction wheels and control surfaces, especially if it can control robotic hinge angles, I fully expect rovers to be able to easily clear 300+m/s which really detracts from the scale of a circumnavigation.

I fear that ship has sailed (aha) - within 18Watt's rules I was able to get the FARboat I used for RSS Earth to do over 280 m/s, and it was limited by stability, not engine thrust - with a little more design time I'm sure it would be possible to beat 300 m/s.

But also, there seem to be two orthogonal issues here - whether it's OK to use MechJeb to make an extremely fast boat controllable (which no edition of the challenge has sought to restrict) isn't really related to whether it's OK to use MechJeb to steer a course for hours.

Edited November 2, 2023 by damerell

[damerell]

On 9/28/2023 at 1:05 AM, Ianwubby said:

Okay so I was closer to the end than I realized, just took another 5 and a half hours of driving, and I've finished my first Elcano! Completed in 68 hours and 40 minutes.

Now to make the timelapse-

I'll wait on that before scoring this one.

[18Watt]

Howdy Elcanoers!

First, I apologize for my absence.  My life has been unusually busy for the past 6 months or so.  It looks like that is going to continue for me, for a while at least.

I'm extremely grateful to @damerell for stepping up, and offering to host this challenge.  As you all know, Elcano is my favorite KSP challenge.  @damerell volunteering to tackle the challenge hosting duties is a bold, brave move- it's not as easy as it looks!  It's difficult to fully express my gratitude for someone assuming the challenge hosting duties.

I fully support the move to the 5th iteration of the Elcano challenge, and am also grateful for the support you all have given @damerell.  Y'all are some of the politest, most respectful, and most dedicated KSP players out there.  I'm glad everyone is giving @damerell the support and feedback that you gave me while I was hosting this challenge.  I assure you that we both appreciate it, it means a lot.

One last note.  One thing I've enjoyed about hosting this challenge is discussing rule issues with everyone, sometimes questions arise.  "Can I do this?"  In the end, a ruling has to be made, and it may not be the decision you were hoping for.  While I was caretaker of Elcano, I made some rulings which were perhaps disappointing to a few players.  However, in the end, the ruling was accepted, and everyone was polite about it.  I appreciated the politeness, and I know @damerell will as well.  Please keep in mind that rule discussions are highly encouraged.  However, in the end the challenge caretaker has the final say, and it's possible it won't be the decision you were hoping for.

The caretaker for Elcano is now @damerell.  Good luck!  And may your rover explosions be few, and only occur immediately after a successful quick save!

Here's a link to the current Elcano Challenge: